Thank you for your reply and questions. As stated at the beginning my post—it was bit of a rant, but still I probably used too much of hyperboles and you point out them well.
So please let me clarify / answer your last paragraph:
If you believe that writing and posting on the EA forum equates to considering a topic one’s focus, then I genuinely ask: what moral calculus justifies your own response? I personally don’t hold the view that writing a forum post is equivalent to prioritizing its topic over any other.
If it was just a forum post I wouldn’t have reacted like that. I consider “working on a statement for the past few weeks” (as quoted from the beginning of the OP), making a public pledge and gathering a group of signatories to sign it as something notably bigger, than just a forum post. Something that shouldn’t be used like that. Especially for applause lights (vide Duncan’s answer).
Your post on the other hand, if it follows its own logic as I understand it, indicates that you think it should be a top cause area for yourself to argue against anti-racism and anti-sexism work.
Not a top cause area (again, forum post < pledge with signatories), but something I think is somewhat important. Because IMO -isms are not going to erode this community—I would bet almost everyone here is against them, a lot of us actively. But losing EA values—good epistemic, avoiding virtue signalling and poseuring, avoiding group-think, etc. might.
I do wish that I had been more constructive in my own reply, rather than merely arguing against your arguments. I will try to remedy that here by specifically addressing why I declined an invitation to sign, despite my understanding that there are genuine problems of racism and sexism in our community and my desire to work against them.
As I led with, I am strongly ambivalent. So while it would not take much to tip me over into the belief that signing is probably net good, it would take a great deal more to assuage me that all harms of such a pledge were acknowledged and mitigated. I updated positively on Rocky’s response to Duncan, explaining the rationale of removing specific actions due to an attempt to create a generalized statement upon which groups (with varying levels of resources) could build. If there were language in the pledge that clearly addressed this, it would probably be sufficient for me to sign and cautiously endorse the pledge.
The best possible version of this proposal that I can imagine is not a pledge, but a roll call. For example, I would be completely on board if EA-NYC had finished their public DEI policy and made an announcement to the effect of: “We condemn racism and sexism, here is what we are trying to do about it. Please give us feedback and feel free to use any element of ours to establish your own policy. Once you have done so, please sign and link to your own policy, and in that way we can make a strong demonstration to those who are uncertain about the EA community’s commitment against bigotry.”
Similarly, I do think the statement as written can easily be perceived as applause lights. I think it can be (and is) completely true that many EAs’ experience is that racism and sexism are already universally condemned and that community builders regularly encounter those with uncertainty. So I am very empathetic to the perceived need to put out a statement even before specific proposals are ironed out. (Having been through the process myself, I can well imagine the “weeks” that the simple pledge above took were not actually workweeks of any individual(s), but merely the difficulty of establishing any kind of consensus around messaging). If the pledge made clear that it did not aim to reify some new commitment to anti-racism/anti-sexism and was intended primarily to be a reference of common knowledge towards which we could direct uncertain newcomers (or antagonistic journalists), that too might have been sufficient to convince me to sign.
The largest factor for me is that which Duncan addressed: the potential consequences of dividing of the relevant parties into those who did sign, and those who didn’t. I see the value in a list of names, I really do. And as I’ve said, now that the list exists, it wouldn’t take very much more to get me to sign it. But I would still prefer a world where there wasn’t one.
I model those who don’t see the possible harm as making the same (imho) mistake as those who dismiss privacy concerns with “if you don’t have anything to hide, you don’t have anything to fear.” Because who could object to declaring oneself against bigotry? I don’t really think it’s probable that anyone in EA will weaponize the division any more than I think it’s dangerous that some people post their home addresses on lists of EA couchsurfing options. I nevertheless want to support robust privacy norms, and norms against creating lists of “Right Minded” individuals.
I think the value created by the list, of demonstration of commitment, could be accomplished better by lists of actions taken (and, in EA fashion, a bunch of discussion about the best ways to measure the impact of those actions). I don’t have a suggestion on how to mitigate the potential harms of dividing people into signers and not signers (besides my most vehement exhortation to not create a list of non-signers. If the list of those invited to sign existed and clearly delineated between those who signed and those who didn’t, I would absolutely object to the entire attempt). I’m not sure if it would have been good to add language that acknowledges the possible harm, though I would appreciate it.
I do want to note that in addition to the comments above, a primary consideration for why I did not/have not yet signed the pledge is that I do not speak on behalf of any community building organization. I do community building work, and may do so in a more official capacity in the near future. I am in the early stages of establishing a role that will hopefully come to fruition; if I were currently holding that position I would have signed the pledge (to represent the stance of the organization) and voiced my objections. As it stands, I think it is valuable to speak as an individual (the only, so far as I know) invited to sign the pledge who has declined. Because although some significant part of my objection is that the existence of such a pledge could in theory be used as a weapon against those who do not sign it, in practice I do not believe the individuals who created the pledge would in fact do so.
