Safe Spaces
For Conservatives:
Viewpoint: The subject of safe spaces is unique in that it divides liberals into two groups. Older liberals are generally opposed to the idea, while most millennial and Generation Z liberals support the implementation of places or environments in which members of minority groups can feel confident that they will not be discriminated against, bullied, harassed, or emotionally harmed in any way.
Reasoning: Liberals often have a progressive outlook, meaning that they are more tolerant of or willing to accept the changing aspects of society. Millennial and Generation Z liberals have spoken out in great numbers about the homophobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, fascism, racism, and other forms of bigotry that they feel are extremely widespread and harmful in the world today. As such, they are in favor of safe spaces in places such as college campuses so that members of minority groups can access environments in which they are not oppressed or marginalized.
Safe spaces are widely criticized for coddling people instead of introducing them to the real world, where they will encounter the ever-present prejudice of a diverse society. However, millennial and Generation Z liberals argue otherwise. They contest that safe spaces are vital, especially on college campuses, for all members of minority groups. In their opinion, these students are at constant risk of harassment and bullying, so they deserve time during which they are guaranteed reprieve.
Millennial and Generation Z liberals also argue that it is essential to provide these students with a community comprised of others in similar situations so that they can become more comfortable with themselves. They say the option of a safe environment does not shield these people from opposite viewpoints but merely gives them a space to be without fear.
Trigger warnings are also a new phenomenon that involve protecting people who might otherwise be negatively impacted by offensive speech. These warnings are often situated at the top of a document or uttered by a person before his or her speech, and they are intended to avoid offending people who are reading or listening to controversial subject matter. In 2016, the University of Chicago decided to abolish both trigger warnings and safe spaces on its campus in order to promote academic freedom. Many liberals strongly opposed this action.
“Instead of fostering academic freedom, it [the policy] could foster mistrust and negatively affect survivors of trauma, including people of color. If students cannot trust that spaces they enter are going to keep them safe, they are less able to feel secure enough to learn.” ~Raeann Pickett, Time
Some liberals on college campuses have taken their goal of creating a safe environment a step further. When controversial people are scheduled to speak at certain universities, liberals have initiated protests to shut the events down. While many argue that this is a suppression of free speech and violates constitutional rights, millennial and Generation Z liberals say that such speakers are using the universities as platforms to spread hate speech and misinformation. They feel that selectively stopping speech is justified. In other words, the only people that they are preventing from speaking are those that should not speak in the first place.
Sources:
The Importance of Safe Spaces & Why Liberals Should Stop Criticizing Them – Daily Kos
For Liberals:
Viewpoint: Safe spaces are places or environments in which members of minority groups can feel confident that they will not be discriminated against, bullied, harassed, or emotionally harmed in any way. Conservatives, along with older generations of liberals, are generally opposed to the implementation of safe spaces in any environment.
Reasoning: Most conservatives are staunchly supportive of free speech. They feel that the right to free speech encompasses all speech, including that deemed hateful. As a result, many conservatives believe that safe spaces undermine the rights given by the First Amendment to the Constitution, as these areas were created for the sole purpose of disallowing certain forms of speech.
Aside from the constitutionality of the matter, conservatives believe that safe spaces are harmful rather than helpful for the people participating. College has always been seen as the period in which students transition from children to adults. They move out of their homes, begin to support themselves, and are truly exposed to the real world for the very first time. However, now, many conservatives believe safe spaces coddle college students, shielding them from rude comments or any opinions that differ from their own—both of which they will encounter when they graduate. Controversy is an inherent aspect of a country that protects the free speech of its citizens. The world is not a safe space, and conservatives believe it is naive and inconsiderate to prolong the period before students must acknowledge this fact.
According to many conservatives, safe spaces also inadvertently protect the people who sparked their initial creation. These are the racists, sexists, homophobes, and others who are behind the hate speech that many believe is a prevalent problem on college campuses. Jonathan Helwink from The Federalist argues that people should try to abolish the actual feelings behind such speech rather than simply prevent the words from being uttered. He feels that when safe spaces and trigger warnings are used to clamp down on offensive speech, the perpetrators are not actually confronted about the beliefs that they hold. “They are silenced through intimidation and threatened punishments,” he says; and yet, their opinions persist.
“Error is not the insulting or assaultive speech—it is the prejudice behind the speech.” ~Jonathan Helwink, The Federalist
While conservatives inherently disagree with the premise behind safe spaces, they do not dispute college students’ rights to have private groups with certain requirements on campus. Students should be able to have exclusive clubs in which they limit who is allowed to attend and what is said at meetings. However, conservatives believe that universities do not have the right to prohibit things said in the classroom or prevent certain people from coming to speak. They feel that these behaviors cross the line because students are no longer censoring speech in private areas; they are preventing other students from hearing certain opinions as well. No one, conservatives believe, should be able to mandate what people around them say or hear. This is a blatant obstruction of the right of all American citizens to free speech—as a result, conservatives feel that the spreading concept of safe spaces is very dangerous for America’s free society.
Sources:
Safe Spaces Just Make the World More Dangerous – The Federalist
The World Isn’t a “Safe Space”: Why College Kids Need To Stop Hiding from Views That Upset Them – The Daily Banter