A quick thought on the why of safe(r) spaces

[Chitown Kev]

Interestingly, while Charles Blow's column in the New York Times today directly addressed the necessity for "safe spaces" for minority students, it was Katherine Stewart's column titled "Ted Cruz and the Anti-Gay Pastor" that really caught my eye this morning on why some are insistent on the need for "safe spaces."

EARLIER this month, in Des Moines, the prominent home-schooling advocate and pastor Kevin Swanson again called for the punishment of homosexuality by death. To be clear, he added that the time for eliminating America’s gay population was “not yet” at hand. We must wait for the nation to embrace the one true religion, he suggested, and gay people must be allowed to repent and convert.

Think about this for a minute.

The genocide of LGBTs is still an issue being discussed in the public square.

A social policy of the 1950's called "Operation Wetback" is now an issue in the public square.

And there remains far too many Americans that want to DO these things as a social policy.

FTR, I don't quite believe in the notion of a "safe space"...quite possibly BECAUSE I am a gay man; I do believe that safer spaces are needed, though, and that those boundaries need to be respected.

But as a black LGBT person, I understand the need for "safe spaces" all too well...

More to come...

[randys1]

1. I just read somewhere that if you have a place only for you, safe, that you are being mean

to us white liberals and you shouldnt do that.

Dont know if I read it here or one of the other boards I post at.

sigh

Anyway, yes, discussing the mass murder of Gay people is now acceptable in our MAINSTREAM as well as that other thing I dont even like to type.

[shraby]

2. What's wrong with making every place a safe place for people?

Whenever possible, shut down the genocide talk. Genocide is illegal from the get-go.
It's a crime against humanity, and anyone who advocates such actions should be publically ostracized from all quarters.

[Chitown Kev]

3. Well, how DO you make every place a "safe space"?

I mean, as a gay man, I don't even feel that being around my family is a "safe space" (a somewhat unique side of the issue for LGBT's) and it is an issue that I have brought up with family members.

[shraby]

4. Education is the name of the game. Enlightened people do

enlightened things.

[Chitown Kev]

5. Enlightened people think of, say, and do pretty unenlightend things, as well.

after all, "scientific racism" is a thing...

[shraby]

6. Explain "scientific racism" Thought that went out with

World War II.
Unless your referring to pseudo-science.

[Chitown Kev]

7. I'll give you a Wikipedia page

Scientific racism

I mean, what do you think The Bell Curve was?

[shraby]

8. Scientific racism

is pseudo-science, made to look like actual science which it is not! No matter how they dress it up, it is racism, pure and simple.

[Chitown Kev]

9. And it sells...

The Bell Curve was a best seller (in spite of being debunked) and many (if not most) white people believe that black people are inferior either because of genetics or because of (presumed) environment.

Race is not an issue that even some "rational" people are exactly rational on.

And the presumption of the inferiority of the races is deeply encoded in American and European cultures.

[shraby]

10. It sells to the lowest common denominator. Thinking people know

better than to believe that tommy-rot.

[Chitown Kev]

11. The LCD = an awful lot of folks...millions...people who vote

sometimes explicitly but much more often implicitly...

and the point is getting derailed a bit...this doesn't just happen to POC...it happens to women, LGBTs, atheists, etc., etc.

A lot of people read and believe and vote and talk in the public square based on bullshit.

And yes, people do need a "safe space" from that kind of frequent harassment.

I am a gay black agnostic who understands these thing and who "gets it" and has "gotten it" in many different permutations.

[shraby]

12. There will never be a safe place. Like I said, education is the

best way to make it safer.

[Chitown Kev]

14. Education....sooooo....

if you were a Muslim student at Mizzou, would you feel safe in a place of education if a group of students had burned an ISIS flag on campus?

Because that did happen.

Keep in mind what is happening now on that campus and what happened to some Muslims and Sikhs after the September 11th attacks and think about what happened recently in Paris.

