Are Chatham House Rules just a way for people to hedge their bets? If they say something controversial, rude, offensive, or downright dodgy, they can hide behind anonymity. But if it’s a hit or something clever, insightful, or widely praised—they’re quick to claim credit. Convenient, isn’t it?
It is indeed convenient, not just for individuals, but for society at large. People keep their most "controversial, rude, offensive, or downright dodgy" only to be said amongst friends whom they trust to not "out" them, while keeping their utterances in the public sphere more self-censored, in order to avoid offending people and being rebuked. I'm pretty sure that this is how it's always been, and I'm quite happy with it.
It doesn't have to be controversial, even. It might just be a little bit private.
I'm on a social tech Slack that uses the CHR. It means if someone asks a question about, I don't know, how my company does something, I can say "ah, yeah, we used to use vendor X, that didn't work because of Y, and now we're with Z instead" without worrying about a blog post showing up that says "wlonkly from company Foo says that Foo used to use X but dropped them because..." but they can definitely use the information I gave them to help solve their problem.
