This time, itās taken just five days, since the hostile takeover of the US by its worst elements, for edicts from above to have actually hurt my life and (much more directly) the lives of my students, friends, and colleagues. Today, we learned that Trump is suspending the issuance of US visas to people from seven majority-Islamic countries, including Iran (but strangely not Saudi Arabia, the cradle of Wahhabist terrorismānot that that would be morally justified either). This suspension might last just 30 days, but might also continue indefinitelyāparticularly if, as seems likely, the Iranian government thumbs its nose at whatever Trump demands that it do to get the suspension rescinded. So the upshot is that, until further notice, science departments at American universities can no longer recruit PhD students from Iranāa country that, along with China, India, and a few others, has long been the source of some of our best talent.
Pointing at it wonāt fix anything. Screaming isnāt going to fix anything.
And itās pretty obvious that the people focused on the inane Nazi-punching discourse arenāt going to figure out something that will help anything.
A little while ago, Duncan Sabien, who works for CFAR, made a post containing this quote, over on Facebook, relating to the vague āProjectHufflepuffā concept thatās in development:
One of the concerns that's been lurking on the edges of this thing (and occasionally stated outright, but usually with a *specific* objection rather than pointing at the general trend) is that grousing doesn't fix a thing, and the grousing itself can be corrosive.
I think this is part of why my initial impulse was to tinker with the idea of starting a house, instead of to strategize around fixing the community as a whole. Just that statementā"let's fix the thing"ācan do further damage by widening the tears.
Which is not to say that gag rules or blind eyes are the way to go. The idea isn't "pretend things are good when they aren't." But I think perhaps a piece of Hufflepuff Wisdom might be: when you see something that's broken, don't prioritize drawing everyone's attention to the broken thing. Instead, just get to work. Start building. *Add* to reality in a positive way. Make the negative part less relevant by decreasing its share of the pie.
I think this is something we all need to contend with, especially in our continual talk about how terrible everyone else is at pursuing things. We need to at least mix a certain amount of constructive action into our criticisms of other people for not solving things, or weāre no better, and every one of those criticisms can be mirrored onto ourselves too.
A little while ago @evolution-is-just-a-theoremā joked that our July argument would beĀ āWhat is the best way to pivot all EA resources to stopping Trump after he [redacted]?ā. This is a joke; we probably donāt want to do this, at least not yet. But Iād like to open that debate now, for putting some resources into it.Ā So everyone else is useless. Big whoop. What could be done?
I can only barely attempt to live up to my own suggestion here, but a short list of starting points:
For Americans, there is a guide by former Congressional staffers on pressuring their representative to oppose things that require Congressional support - Indivisible: The Guide. It has limited ambitions and still seems ambitious, but is worth considering. There seems to be actionable stuff in it, with particular applicability for anyone in a red state.
The ACLU are always good; they were asked to take over a recent discrimination case after the EEOC asked for a delay due toĀ āadministration changeā, on grounds the EEOC is now potentially less reliable than it was. One can donate; this does not seem to be limited to Americans. (EDIT: I sent them $50, for now)
Try to directly lobby thinkpiece writers and journalists to stop being ridiculously counterproductive? Risky, but theyāre not as inaccessible as other people. People are listening to stuff Scott Alexander writes, if no one else, and he sort of listens to us.
I think other people should be able to come up with better ones, though.