Thank you for your reply and questions. As stated at the beginning my post—it was bit of a rant, but still I probably used too much of hyperboles and you point out them well.
So please let me clarify / answer your last paragraph:
If it was just a forum post I wouldn’t have reacted like that. I consider “working on a statement for the past few weeks” (as quoted from the beginning of the OP), making a public pledge and gathering a group of signatories to sign it as something notably bigger, than just a forum post. Something that shouldn’t be used like that. Especially for applause lights (vide Duncan’s answer).
Not a top cause area (again, forum post < pledge with signatories), but something I think is somewhat important. Because IMO -isms are not going to erode this community—I would bet almost everyone here is against them, a lot of us actively. But losing EA values—good epistemic, avoiding virtue signalling and poseuring, avoiding group-think, etc. might.
To paraphrase Does Sam make me want to renounce the actions of the EA community? No. Does your reaction? Absolutely.:
Does sexism in EA make me want to renounce the actions of the EA community? No.[1] Does this pledge? A bit.
Because it is unanimously condemned.
I do wish that I had been more constructive in my own reply, rather than merely arguing against your arguments. I will try to remedy that here by specifically addressing why I declined an invitation to sign, despite my understanding that there are genuine problems of racism and sexism in our community and my desire to work against them.
As I led with, I am strongly ambivalent. So while it would not take much to tip me over into the belief that signing is probably net good, it would take a great deal more to assuage me that all harms of such a pledge were acknowledged and mitigated. I updated positively on Rocky’s response to Duncan, explaining the rationale of removing specific actions due to an attempt to create a generalized statement upon which groups (with varying levels of resources) could build. If there were language in the pledge that clearly addressed this, it would probably be sufficient for me to sign and cautiously endorse the pledge.
The best possible version of this proposal that I can imagine is not a pledge, but a roll call. For example, I would be completely on board if EA-NYC had finished their public DEI policy and made an announcement to the effect of: “We condemn racism and sexism, here is what we are trying to do about it. Please give us feedback and feel free to use any element of ours to establish your own policy. Once you have done so, please sign and link to your own policy, and in that way we can make a strong demonstration to those who are uncertain about the EA community’s commitment against bigotry.”
Similarly, I do think the statement as written can easily be perceived as applause lights. I think it can be (and is) completely true that many EAs’ experience is that racism and sexism are already universally condemned and that community builders regularly encounter those with uncertainty. So I am very empathetic to the perceived need to put out a statement even before specific proposals are ironed out. (Having been through the process myself, I can well imagine the “weeks” that the simple pledge above took were not actually workweeks of any individual(s), but merely the difficulty of establishing any kind of consensus around messaging). If the pledge made clear that it did not aim to reify some new commitment to anti-racism/anti-sexism and was intended primarily to be a reference of common knowledge towards which we could direct uncertain newcomers (or antagonistic journalists), that too might have been sufficient to convince me to sign.
The largest factor for me is that which Duncan addressed: the potential consequences of dividing of the relevant parties into those who did sign, and those who didn’t. I see the value in a list of names, I really do. And as I’ve said, now that the list exists, it wouldn’t take very much more to get me to sign it. But I would still prefer a world where there wasn’t one.
I model those who don’t see the possible harm as making the same (imho) mistake as those who dismiss privacy concerns with “if you don’t have anything to hide, you don’t have anything to fear.” Because who could object to declaring oneself against bigotry? I don’t really think it’s probable that anyone in EA will weaponize the division any more than I think it’s dangerous that some people post their home addresses on lists of EA couchsurfing options. I nevertheless want to support robust privacy norms, and norms against creating lists of “Right Minded” individuals.
I think the value created by the list, of demonstration of commitment, could be accomplished better by lists of actions taken (and, in EA fashion, a bunch of discussion about the best ways to measure the impact of those actions). I don’t have a suggestion on how to mitigate the potential harms of dividing people into signers and not signers (besides my most vehement exhortation to not create a list of non-signers. If the list of those invited to sign existed and clearly delineated between those who signed and those who didn’t, I would absolutely object to the entire attempt). I’m not sure if it would have been good to add language that acknowledges the possible harm, though I would appreciate it.
I do want to note that in addition to the comments above, a primary consideration for why I did not/have not yet signed the pledge is that I do not speak on behalf of any community building organization. I do community building work, and may do so in a more official capacity in the near future. I am in the early stages of establishing a role that will hopefully come to fruition; if I were currently holding that position I would have signed the pledge (to represent the stance of the organization) and voiced my objections. As it stands, I think it is valuable to speak as an individual (the only, so far as I know) invited to sign the pledge who has declined. Because although some significant part of my objection is that the existence of such a pledge could in theory be used as a weapon against those who do not sign it, in practice I do not believe the individuals who created the pledge would in fact do so.