[jwirr]

29. I hear what you are saying about needing a safe place. I do

have a question - how does the safe place help once the victim steps back out into the unsafe world? The false ideas are still there.

[Chitown Kev]

33. But you are better able the confidence to be able to handle those situations

appropriately...at least that's how the theory goes.

I can't find the study at the moment, but there are studies that show that black students not only are more likely to graduate from a black college (as opposed to a college where they are a minority) but that such a student is better able to adjust in the unsafe world (and I believe the same holds true for women's colleges).

[jwirr]

39. Okay I had thought about the black colleges and it makes

sense. At least in that situation the black student can be taught about some of those idiots in the link you supplied me. It often helps to understand where people are coming from. Plus in that black class the theory would be debunked and it could no longer destroy ones own self concept.

My family lives on a reservation and of course we are subject to much of this bull also. But we have not found the reservation to be a safe place. Our children go to the white schools, and the few children who do go to the school here on the reservation are considered trouble makers.

What has help us has been the fact that the casino gave us jobs and is the biggest employer in the area for all races. We have kind of been forced out of the safe place and become a real part of the community instead of living on the fringe. Many of our younger families are now buying homes located inside the community rather than on the reservation.

I guess what I am saying is that both a safe place and exposure to the community can help. I support the idea of safe places.

One other thing that I have been thinking about regarding the Missouri college is that there seems to be a lot of bigotry all around Missouri that may very well be traced clear back to the civil war era. If Ferguson MO was any indication it is not surprising that they have problems in their colleges.

[jwirr]

28. Wow - that link is a required reading list for white supremacists.

In a sociology class in college we were required to read a book which was handed out by some supremacist group and then had a long discussion about it. And my own family was a victim of US eugenics so I knew that this was part of discrimination but I never realized how deeply it was believed in the scientific world.

Thank you for the link.

[Chitown Kev]

31. You're welcome!

[Kentonio]

13. No, we don't need safe spaces.

We need to stand up and make sure hatred and bigotry and calls for violence against people based on nothing more than the color of their skin or their sexual orientation is completely unacceptable, not just in mainstream society but in ANY society.

The concept of a 'safe space' carries the danger of it being twisted into little more than a prison cell that bigots can point at with a "well you have your space why do you need to bring your issues into ours?". The desire to feel safe and free from confrontation is a natural and understandable one, but it feels like an acceptance of the problem rather than a refusal to accept the problem and try and actually solve it. Until you feel safe being yourself in society, none of us should feel safe living in a place with that much hate in its heart.

[Chitown Kev]

15. Not necessarily...after all, the oldest African American religious denomination began, to extent

because black people wanted a "safe space" to worship.

The AMEC grew out of the Free African Society (FAS) which Richard Allen, Absalom Jones, and others established in Philadelphia in 1787. When officials at St. George’s MEC pulled blacks off their knees while praying, FAS members discovered just how far American Methodists would go to enforce racial discrimination against African Americans. Hence, these members of St. George’s made plans to transform their mutual aid society into an African congregation. Although most wanted to affiliate with the Protestant Episcopal Church, Allen led a small group who resolved to remain history.

In 1794 Bethel AME was dedicated with Allen as pastor. To establish Bethel’s independence from interfering white Methodists, Allen, a former Delaware slave, successfully sued in the Pennsylvania courts in 1807 and 1815 for the right of his congregation to exist as an independent institution. Because black Methodists in other middle Atlantic communities encountered racism and desired religious autonomy, Allen called them to meet in Philadelphia to form a new Wesleyan denomination, the AME.

Remember, white Americans wanted "safe spaces" of a sort as well.

[Kentonio]

18. It's the last line of your post that worries me.

Although the appeal of safe spaces is clear, the risk is that they become a tool of seperation that those outside the space can use as an excuse for limiting integration and acceptance. I suppose at the heart of it we all feel we need a place where we feel safe, but to formalize that I think sends a message that can harm as much as help.

