Recording of the debate at Battle of Ideas 2017 (https://www.battleofideas.org.uk/session/safety-first/)
The ‘safety first’ outlook, intending to keep us safe by imagining the worst, risks increasing our sense of existential insecurity. Always anticipating catastrophe may mean over-reacting, especially in the fields of science, health and technology. We have become the victims of scaremongering over theoretical risks – from mobile phone radiation or the latest strain of flu, even from familiar foods such as sugar and salt.
Has safety become an aim in itself, divorced from a common-sense assessment of risk? Does the desire to eliminate all danger undermine individual freedom? Is it time to confront the dangers of our ‘safety first’ society?
SPEAKERS
Richard Angell
director, Progress
Terry Barnes
principal, Cormorant Policy Advice; fellow, Institute of Economic Affairs; former special adviser to two Australian health ministers
Professor Bill Durodié
chair of international relations, former head of department, University of Bath
Dr Clare Gerada
medical director, NHS Practitioner Health Programme; former chair, Royal College of General Practitioners
Lenore Skenazy
'America’s Worst Mom'; president, Let Grow; founder, Free-Range Kids book, blog and movement
#LockdownDebates: The divided state of America?
#LockdownDebates: Can we cancel ’cancel culture’?
#Arts&SocietyForum: Gabriella Swallow on JS Bach and Helmut Lachenmann
#SocialPolicyForum: Behind the NHS frontline
#EconomyForum: The Covid-19 global economy - from Italy to South Africa
Book Launch: Why borders matter, with Professor Frank Furedi
#Arts&SocietyForum: Gericault, Picasso and the art of composition
#Arts&SocietyForum: Morality and hell - the power of Dante’s Inferno
#EducationForum: After toppling statues, is it time to rewrite the curriculum?
#LockdownDebates: From furlough to mask-wearing: can we ever return to normal?
#BookClub: Burning books and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451
#LockdownDebates: How innovation works, with Matt Ridley
#SportscastOfIdeas: Sporting life beyond lockdown
#LockdownDebates: Has the NHS had a good crisis?
#Arts&SocietyForum: The shock of the old in Steven Berkoff’s ‘Greek’
#BookClub: Sally Rooney’s Normal People and the triumph of intimacy
#EconomyForum: The oil industry in times of Corona
#EducationForum: Can we go back to school?
#BookClub: When art imitates life - Albert Camus’ The Plague in lockdown
#LockdownDebates: What does George Floyd’s killing mean for British society?
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free