An important topic and a great read. However, I was taken aback at the use of, or hijacking of, the phrase “concept creep” to specifically mean harm-related concepts. I’m 68yo and in my career that phrase was used for all kinds of things, but never in regard to this topic. So the paper’s opening line ‘“Concept creep” IS the gradual semantic expansion of harm-related concepts such as ...’ totally discredited the team of authors in my view. Or am I just supposed to chill out and watch as the next generation redefines common words and phrases? How about “harm creep”? Now I’m worried if I use the phrase in conversation about a piece of software or a political concept I’m going to get mobbed.
But the greatest cause of verbicide is the fact that most people are obviously far more anxious to express their approval and disapproval of things than to describe them. Hence the tendency of words to become less descriptive and more evaluative; then become evaluative, while still retaining some hint of the sort of goodness or badness implied; and to end up by being purely evaluative -- useless synonyms for good or for bad.
"Those who claim to be hurt by words must be led to expect nothing as compensation. Otherwise, once they learn they can get something by claiming to be hurt, they will go into the business of being offended."
And of a passage in skeptic Michael Shermer's review of Walsh's documentary:
"But [University of Tennessee professor] Grzanka’s dodge is not uncommon in academia today, and in exasperation with Walsh’s persistent questioning in search of the truth, Grzanka pronounces on camera, 'Getting to the truth is deeply transphobic.' ...."
Hard not to see Grzanka's assertion as a suitable epitaph for much of Academia. If "getting to the truth" isn't what Academia is all about then maybe we should burn it to the ground and start over.
"indeed, sometimes the views perceived by some people as offensive might be more aptly described as uncomfortable truths uncovered by rigorous scientific studies"
And some may be truths that are blatantly obvious without the need for any sort of study.
Hi - I'm reposting my comment on a similar post - I thought some may find it useful:
Thanks for the excellent post!
I'll add that the broadening of the concept of harm is not entirely an organic/spontaneous development. It's a result of a concentrated, prolonged effort by various activists-academics, who for decades have indirectly and sometimes underhandedly advocated for its expansion in various academic writings (there are very visible trends in the literature I’m familiar with, in law and philosophy).
This broadening appears to have been directly motivated by the U.S. first amendment doctrine, which maintains that speech is protected unless it causes imminent harm (the incitement exception). So instead of arguing directly for a change in constitutional protections or the law more broadly, these scholars-activists have tried to expand the notion of harm. This has gone along with similar attempts to expand the notion of trauma and other mental health-related concepts, as legal doctrines in many countries have traditionally acknowledged only physical harm and not any form of emotional distress as “harm” for legal purposes, unless it amounts to a medically recognized mental condition; and with attempts to claim that various things are actions and not speech (e.g., that insulting minorities/women is not speech but an act of humiliation/subordination)—because actions are not protected by the first amendment.
All of these attempts have for decades used various technically sophisticated theories and argumentative moves to support those conceptual expansions/conflations, making them appear like good-faith academic inquiry, when in reality much of this is driven by the underlying lawfare. All the while, the application of the concept of harm, for instance, has been very biased and selective – e.g., it’s been used to support only certain efforts that conflict with freedom of expression, while completely ignoring other causes that may be equally supported by the same arguments but are not favored by the relevant scholars/activists, and generally, while ignoring the harms stemming from suppression of free speech.
Interesting comment. Given the premise that intent does not factor into whether something is deemed harmful or not, the obvious conundrum presents itself -- essentially anything can be said to cause harm when the concept becomes so broad, as the author rightly pointed out in her piece. When this glaring fault is pointed out, the Social Justice types then argue that only people they consider belonging to "historically marginalized groups" get to engage with speech in this way. If, for example, a straight, white, and male student said that he was harmed by hearing "Anti-Racist" rhetoric that demonizes whites, they would discount and disregard his claim. As a result, it becomes readily obvious that they do not intend to prevent harm but rather make adjustments to how speech is policed in order to best serve their political ends.
Yep... those kinds of speech-causes/is-harm arguments usually come with the whole normative apparatus of background assumptions maintaining, e.g., that everyone has some group-based social positioning (the renowned "victimhood hierarchy"), and that only the victimized/marginalized groups can be harmed/subordinated by speech (because other groups have "social power" over them). A set of claims which, in my view, builds on some valid and widely-shared moral intuitions (which makes it appear superficially plausible), but completely misuses them. This is in part to promote political ends, but I suspect that's not the whole story - many people do sincerely buy the entire normative story without qualification. In any case, this too has been long brewing in the literature I mentioned… in my view what's playing out now is, in part, just the spillover of all of that.
The confusion of close personal relationship and the relationship of one with society as a whole is a hallmark of extremist social justice-ism, I think. I too think some of those claims would be appropriate if directed at, say, an abusive partner/parent etc. The whole movement appears to encourage the conflation of the two and perpetuate unhealthy expectations of individuals from society, possibly building on prior interpersonal trauma.