In a minor way I think DU serves as an example. I havent posted here for long, but it still shocks me that in a supposedly progressively minded place like this, there is still seen to be a need for protected places where groups can feel safe from attacks on their race, gender or orientation. Reading those forums, you often see people hurt by posts they've seen in the general areas, dismay and disgust at the lack of tolerance they've experienced by people who should know better. Why in hell are those feelings having to be taken out of the mainstream and into a protected group? Why isn't that intolerance and lack of understanding being called out, discussed and condemned right there in the full public gaze? How can 'well its not a protected group' or a 'safe space' be a defense against things that we should all find obscene and unacceptable?

I guess I just think its all our duty to protect each other, and the people who will be willing to stand up and do their duty aren't always just going to be members of the same oppressed group as the individual being oppressed. I think by confronting bigotry in the public gaze, there's a lot more people who may never have really even thought much about it, who'll see the injustice and think "this just isn't fair" and experience the kind of conversion that helps turn the tide.

I'd never dismiss or look down at someone for feeling they needed a safe space, because having to confront and fight all the time is a burden no-one should be asked to bear 24/7. I just think we need to be a little careful that 'safe space' doesn't become a new form of seperation.

[Chitown Kev]

19. We're getting somewhere

Although the appeal of safe spaces is clear, the risk is that they become a tool of seperation that those outside the space can use as an excuse for limiting integration and acceptance. I suppose at the heart of it we all feel we need a place where we feel safe, but to formalize that I think sends a message that can harm as much as help.

And just because someone is within that "safe space" doesn't mean that integration and acceptance can be found.

One of the ultimate "safe spaces", I suppose, is the family. Yet many LGBT's have not found their families to be "a safe space"

[Kentonio]

21. Yeah, as I think more about it..

For that very reason a safe space is probably something that is hard to argue against for LGBT's despite the concept being something that can carry risks. If you can't find comfort and emotional support in the hands of your family, then you need somewhere you can get that, regardless of any other considerations. I hope you have such a place.

[Chitown Kev]

23. I went to an black college in the South for a time

Other than one incident in which I was gay bashed on campus (an incident that did not involve students at the school) I wouldn't say that my school was anti-gay but I did feel isolated and I didn't really know or understand what all of the "being gay" meant.

So I spent most of my social time at the majority white school in the same town where some of the white gays would say that "they really didn't think of me as black"...which was an attempt at a complement I suppose...

So...I mean, here were a couple of "safe spaces" where I didn't really feel "safe"

[jwirr]

32. Good example using the family. Interracial marriage also

has often found that the family is not necessarily a safe place.

[Chitown Kev]

16. Remember, I'm black AND LGBT and a religious agnostic so...

The concept of a 'safe space' carries the danger of it being twisted into little more than a prison cell that bigots can point at with a "well you have your space why do you need to bring your issues into ours?".

I wouldn't quite put it like that but I can't say tat I disagree with it; in fact, it's one of my own primary issues with "safe spaces"

But remember, white people (or straight people, for that matter) have never had a problem with enforcing their need for a "safe space" of their own (and course, those "safe spaces" are t enforce some sort of supremacy).

So why are people so outraged when POC and LGBTs want "safe spaces" to get away from pervasive social bigotry?

Remember, I'm not asking for anyone to approve or disapprove of "safe spaces". I'm asking for understanding.

Not all white and/or straight people are very nice, you know, even and especially in the public square.

And with minorities, it can very often be a matter of life and death.

[ram2008]

25. You can't enforce acceptance without being totalitarian

That's the issue at hand I believe.

Being physically safe is completely different than feeling accepted or being with entirely like minded people/thinking or hearing opinions you disagree with. If someone one feels uncomfortable because of someone else's opinions or beliefs, that is not the same as being unsafe.

We legalized same-sex marriage in this country; however, we will never be able to force people into changing their minds about how they feel, or to stop them from speaking out if they disagree.

The issue with "safe spaces" is its trying to force people to align entirely with a line of thinking that they do not share, and if they do not share it they are shouted down, told to check their privilege, mocked etc.

