I would perhaps prefer we had a list of three things we don’t discuss (say Politics, Race science and Infohazards) and if we want to not discuss a new thing we have to allow discussion of one of those others. Seems better to be clear what isn’t being discussed.
I’m pro being clear about what we don’t discuss, but it’s unreasonable to limit the list to three. The number of topics that is net negative to discuss is just a fact about the world and is probably over three, and I would rather not have people talk about the 4th worst controversial topic just because we uncover three even more pointless and controversial ones.
Politics also seems inadvisable to ban because it’s too broad.
I think implementing this policy would require frequent publicization of what issues are on the current list and frequent debates and votes on whether to replace one topic on the list with another topic not yet on the list and would therefore have the opposite of the intended effect. Maybe there’s a clever way to get around those issues, but I doubt it.
I would perhaps prefer we had a list of three things we don’t discuss (say Politics, Race science and Infohazards) and if we want to not discuss a new thing we have to allow discussion of one of those others. Seems better to be clear what isn’t being discussed.
I’m pro being clear about what we don’t discuss, but it’s unreasonable to limit the list to three. The number of topics that is net negative to discuss is just a fact about the world and is probably over three, and I would rather not have people talk about the 4th worst controversial topic just because we uncover three even more pointless and controversial ones.
Politics also seems inadvisable to ban because it’s too broad.
See also Heads I Win, Tails?—Never Heard of Her; Or, Selective Reporting and the Tragedy of the Green Rationalists. Which goes into how people who don’t know that there’s some implicit consensus not to talk about some things can come away confused and with wrong beliefs.
I think implementing this policy would require frequent publicization of what issues are on the current list and frequent debates and votes on whether to replace one topic on the list with another topic not yet on the list and would therefore have the opposite of the intended effect. Maybe there’s a clever way to get around those issues, but I doubt it.