Easter Break 2015

Look, people from 20 or 30 different countries regularly read this page :) Know that you can write to our agents at cakefaeries *at* gmail.com if you have any benevolent questions, and abide by our Safer Space Rules and Disclaimer .

If you are looking into setting up Safer Spaces yourself, note that people coming to us about such matters usually adopt 2 percent or less of our rules and methods, even if UK-based, for which the current state of the law, the attitude of the public, the set-up of universities and of 'university' parts of town etc are more likely to be similar. These factors are more likely to be different abroad, including, in some cases, very different, so people looking into Safer Spaces abroad might well consider rather less than 2 percent of our rules and methods. Indeed, even 2 percent or less of our rules and methods can make a substantial difference to the wellbeing, safety and feeling welcome of a wide range of vulnerable people. For many people have thought about these things at ours, systematically, in an environment in which tolerant people can simply speak of new ideas without fear of being abused for having and stating these ideas. That means that there is constant progress.

Issues gathered at ours, such as below, are looked at i) conceptually. And ii) from the point of view that further awareness is always welcome as opposed to resistance to change for its own sake or because 'might is right' still tacitly governs who and what is admitted, accepted and welcomed. Conceptually, we look at whether awarenesses raised involve any features that are new to us (if so, we expand some of our classifications of such, and eventually the rules, mission statement, and activities on offer come to reflect the updated version of the classification. Writing such as a Safer Space ruleset is thus an act of genuine, rather than cavalier, summary.

Cavalier summary involves conflating things which 'look similar'. On the other hand, genuine summary involves classifying all known awarenesses and difficulties by significant underlying thoughts and causes.

Also, in the case of general-purpose Safer Spaces, one is to be inclusive rather than exclusive of further possible awarenesses and cases. This is reflected in phrases like 'this is a Safer Space for all people who are tolerant of all other tolerant people', which does not make any claim on knowing a 'full list' describing such people. Or 'this Space does not condone racism, sexism, LGBT-phobia, and more: this is not a complete list and you can always approach us as regards extending what is stated in this list.' With NO tacit '(but we'll only change to accommodate if you are numerous, shout, already have acceptance in public perception, protection by law etc)' so that this is based on *valuing awareness for its own sake* rather than only kowtowing to various kinds of 'might is right'. We note the following bounds on what we deal with. It must be *consensual*, and it must be *legal*. Legal is not the same as 'legally protected', e.g. being Asexual is not per se in breach of any UK laws, as opposed to Asexual not currently being mentioned alongside such as LGBT in laws against hate crimes, workplace discrimination etc. We also do not deal with 'Safer Spaces in schools' or similar: the situations we deal with concern people who are 'of university age or older'. Though this needn't imply that they are, or have been at, a university. This is since we are also designed to cope with the discrimination that is widespread in uni areas concerning how almost every club or society in sight has no place for ex-uni, non-uni or the other uni in town's people, or 'by invitation only, withdrawable at any time' for such, or other 'second-class citizen' restrictions embodied in statements like 'the committee must consist only of students at this uni'. Yes, we get it that quite a lot of people want such clubs. However, some people consider being at uni, at which uni, and with what rank, to either be irrelevant to participation in societies, or to be an unnecessary and rather often hurtful stratification of exclusivenesses. Thus we are not at all OK with 'student societies' and 'this uni's members only' societies having a monopoly on societies in university towns. At the very least, there is the *possibility* of societies that are *based on* treating people the same, and there is no reason why these should be 'made to fit' some monopoly about exclusive uni-only or student-only societies. This is indeed relevant to running Safer Space societies in a range of other cities and countries, since not everywhere has the opportunity afforded in Cambridge to 'non-official' societies. For these are free from having to ascribe to any monopolies, and yet can 1) book the society fair stalls that get enough members to keep on going some further years. 2) Use standard society webpages and email lists, because in Cambridge these are run independently from 'official society' registration. 3) Book venues, at least in some colleges, regardless of whether the society doing so is 'official' or 'unofficial'.

If 2) and 3) are absent, dear readers, versions of 2) unattached to any uni exist, and 3) can often be replaced with picnics, pubmeets etc. We also understand the idea that safer spaces are safer in some parts of a town than another as regards having a picnic or a pubmeet. If we need such, some of our tougher organizers spend some time in a range of such places, seeing which happen to be used by abusive people, or are too empty or too full. As regards pubs, and coffee shops, and nightclubs, one can additionally look into which are awarely run. At least in the UK, some such have safer space policies of their own, or are already trusted by a range of safer space organizers. We'd also not be OK if a such attempted to alter the rules of Safer Space societies or support groups meeting there. Meeting in such a place does include abiding by their rules as well as ours when doing so, but it is not to include substituting their rules for ours. The basic plan is that, if such a place has a stated policy about e.g. being LGBT friendly or not having unwanted advances on the premises, then it is somewhat more likely to understand that safer space groups meeting on its premises may have additional concerns as regards their own meetings. If that becomes an actual issue due to some incident, we see in practise whether they're willing to understand, stand by our concern raised. If they do not, and that is enough of an issue for us, we'd simply move to meeting elsewhere from then onward. These things are all in line with how we are a safer space *as regards how our members interact with each other*. We can't promise that passers-by won't be abusive toward us when we are in public. What we can do, and do do, however, is take note of where in town such things happen to us and others, and then meet in the lowest risk areas.