An important topic and a great read. However, I was taken aback at the use of, or hijacking of, the phrase “concept creep” to specifically mean harm-related concepts. I’m 68yo and in my career that phrase was used for all kinds of things, but never in regard to this topic. So the paper’s opening line ‘“Concept creep” IS the gradual semantic expansion of harm-related concepts such as ...’ totally discredited the team of authors in my view. Or am I just supposed to chill out and watch as the next generation redefines common words and phrases? How about “harm creep”? Now I’m worried if I use the phrase in conversation about a piece of software or a political concept I’m going to get mobbed.
Verbicide
But the greatest cause of verbicide is the fact that most people are obviously far more anxious to express their approval and disapproval of things than to describe them. Hence the tendency of words to become less descriptive and more evaluative; then become evaluative, while still retaining some hint of the sort of goodness or badness implied; and to end up by being purely evaluative -- useless synonyms for good or for bad.
C.S. Lewis, Studies in Words
Reminds me of a quip of Jonathan Rauch:
"Those who claim to be hurt by words must be led to expect nothing as compensation. Otherwise, once they learn they can get something by claiming to be hurt, they will go into the business of being offended."
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/5539805-those-who-claim-to-be-hurt-by-words-must-be
And of a passage in skeptic Michael Shermer's review of Walsh's documentary:
"But [University of Tennessee professor] Grzanka’s dodge is not uncommon in academia today, and in exasperation with Walsh’s persistent questioning in search of the truth, Grzanka pronounces on camera, 'Getting to the truth is deeply transphobic.' ...."
https://michaelshermer.substack.com/p/what-is-a-woman-anyway
Hard not to see Grzanka's assertion as a suitable epitaph for much of Academia. If "getting to the truth" isn't what Academia is all about then maybe we should burn it to the ground and start over.
"indeed, sometimes the views perceived by some people as offensive might be more aptly described as uncomfortable truths uncovered by rigorous scientific studies"
And some may be truths that are blatantly obvious without the need for any sort of study.
It's gaslighting, really.
Hi - I'm reposting my comment on a similar post - I thought some may find it useful:
Thanks for the excellent post!
I'll add that the broadening of the concept of harm is not entirely an organic/spontaneous development. It's a result of a concentrated, prolonged effort by various activists-academics, who for decades have indirectly and sometimes underhandedly advocated for its expansion in various academic writings (there are very visible trends in the literature I’m familiar with, in law and philosophy).
This broadening appears to have been directly motivated by the U.S. first amendment doctrine, which maintains that speech is protected unless it causes imminent harm (the incitement exception). So instead of arguing directly for a change in constitutional protections or the law more broadly, these scholars-activists have tried to expand the notion of harm. This has gone along with similar attempts to expand the notion of trauma and other mental health-related concepts, as legal doctrines in many countries have traditionally acknowledged only physical harm and not any form of emotional distress as “harm” for legal purposes, unless it amounts to a medically recognized mental condition; and with attempts to claim that various things are actions and not speech (e.g., that insulting minorities/women is not speech but an act of humiliation/subordination)—because actions are not protected by the first amendment.
All of these attempts have for decades used various technically sophisticated theories and argumentative moves to support those conceptual expansions/conflations, making them appear like good-faith academic inquiry, when in reality much of this is driven by the underlying lawfare. All the while, the application of the concept of harm, for instance, has been very biased and selective – e.g., it’s been used to support only certain efforts that conflict with freedom of expression, while completely ignoring other causes that may be equally supported by the same arguments but are not favored by the relevant scholars/activists, and generally, while ignoring the harms stemming from suppression of free speech.
Interesting comment. Given the premise that intent does not factor into whether something is deemed harmful or not, the obvious conundrum presents itself -- essentially anything can be said to cause harm when the concept becomes so broad, as the author rightly pointed out in her piece. When this glaring fault is pointed out, the Social Justice types then argue that only people they consider belonging to "historically marginalized groups" get to engage with speech in this way. If, for example, a straight, white, and male student said that he was harmed by hearing "Anti-Racist" rhetoric that demonizes whites, they would discount and disregard his claim. As a result, it becomes readily obvious that they do not intend to prevent harm but rather make adjustments to how speech is policed in order to best serve their political ends.
Yep... those kinds of speech-causes/is-harm arguments usually come with the whole normative apparatus of background assumptions maintaining, e.g., that everyone has some group-based social positioning (the renowned "victimhood hierarchy"), and that only the victimized/marginalized groups can be harmed/subordinated by speech (because other groups have "social power" over them). A set of claims which, in my view, builds on some valid and widely-shared moral intuitions (which makes it appear superficially plausible), but completely misuses them. This is in part to promote political ends, but I suspect that's not the whole story - many people do sincerely buy the entire normative story without qualification. In any case, this too has been long brewing in the literature I mentioned… in my view what's playing out now is, in part, just the spillover of all of that.
The confusion of close personal relationship and the relationship of one with society as a whole is a hallmark of extremist social justice-ism, I think. I too think some of those claims would be appropriate if directed at, say, an abusive partner/parent etc. The whole movement appears to encourage the conflation of the two and perpetuate unhealthy expectations of individuals from society, possibly building on prior interpersonal trauma.