there’s something useful about there being safe spaces where people aren’t allowed to flirt with / hit on each other
That is true, but something that’s a safe space for one kind of a person often hurts another kind of person. For something like “do not flirt with each other or otherwise express sexuality”, there is a clear case for why having that norm is the better tradeoff in many situations… but for something like “do not express your feelings or let other people know what would make communication easier for you”, it is much less obvious to me that this is the norm that helps more people than it hurts. (to be clear, the same is true for the reverse case; I’m genuinely expressing uncertainty rather than implying that one of them would be clearly better/worse)
I feel like “don’t circle at people without their consent” is meaningfully different from “do not express your feelings or let other people know what would make communication easier for you.” Very few people have ever circled, but nearly everyone can express feelings and preferences.
That rule might exclude people who only have one script for expressing feelings and preferences, however, which is a particular concern in a community where so many people rely on scripts to communicate.
I agree that they are different; I was thinking in the context of Val’s worry that trying to enforce a rule of “no circling / NVC on LW without express consent” will in practice become interpreted as
“Don’t express your feelings or ask about mine” and “If you express preferences about how I communicate and the topic is emotionally laden, then you’re making a status grab and should be ashamed.”
there’s something useful about there being safe spaces where people aren’t allowed to flirt with / hit on each other
That is true, but something that’s a safe space for one kind of a person often hurts another kind of person. For something like “do not flirt with each other or otherwise express sexuality”, there is a clear case for why having that norm is the better tradeoff in many situations… but for something like “do not express your feelings or let other people know what would make communication easier for you”, it is much less obvious to me that this is the norm that helps more people than it hurts. (to be clear, the same is true for the reverse case; I’m genuinely expressing uncertainty rather than implying that one of them would be clearly better/worse)
I feel like “don’t circle at people without their consent” is meaningfully different from “do not express your feelings or let other people know what would make communication easier for you.” Very few people have ever circled, but nearly everyone can express feelings and preferences.
That rule might exclude people who only have one script for expressing feelings and preferences, however, which is a particular concern in a community where so many people rely on scripts to communicate.
I agree that they are different; I was thinking in the context of Val’s worry that trying to enforce a rule of “no circling / NVC on LW without express consent” will in practice become interpreted as
Circling isn’t just about expressing feelings or preference but it’s about being explicit about relating.
It’s not just saying “I’m sad” but saying “When you said X that made me sad”. Circling is also less about scripts than NVC.