We also comment that 3) does not remove this consideration, since university staff are not immune from outbursts against minorities, especially litte known and not legally protected ones, and might also not understand that a Safer Space group asking for someone who's hurting them to be removed from the premises is a situation to be taken seriously and handled sensitively. Some places one might consider booking a room might also use arguments like 'official societies only. No exception for safer spaces. No, not even for safer spaces whose mission statements preclude them from being official societies due to having awarenesses and safenesses well in excess of what the official societies charter has thought to provide for'. Though, mind you, in the very occasional cases in which we've encountered such attitudes, we've seldom been comfortable enough to be Out about having 'warenesses and safenesses well in excess of what the official societies charter has thought to provide for'. In essence, if a place insists that its rules, which exist for other than safer space reasons, necessarily have to be rigidly adhered to in situations involving a safer space, then it is better to find elsewhere for that safer space to meet. At least in this city, there's a wide range of places where this problem does not occur. We additionally discuss these things with our upcoming organizers, so that they know that not all pubs, greens and rooms are the same, and which among these are known to be particularly suitable for safer space activities.

So. We're willing to learn more about how other cities and countries vary as regards the above kinds of factors. Very limited personnel hours as we may have for this, we do have a few, particularly 'out of termtime', meaning December, March, April, July, August and September. So be patient and we would eventually reply. We get enough responses, and this news-item will be changed to a link to one or more new webpages. We do not claim that societies like ours could be viable in all countries. Societies like ours probably require: not a war zone, not a dictatorship, not a police state, acknowledgment of women's rights, no laws criminalizing LGBT. *Awarenesses* can extend beyond these bounds, but safer spaces that are openly marked as safer spaces and run open-participation activities in a similar spirit to ours probably cannot.

Also, don't think that discussing safer space matters with us would tie you to being cake deliverers, waterfighters or adults who gather to read children's books in silly voices. Those are *but examples* of Icebreakers which we happen to have often found to be useful in our little university-city. We'll link here to some extent about what Icebreakers are more generally, and icebreaker design. Icebreakers serve two purposes: A) bring in for-fun participants, amongst whom closeted people feel unexposed enough to view the activity as approachable. B) Provide a year-long service for people along the lines of 'shy' and/or 'different', for whom the wider provision of Icebreakers in Freshers' week is on a somewhat to very much too short timescale to have effect. Those who need Icebreakers the most need them all year round! B) is in the context of university cities having many new arrivals, with particular mention of graduate students and exchange students sometimes arriving at other points in time than freshers week, nor having freshers week icebreaker activities thought out for them. Yes, graduate students new to a uni often would benefit from a similar amount of Icebreakers designed with them in mind to the amount that undergraduates are now starting to have available in UK uni freshers weeks. Graduate students often see themselves as having far fewer peers: small research groups instead of giant fresher lecture classes, less links in practises to colleges (eg living out). Colleges may consider integration of graduate students to lie with Departments, but Departments far more seldom provide Icebreakers, for they don't have things like JCR or MCR committees, which involve many person hours and not inconsiderable financial resources for leisurely activities, and free access to many a social function room. MCR committees (graduate: college level) may well also for now have less inclination to run Icebreakers, or College Parenting for gradauate freshers. Yet the reasons the latter works well for many an undergraduate fresher do not change when it comes to graduate freshers, and no, it is not hard to contemplate 'somewhat more mature' Icebreaker forms and themes for fresher graduates.

Actually waterfighting and reading books in silly voices work well for (graduates intersection alternative people), and cakefaeries even for graduates in general. (Perhaps 10 percent of graduates and undergraduates are alternative people, these also being the ones for which most 'standard societies and conventional social groups' don't work. This is why alternative icebreakers are amongst those *most in demand throughout the year*. Though in no way does icebreaker imply alternative. Many cakefaeries are at least one of 'probably not alternative' and 'helpful regardless of whether alternative'.

Another icebreaker format for non-alternative people is a sufficiently thought out format for film nights: the kind in which people talk for 20-30 minutes before and after the film. This could include introducing people to each other as part of the mission statement, brief welfare announcements, and possibly such as cake, snacks or a meal also.

Further examples include: 1) scavenger hunts. 2) Sufficiently friendly versions of the 'assassins game' in cities with sufficiently low crime and rational nonabusive police and uni security set-up. 3) Pirate outings' on small boats, or cardboard boat racing. 4) Improvisation acting workshops, or lighter-hearted acting with scripts. 5) Improv can be extended to invent your own 10-minute society or 10-minute icebreaker, in places with some craft-kit (paper, scissors, glue, lightweight props...) This can *generate* further icebreaker ideas, and test them out.

At least in this city, 1) to 5) are all done by multiple different communities at once, and at least some film nights are run in the above kind of format rather than just for the film itself.