The Bugbear Dispatch

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The Bugbear Dispatch
The Bugbear Dispatch
Leaving Substack and Other Thoughts on Cutting Ties with Old Affiliations

Leaving Substack and Other Thoughts on Cutting Ties with Old Affiliations

Chrissy Stroop's avatar
Chrissy Stroop
Aug 09, 2025
∙ Paid
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The Bugbear Dispatch
The Bugbear Dispatch
Leaving Substack and Other Thoughts on Cutting Ties with Old Affiliations
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The Bugbear Dispatch is, as of today, two years old! I want to thank all of you who have been with me for some or all of that time, and I hope the newsletter will have a bright future.

One thing I’m announcing today is that the future of this newsletter will not be with Substack. Once I get set up at a better alternative, probably Ghost, I will announce a belated two-year anniversary sale. This may take me a couple of weeks yet, and the publication schedule may remind a little behind and irregular until I get the details sorted out. I’m sorry about that.

I participated in the original “Substackers Against Nazis” campaign, which did not require participants to leave but was meant to put pressure on the owners of this site to stop funding Nazis and other violent white supremacists. The campaign failed to change the site’s approach, but many good people, including marginalized and specifically trans writers, stayed. At the time, I reasoned that I did not want to let Nazis push us off of every platform. I was reeling from the loss of Twitter and my weekly column for openDemocracy, and also afraid of the risk of losing any income from making a switch at a time when my finances were somewhat precarious. Sadly, they still are/

A glass sign lit up with red light illuminating the letters "E-X-I-T" on a dark black background. It almost looks as if the exit sign is imply floating in a black void.
Photo by Wesley Tingey, vis Unsplash. Cropped by The Bugbear Dispatch.

This is a smaller newsletter (and a one-person operation), bringing in about $17,000 annually at the moment. Today, despite the intimidating prospect of moving (exacerbated by the fact that my depression has been pretty bad of late), I can no longer justify staying on this platform. Not after the literal Nazi push notification “mistake.” This platform is sick, and its “free speech absolutism” is a sick ideology. I never blinded myself to that, but, recognizing that total purity on the internet and under capitalism is impossible, I stayed. At this point, however, I feel compelled to move on. I probably should have found the energy and resolve to prioritize doing it earlier. More information will be forthcoming soon on how I’ll complete my exit from this platform.

The Bugbear Dispatch exists thanks to the financial support of readers like you. This is a paid post; if you like what you’re reading and can afford to, please become a paid subscriber!

Further Thoughts on Cutting Ties and Letting go

Thinking of things I should have done earlier, last week I did something that I honestly should have done a long time ago. I wasn’t actively putting off doing the thing; I honestly hadn’t thought about it in a long time. Specifically, I needed to cut what was at this point an on-paper only tie, but one that nevertheless sent the wrong message to anyone who might have noticed?

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