Long gone is the time, towards the end of the last decade, when we all laughed off ‘safe spaces’ as the latest, neurotic fad confined to university campuses. Few are laughing now, because in the ensuing years, as this risk-averse mentality has trickled down into mainstream society, the belief in the primacy of ‘safety’ is having outcomes that are proving ever-more authoritarian, frightening and – ironically – dangerous.

Students who grew up with ‘safe spaces’ have become today’s narrow-minded adults

Students who grew up with ‘safe spaces’ have become today’s narrow-minded adults

The decision last week by the British Museum to postpone a Jewish Culture Month event, citing its responsibility to guest speakers to ‘proceed safely, securely and without intimidation’ is a case in point. This incident followed a now depressingly familiar pattern, of events featuring Jewish speakers, or centred on Jewish themes, being abandoned out of cowardice, out of fear of what far-left activists or Islamists might do. In September last year, the Bristol Brunel Academy postponed a visit from Damien Egan MP due to planned protests by pro-Palestine activists. After Egan’s visit was halted, the Bristol Palestine Solidarity Campaign hailed it as a ‘victory for parents, teachers and the community’. Or in other words: a victory for mafia-like........

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