But I also think it's important to clarify what exactly a "safe space" entails. As most people seem to have different definitions.

[Chitown Kev]

26. Thing is

"normies" (white or straight or male or able-bodied, or religious) very very often go into safe spaces and flaunt their privilege and act sooooooooooooo ignorant and judgmental....they really do (i.e. black churchified people that ask me what church I go to or do I want to go to church with them even if they know damn well that I'm agnostic...that's one example....women groping gay men at gay bars is another example).

People with privilege, even in a relatively "protected" or "safe" setting tend to act like assholes, in my experience.

Remember, this is not about the "whether to do" or the "how" but the "why"

[ram2008]

27. But again, what designates something as a safe space?

How is such a thing enforced and what does it entail?

Just because someone does something the majority of people do doesn't mean they're exactly privileged; just because someone is different in some way doesn't make them oppressed.

No one has a right to be immune from criticism or people being assholes, that's reality.

[Chitown Kev]

30. But people do have a need (and maybe a right)

to feel safe, especially if they are a paying customer (which a college student would be).

I wouldn't want to go to school on a campus where the racism is so obvious that I know that, as a black person, I shouldn't walk in front of certain fraternity houses, for example...that sounds like a hostile environment.

I'm not certain exactly where to draw lines here because I have concerns about both the world outside the "safe space" and the world within that safe space.

For the most part, I suppose that I've chosen a sort of chaos; I am very very suspicious of terms like "community" in the way they are bandied about nowadays.

[ram2008]

34. Again colleges are literally the safest spaces there are

Walled off from the world outside...

I haven't seen any high profile cases of random acts of physical assault on minority students by white students on the basis of race, so I'm not sure why walking in front of fraternity house should make someone feel unsafe. If it is, then certainly the college administration would deal with it. Yes there are subtle cases of classism and racism, but for the most part the University goes above and beyond keeping their students safe and addressing these concerns. I went to Fordham (hence the mascot name in my username) and I can certainly tell you that I was a lot safer on campus, than off.

[Chitown Kev]

35. Jesuit schools rock

I went to a Jesuit university too...

I think we disagree on this subject (which is OK)...all of this looks OK from the outside (and even privileged)...but it isn't.

Also, why are you so focused on physical assault?

[ram2008]

36. Woohoo Jesuits! I guess it boils down to what I believe the duty of preserving safety entails

A University should focus on the space being safe to the extent that its students aren't under a constant threat of physical harm or mental anguish so that they can set out what they intended to at the institution: learn and be prepared for the real world. Feelings being hurt by peoples ignorance or criticism being received is not part of feeling unsafe, it's part of dealing with reality and growing as a person-- a reality which is often times not perfect and is far, far from a "safe space." The University can instill and promote good values, critical thinking, and a knowledge of what is just (as our Jesuit schools have!), but anything more is impossible to implement or enforce.

[Chitown Kev]

37. If you go to a Jesuit school

you will learn to think and to reason and to critically think, that's for sure.

In part, that's my sense of it too that a college or a university should be a somewhat less safe place than the family unit.

I understand the problems, I'm simply not sure where the line should be drawn...

[ram2008]

17. Most College Students are already safe, that's the reality

Especially the spaces these Ivy League protestors are coming from.

Heated rooms, fenced off campuses, a warm meal whenever they want, multi million dollar facilities, a university security force, fitness centers, health centers, all provided to them by the University.

As a minority who just finished college 3 years ago I find the idea that college campuses are unsafe absolutely absurd. It is probably the most "safe space" you will ever have in your entire life.

Now, the issue I see with the current college protests is that "Safe space" is being conflated with the idea that anything that makes you UNCOMFORTABLE means that you are unsafe. And thus any opinion you disagree with should not be allowed and should be stamped out. That should not be the case. There have been plenty of times in college where I didn't feel comfortable, that's the nature of reality, some people suck; there will always be racists and people saying stupid things. Confront them, make them feel like idiots and move on. Never once did I feel like I was unsafe or that the University was actually promoting this type of behavior. If someone is bullying you or threatening you there are already methods within the university to address those concerns.

