This is a rant, one of weaker ones for PopeHat. There is nothing on the history or nature of the idea of "safe spaces" beyond a couple of anecdotes in the form

This is a rant, one of weaker ones for PopeHat. There is nothing on the history or nature of the idea of "safe spaces" beyond a couple of anecdotes in the form of links to previous PopeHat posts. There is zero mention of queer politics and queer theory, despite those enterprises hosting the strongest advocates for safe spaces. One might imagine this is because the writer is ignorant of what is going on modern LGBT politics, or supports queer politics, or realizes that his rant would be unpopular if he talked about ideas like the extremely popular notion that certain kinds of speech is literally violence against trans people. But really, the only purpose here, as is the case with most PopeHat rants, is to attempt to appeal to everyone. The subtle calling-out of women, blacks, and gays will please one type of person. The civil libertarianism will please another type of person. It's a very transparent thing if you read more than one PopeHat rant -- what they choose to focus on is what will maximize their readership and back-patting. Anything else is minimized and ignored. PopeHat is useful because the writers are sometimes passionate enough to produce decent writing about individual cases of people's self-interest overriding common sense and maybe endangering actual freedom. But many posts on it are transparently sparked by dishonest opportunism. In this case, the opportunity was fabricated out of nothing. (see tomlock's comment)