Safer Spaces

Perhaps using the term safer spaces rather than safe spaces might empower more people with the awareness and skills to protect their safety everywhere.

Years ago, I was extremely active in community HIV prevention efforts. It was the 1980s. I volunteered with the first HIV prevention nonprofit organization in Los Angeles. People were dying. Lots of people. We didn't know exactly why for a long time. Eventually scientists discovered HIV is transmitted sexually and the HIV prevention movement coined the term "safe sex."

Practice safe sex. Safe sex is the way to go. It's safe sex or no sex. You get the idea.

However, over time HIV and STI/STD (STI is the preferred term these days) prevention professionals began to realize that the word safe wasn't entirely appropriate most of the time. Condoms weren't always 100% effective.  Having insertive sex of any kind inherently carries with it at least some risk even if we educate people on how to lower that risk. At least two STIs can be transmitted through skin-to-skin contact without necessarily involving any insertion. Safe sex felt like it was somewhat untrue.

Slowly HIV/STI prevention professionals and sexually active communities began to use the term "safer" sex. Safer signaled that the practices we were encouraging reduced risk but didn't always eliminate all risk. Safety levels varied depending on the specific types of sexual activities, number of partners, and other factors.

Planned Parenthood offers this differentiation between safer and safe sex.

“Safer sex” refers to anything we do to lower our risk — and our partners’ risk — of sexually transmitted infections. Some people call it “safe sex,” but this isn’t accurate — no type of sex with a partner can be guaranteed to be 100 percent safe.

(Source)

I'm still fairly active in the HIV/STI prevention realm. I've been an advocate for the adoption of PrEP and informing people about Undetectable Equals Untransmissible (U=U) for HIV prevention and Doxy PEP for STI prevention among certain sexually active populations. Of course, for many people, condoms and sexual activity adaptation are still risk reduction measures many adopt as well. I encourage anyone who’s sexually active to get tested regularly to best protect themselves and the community.

All of those things are safer sex strategies. Safer sex is now the preferred phrase, not safe sex. The idea the word safer better communicates is that engaging in sex of nearly any kind carries with it at least a modicum of risk.

Today I was sitting in a kink education workshop and the phrase "safe spaces" came up in the discussion. Everyone in the room knew exactly what safe spaces means. Many of the kinksters in the room came from marginalized demographics who often benefit from have safe spaces in which to socialize, play, and so on.

For some reason when this topic came up, my years of HIV/STI prevention work came to mind because of the word safe. I wondered to myself if any space is truly safe in the absolute sense of the word. I often frequent social and play spaces comprised of only kinky gay men, ostensibly a safe space for me. But there can still be the occasional asshole or unsafe player. Despite it likely considered a safe space by many, it's not entirely. It's a safer space.

Why is this distinction important?

While we rightfully should and must create safer spaces for all types of people, are we simultaneously doing a disservice to them by proclaiming they're safe? Might those who desire and sometimes need safer spaces be better served by identifying them as safer? That way we don't remove all sense of risk or personal responsibility from the equation.

People who are informed that a space, be it a bar, play space, sex venue, social event, or whatever, has a lower assumed risk and likely more safety, but isn't without a doubt entirely safe, are better equipped to handle those instances when safety boundaries are breeched. This is true not just in those spaces, but when the people frequenting those spaces go elsewhere in the world and don't have a community or overseer enforcing the safer environment guardrails.

Of course, when I looked into it, I'm not the first person to think of this. the Mental Health Commissions of Canada describes safer spaces this way.

A safer space is a supportive, non-threatening environment where all participants can feel comfortable to express themselves and share experiences without fear of discrimination or reprisal. We use the word safer to acknowledge that safety is relative: not everyone feels safe under the same conditions.

(Source)

Safe space. Safer space. We all know what both those phrases mean. But I believe fostering the use of safer versus safe might better benefit those of us who need or want such spaces.

You can use this link to access all my writings and social media and ways to support my work.