What I do think is unfair is to shout down opposition, stifle free speech, make people feel bad for the color of their skin, and call for a bunch of unrealistic changes all based on a couple mischievous students trying to cause havoc.

[Chitown Kev]

20. I disagree with you

on the "safety" of college campuses...for example, minority and female graduate students that undergo harassment that's rendered invisible.

University of Chicago law professor Martha Nussbaum, in fact, wrote poignantly about the sexual harassment that she went through as one of the few female graduate students in her field.

bell hooks has written the same of racism and sexism that she went through as an undergrad at Stanford....there's lots of anecdotal and empirical evidence on this issue.

Once again, from Mizzou:

http://www.themaneater.com/stories/2015/9/30/low-reporting-numbers-highlighted-aau-campus-clima/

Granted, there are more resources and recourse for stuff like this but even t do that can come with a cost and can cost you a career in your chosen vocation.

[ram2008]

22. What can an institution do to change this?

You mix a bunch of young adults, a lot of alcohol and drugs, a hookup culture, and you are going to get a lot of unwanted sexual contact. No amount of protests change that.

I've been groped before by drunk females at parties, it's not something that I wanted or found pleasing... I didn't report it...but other people can... unwanted sexual advances happen, they can be reported, and the law will be enforced.

Again, we have to be careful with conflating the language. Unwanted advances does not equal rape in most cases.

[Chitown Kev]

24. Well, yes...

I'm uncertain as to how far the concept should go...

Of course, there were issues like this all over the country w/r/t women that liked to go to gay bars (sometimes with their gay friend, sometimes for bachelorette parties) and grope gay men. It became so frequent and so many gay men complained that some bars banned the parties (not the women, though)

Plus there was the issue of bachelorette parties occurring in the midst of the marriage equality battle

http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/gay/lesbian/news/ARTICLE.php?AID=21008

Both of these were occurring with seeming little regard of the space that was being occupied and specific issues of the community.

[gollygee]

38. "unwanted sexual contact?"

Why not just say "rape?"

[ram2008]

40. Because the two are not the same

Me being groped is not the same as me being raped. I don't consider myself being a rape victim, and to do so would undermine true rape victims. There are different degrees of sexual assault. Rape is generally reserved for the worst and is done under the threat of violence, especially in the view of the law.

[gollygee]

41. Rape is not always done under threat of violence

For instance if someone is unable to consent due to being unconscious.

[ram2008]

43. That part is correct

Usually the person has the option to block consent to a sexual contact that is unwanted. When the person persists past that blocking of consent (usually by force or incapacitation), then it is bordering on rape.

[Chitown Kev]

42. But the link uses the specific and appropriate

legal terminologies.

41% of genderqueer, transgender, and gender non-conforming students at Mizzou were victims of unwanted "sexual contact", 78% of women who received unwanted sexual contact did not report it, 1/4 of those student's didn't want to so as not to get the offender in trouble.

That's an acceptable campus culture to you? Because it's not rape?

[ram2008]

44. The methodology of that survey is a bit flawed to begin with

It was based on voluntary surveys, so it could be a bit self-selected.

"Unwanted sexual contact" is rather vague... could it mean someone who leaned in for a kiss that was unwanted? A touch on the shoulder? Trying to take a sexual encounter further than intended? etc >61% said they didn't think the infraction was enough to report, which makes me think the majority of these were minor infractions. Things like that should be clarified.

It is certainly not a good thing that there is unwanted sexual contact, but I wish the survey would have had some broader questions to measure the sexual health of the students. I also don't see how you can change this culture without severely cracking down on alcohol, and getting rid of the libido of young adults. Young people do stupid things, get very drunk, and have a lot of stupid sex. It will be hard to change.