Austen, I see your point but think you have the wrong model of how social movements work. Basically any successful social movement I can think of (e.g. civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights) has had extremists who were important to the movement and has included acts of extremism that were historically important to the movement’s self-identity. More to the point, it’s impossible to know ahead of time what acts will end up considered extremist, so it’s silly to criticize an action that aligns with the movement’s values as being against the movement because of potential PR consequences, particularly when the act is non-violent and widely considered admirable. (Another way of saying all this is that effective movements are internally diverse and should be wary of self-policing).
I think you are confusing radicalism of getting attention with that of the form the social change will take. For example, Emily Davison ran onto a race track as a PR stunt, but all she was seeking was voting rights for women, not the right for them to walk around naked. Nelson Mandela was jailed for economic terrorism to bring attention to his cause, but he simply wanted blacks to enjoy the freedoms whites had – nothing radical about that. PETA does crazy publicity stunts sometimes, and perhaps they’ve had a net benefit, but they do them to bring attention to the abuse of animals on farms, mostly, not to emancipate domesticated dogs and cats. We should make a distinction between extremism in publicity measures with that of the demands that activists are making on society.
To look at EA, the demands it makes on people should also be reasonable: give according to impact, not feelings; be irreplaceable, especially for the more important causes, etc. Making unreasonably large demands on people could result in people rejecting even the easier actions. For instance, studies demonstrate that to promote veganism, it’s actually more effective to promote vegetarianism, and let the vegetarians eventually gravitate towards veganism, than it is to directly promote veganism, which results in people not even giving up meat, because avoiding animal products completely is so demanding to people that they end up rejecting the whole veg thing altogether.
Please don’t take my comments as policing, I like your post and I think donating kidneys is great, I just wouldn’t want to see a CNN segment on EA discussing kidney donation as viewers may use it as an excuse to reject EA altogether.
Austen, I see your point but think you have the wrong model of how social movements work. Basically any successful social movement I can think of (e.g. civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights) has had extremists who were important to the movement and has included acts of extremism that were historically important to the movement’s self-identity. More to the point, it’s impossible to know ahead of time what acts will end up considered extremist, so it’s silly to criticize an action that aligns with the movement’s values as being against the movement because of potential PR consequences, particularly when the act is non-violent and widely considered admirable. (Another way of saying all this is that effective movements are internally diverse and should be wary of self-policing).
I think you are confusing radicalism of getting attention with that of the form the social change will take. For example, Emily Davison ran onto a race track as a PR stunt, but all she was seeking was voting rights for women, not the right for them to walk around naked. Nelson Mandela was jailed for economic terrorism to bring attention to his cause, but he simply wanted blacks to enjoy the freedoms whites had – nothing radical about that. PETA does crazy publicity stunts sometimes, and perhaps they’ve had a net benefit, but they do them to bring attention to the abuse of animals on farms, mostly, not to emancipate domesticated dogs and cats. We should make a distinction between extremism in publicity measures with that of the demands that activists are making on society.
To look at EA, the demands it makes on people should also be reasonable: give according to impact, not feelings; be irreplaceable, especially for the more important causes, etc. Making unreasonably large demands on people could result in people rejecting even the easier actions. For instance, studies demonstrate that to promote veganism, it’s actually more effective to promote vegetarianism, and let the vegetarians eventually gravitate towards veganism, than it is to directly promote veganism, which results in people not even giving up meat, because avoiding animal products completely is so demanding to people that they end up rejecting the whole veg thing altogether.
Please don’t take my comments as policing, I like your post and I think donating kidneys is great, I just wouldn’t want to see a CNN segment on EA discussing kidney donation as viewers may use it as an excuse to reject EA altogether.