My experience at the controversial Manifest 2024 — EA Forum
forum.effectivealtruism.org
My experience at the recently controversial conference/festival on prediction markets …

So despite the nitpicking they did of the Guardian Article, it seems blatantly clear now that Manifest 2024 was infested by racists. The post article doesn’t even count Scott Alexander as “racist” (although they do at least note his HBD sympathies) and identify a count of full 8 racists. They mention a talk discussing the Holocaust as a Eugenics event (and added an edit apologizing for their simplistic framing). The post author is painfully careful and apologetic to distinguish what they personally experienced, what was “inaccurate” about the Guardian article, how they are using terminology, etc. Despite the author’s caution, the comments are full of the classic SSC strategy of trying to reframe the issue (complaining the post uses the word controversial in the title, complaining about the usage of the term racist, complaining about the threat to their freeze peach and open discourse of ideas by banning racists, etc.).

  • David Gerard@awful.systemsMEnglish
    0·
    6 months ago

    comment:

    I was at Manifest as a volunteer, and I also saw much of the same behaviour as you. If I had known scientific racism or eugenics were acceptable topics of conversation there, I wouldn’t have gone. I’m increasingly glad I decided not to organise a talk.

    EA needs to recognise that even associating with scientific racists and eugenicists turns away many of the kinds of bright, kind, ambitious people the movement needs. I am exhausted at having to tell people I am an EA ‘but not one of those ones’. If the movement truly values diversity of views, we should value the people we’re turning away just as much.

    my brother in the Acausal Robot God, I have some unfortunate news about what your fellow EAs have espoused for the past twenty years.

    Austin from Manifest responds that leftist views would obviously much more damaging to EA than racist ones, because reasons.

    • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
      0·
      6 months ago

      Austin from Manifest responds that leftist views would obviously much more damaging to EA than racist ones, because reasons.

      I can accept racism, but I draw the line at suggesting that self enrichment is bad.

      • Sailor Sega Saturn@awful.systemsEnglish
        0·
        6 months ago

        comment from Austin:

        I don’t love that some guests we invited may turn away bright, ambitious, and especially kind folks like yourself; I write a bit more about this here. I think the opposite is true as well, though, where left-leaning views turn away some of the most awesome up-and-coming folks.

        “Sure it’s not ideal that all the racists drove off all the leftists. But have you considered the alternative is alienating the most awesome up and coming racists??”

        • deborah@awful.systemsEnglish
          0·
          6 months ago

          also here for “well the opposite of left wing views is racism”

          thanks for saying it aloud my friend

        • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
          0·
          6 months ago

          where left-leaning views turn away some of the most awesome up-and-coming folks.

          What left-leaning views? Like most of the times people are driven off by the strawmen of left-leaning views. Look at this place for example, nobody has shared guillotine building instructions for days! I half joke here, but it was quite odd how often during my /ssc period I saw people go ‘the left doesn’t think/talk about X, or they have not considered problem Y’, while seeing leftwing politicians I knew talk about those subjects at the same time. For all the claims about the right being better at passing political turing tests, they actually failed in real time. And considering some things we read about this event the left-leaning ideas are more like ‘don’t act like a transphobe’.