Yeah I just don’t think that what people are objecting to is that these beliefs are the subject of even heated disagreement. I’m not saying “disagreement is fine, as long as it’s not heated”, I’m saying “even heated disagreement is fine, but there’s some other distinction that makes it potentially a problem”, and while I’m not quite precise about what that other distinction is, it’s something like, is this topic directly about some of the people in the conversation, and does it implicitly or explicitly threaten the legitimacy of their presence or their contribution?
I think vaccine skepticism is an interesting example, as I do tend to think conferences shouldn’t invite vaccine skeptics. But that’s more out of a sense that vaccine skeptics in practice are grifters / dishonest (which is no coincidence, in that the genuinely curious have mostly had their curiosity satisfied). I would be very happy to see someone speak about how the new malaria vaccines aren’t effective enough to be worth it, if they had good reasons for thinking that.
I don’t think people object to these topics being heated either. I think there are probably (at least) two things going on:
There’s some underlying thing causing some disagreements to be heated/emotional, and people want to avoid that underlying thing (that could be that it involves exclusionary beliefs, but it could also be that it is harmful in other ways)
There’s a reputational risk in being associated with controversial issues, and people want to distance themselves from those for that reason
Either way, I don’t think the problem is centrally about exclusionary beliefs, and I also don’t think it’s centrally about disagreement. But anyway, it sounds like we mostly agree on the important bits.
Yeah I just don’t think that what people are objecting to is that these beliefs are the subject of even heated disagreement. I’m not saying “disagreement is fine, as long as it’s not heated”, I’m saying “even heated disagreement is fine, but there’s some other distinction that makes it potentially a problem”, and while I’m not quite precise about what that other distinction is, it’s something like, is this topic directly about some of the people in the conversation, and does it implicitly or explicitly threaten the legitimacy of their presence or their contribution?
I think vaccine skepticism is an interesting example, as I do tend to think conferences shouldn’t invite vaccine skeptics. But that’s more out of a sense that vaccine skeptics in practice are grifters / dishonest (which is no coincidence, in that the genuinely curious have mostly had their curiosity satisfied). I would be very happy to see someone speak about how the new malaria vaccines aren’t effective enough to be worth it, if they had good reasons for thinking that.
I don’t think people object to these topics being heated either. I think there are probably (at least) two things going on:
There’s some underlying thing causing some disagreements to be heated/emotional, and people want to avoid that underlying thing (that could be that it involves exclusionary beliefs, but it could also be that it is harmful in other ways)
There’s a reputational risk in being associated with controversial issues, and people want to distance themselves from those for that reason
Either way, I don’t think the problem is centrally about exclusionary beliefs, and I also don’t think it’s centrally about disagreement. But anyway, it sounds like we mostly agree on the important bits.