And suppose we did make introductory spaces “safe” for people who believe that certain types of speech are very harmful, but somehow managed to keep norms of open discussion in other more “advanced” spaces. How would those people feel when they find out that they can’t participate in the more advanced spaces without the risk of paying a high subjective cost (i.e., encountering speech that they find intolerable)? Won’t many of them think that the EA community has performed a bait-and-switch on them and potentially become hostile to EA? Have people who have proposed this type of solution actually thought things through?
I think it’s important to make EA as welcoming as possible to all people, but not by compromising in the direction of safetyism, as I don’t see any way that doesn’t end up causing more harm than good in the long run.
And suppose we did make introductory spaces “safe” for people who believe that certain types of speech are very harmful, but somehow managed to keep norms of open discussion in other more “advanced” spaces. How would those people feel when they find out that they can’t participate in the more advanced spaces without the risk of paying a high subjective cost (i.e., encountering speech that they find intolerable)? Won’t many of them think that the EA community has performed a bait-and-switch on them and potentially become hostile to EA? Have people who have proposed this type of solution actually thought things through?
I think it’s important to make EA as welcoming as possible to all people, but not by compromising in the direction of safetyism, as I don’t see any way that doesn’t end up causing more harm than good in the long run.