Okay, this is going to be long and rambling, but I hope will clarify how I view the situation regarding "Safe Spaces" and the like. Like Alex, I'm not a wordsmith, and I hope this doesn't offend anyone.
Let's start with the basics, so everyone knows where I'm coming from. I'm a 36-year-old (ugh, god) straight, white, cis male. I was brought up for the first 22 years of my life in the UK, though I am now living in Canada. It is to this former place of residence I am going to be mostly talking about.
The UK has something of an archaic view on gender, and the emotional roles thereof. It is an unwritten law (not rule, or advice, but law) that there are only 3 times a "real man" may show emotion - Upon the death of their child, upon learning they have contracted a fatal illness, or upon their football team winning their national championship. These displays must last no longer than 5 minutes, at which point the "real man" should buck up and get on with it, returning to being as stoic as a rock. Mental illness has only two possible levels - either everything's perfectly fine, or you need to be wrapped in a straightjacket and locked up in a sanitarium. Your problems are yours alone, and looking for help with them is a sign of weakness. "Shell Shock" (or PTSD as we know it now) is something that only weak and insignificant people get, and any problem can be solved by having a cup of tea and just getting on with it. Lost a leg? Walk it off! The refrain from the bridge of 10cc's "I'm not in love" ("Be quiet, big boys don't cry") is whispered to toddlers in their crib, and is hammered into you again and again.
Everyone, and I do mean everyone, men and women, young and old, know these laws to their very core, and hold both themselves and each other to them. For a man to talk about his feelings with anyone is almost the strongest taboo. Women are expected to be highly emotional, running hot and cold as the wind changes, and men have to take it all, remaining firm and strong like the Rock of Gibraltar.
You might believe I'm joking about this, but I'm deadly serious. It's a code that runs throughout the UK as the way it is supposed to be. This is the "Tough Love" that is the very foundation of the country. And it's not just machismo, because that implies there's another way, it's simply The Way It Is. It's been that way since time immemorial, and will ever be so. The "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster wasn't meant to be aspirational, it was reinforcement of an edict so deeply embedded in the collective unconscious the poster was not used because it was thought redundant - of COURSE people would keep calm and carry on, that's how society works!
In the UK, this isn't even considered "Tough Love". This is just how it is. And pushing against that is an incredible uphill struggle - the concept has such inertia it's almost impossible to make headway. All the comedians joking around with self-deprecating humour in the UK? I'll let you in on a little secret - They're not joking. The delivery is "Ha Ha Only Joking" but the reality in their mind is "Ha Ha Only Serious". They mean every word they say, and everyone in the audience understands that. They're laughing because if they don't, someone might find out they're the same, and you can't have that. If that's the case, you must be mental, and the guys in white coats will be by shortly to collect you. That or you're too weak to be trusted with anything, at which point you're a social outcast not worthy of living. I'm pretty sure the UK contingent here will agree with my assessment, just in case you think I'm off my rocker, or projecting or something.
This kind of attitude leads to one of two scenarios. Either you wimp out entirely, break the second most important taboo and rid the world of a defective (namely yourself), or you undergo a psychotic break. While the latter is difficult to track, the former is quite easy. There's a group called "The Samaritans" who maintain suicide prevention phone lines and offices. They are the only independant group in the UK keeping
statistics on suicides, which state that in 2014, 6,122 suicides were registered in the UK. This corresponds to a suicide rate of 10.8 per 100,000 people (16.8 per 100,000 for men and 5.2 per 100,000 for women). That's right, male suicides are THREE TIMES as many as female suicides, which incidentally were the highest rate recorded. And suicide was the leading cause of death for men between 20 and 34 in England and Wales, representing 24% of all deaths.
Statistics like that are what "Tough Love" gets you. It's what being so surrounded by your problems that you have no out, no place to stop and relax, to get your bearings and to chart a new course, not even for a moment, gets you. It's why safe spaces are needed. Not to bury your head in the sand, but to give yourself some space, a chance to collect your thoughts and feelings and look at them objectively, rather than being forced to deal with them head-on every moment of every day. If you have somewhere you can relax, some time you can decompress for a few moments, put your feet up, play a game, have a pint with friends, something like that, then I am very glad you have found a safe space of your own. You might not call it that, you might not think of it like that, but that is what it is. And some people don't have that luxury. Everywhere they go, everywhere they look, they are surrounded by their problems, to such an extent they have nowhere they can go to relax and reflect. Nowhere they can take off the mask of civility and be themselves for a moment, nowhere where they can't be what someone else expects them to be. For those people especially, but for absolutely everyone in general, the doors of the stream shelter are open. You don't have to be, or do, anything here. You don't have to pretend anything. Just come in, be yourself, even if you're not sure who that self is, relax and take a moment. It'll be okay.