“Basically no one took this seriously as a possibility, or at least I do not know of anyone.”
I alluded to this over a year ago in this comment, which might count in your book as taking it seriously. But to be honest, where we are at in Day 100 of this administration is not the territory I expected us to be in until at least the 2nd year.
I think these people do exist (those that appreciated the second term for the risks it presented) and I’ll count myself as one of them. I think we are just less visible because we push this concern a lot less in the EA discourse than other topics because 1) the people with these viewpoints and are willing to be vocal about it are a small minority of EA*, 2) espousing these views is perceived as a way to lose social capital, and 3) EA institutions have made decisions that have somewhat gatekeeped how much of this discourse can take place in EA official venues.
Note on #1
A lot of potential EAs—people who embrace EA principles and come to the conclusion that the way to do the most good is work on democracy/political systems/politics of Great Powers—interact with the community, are offput by the little engagement and, sometimes, dismissiveness of the community towards this cause area, and then decide that rather than fight the uphill battle of moving the Overton window they will instead retreat back to other communities more aligned with their conclusions.
This characterized my own relationship with EA. Despite knowing and resonating with EA since 2013/2014, I did not engage deeply with the community until 2022 because there seemed to be little to no overlap with people that wanted to change the political system and address the politics upstream of the policies EA spend so much time thinking how to influence. I think this space is still small in EA but is garnering more interest and will only do so because I think we are at the beginning and not the end of this moment in history.
Note on #1 and #2
When I talk with EAs one-on-one, a substantial portion share my views that EA negelects politics of the world’s superpower and the political system upstream of those politics. However, very few act on these beliefs or take much time to vocalize them. I think people underestimate how much people share this sentiment, which only makes it less likely for people to speak out (which of course, leads back to people underestimating the prevalence of the belief).
Note on #3
CEA has once allowed me to speak once on the topic of risks to the US system at an EAGxVirtual—kudos where it is due. However, I’ve have inquired multiple times with CEA since 2022 about running such an event at an actual EAG and have always been declined; I think this is clear area of improvement. I’d also like to see networking meetups for people interested in this area at the EAGs themselves instead of people resorting to personally organizing satellite events around them; recently there was indication CEA was open to this.
On the Forum, posts in and around this topic can, and sometimes do, get marked as community posts and thus lose visibility. This is not to say it happens all the time. There are posts that make it to the main page that others would want to see moved to community.
“Basically no one took this seriously as a possibility, or at least I do not know of anyone.”
I alluded to this over a year ago in this comment, which might count in your book as taking it seriously. But to be honest, where we are at in Day 100 of this administration is not the territory I expected us to be in until at least the 2nd year.
I think these people do exist (those that appreciated the second term for the risks it presented) and I’ll count myself as one of them. I think we are just less visible because we push this concern a lot less in the EA discourse than other topics because 1) the people with these viewpoints and are willing to be vocal about it are a small minority of EA*, 2) espousing these views is perceived as a way to lose social capital, and 3) EA institutions have made decisions that have somewhat gatekeeped how much of this discourse can take place in EA official venues.
Note on #1
A lot of potential EAs—people who embrace EA principles and come to the conclusion that the way to do the most good is work on democracy/political systems/politics of Great Powers—interact with the community, are offput by the little engagement and, sometimes, dismissiveness of the community towards this cause area, and then decide that rather than fight the uphill battle of moving the Overton window they will instead retreat back to other communities more aligned with their conclusions.
This characterized my own relationship with EA. Despite knowing and resonating with EA since 2013/2014, I did not engage deeply with the community until 2022 because there seemed to be little to no overlap with people that wanted to change the political system and address the politics upstream of the policies EA spend so much time thinking how to influence. I think this space is still small in EA but is garnering more interest and will only do so because I think we are at the beginning and not the end of this moment in history.
Note on #1 and #2
When I talk with EAs one-on-one, a substantial portion share my views that EA negelects politics of the world’s superpower and the political system upstream of those politics. However, very few act on these beliefs or take much time to vocalize them. I think people underestimate how much people share this sentiment, which only makes it less likely for people to speak out (which of course, leads back to people underestimating the prevalence of the belief).
Note on #3
CEA has once allowed me to speak once on the topic of risks to the US system at an EAGxVirtual—kudos where it is due. However, I’ve have inquired multiple times with CEA since 2022 about running such an event at an actual EAG and have always been declined; I think this is clear area of improvement. I’d also like to see networking meetups for people interested in this area at the EAGs themselves instead of people resorting to personally organizing satellite events around them; recently there was indication CEA was open to this.
On the Forum, posts in and around this topic can, and sometimes do, get marked as community posts and thus lose visibility. This is not to say it happens all the time. There are posts that make it to the main page that others would want to see moved to community.