But if that’s the case, then a record is the wrong data type for what you’re doing anyway, since you can call the primary constructor at any point with those sa

But if that’s the case, then a record is the wrong data type for what you’re doing anyway, since you can call the primary constructor at any point with those same un-validatable values. It’s not “with” that’s problematic. If a record doesn’t work for what you’re trying to do, just use a class. Though I will say that this is why I generally think ML’s (i.e. OCaml, Standard ML) approach to encapsulation with modules is generally superior to using classes for encapsulation.