No one is arguing that people should be harassed "literally all the time" (or ever).
Some of the more egregious deployments of "safe spaces" in universities happened in response to controversial campus speakers who were deemed to have views that were threatening to some students. According to some campus radical leftists, the very presence of such speakers was "violence" and a literal "threat" to marginalized students.
Of course, the students could simply refuse to attend the talks of speakers they didn't like, but that wouldn't make as dramatic a statement as creating an explicit "safe space" where they could congregate.
Some of the more egregious deployments of "safe spaces" in universities happened in response to controversial campus speakers who were deemed to have views that were threatening to some students. According to some campus radical leftists, the very presence of such speakers was "violence" and a literal "threat" to marginalized students.
Of course, the students could simply refuse to attend the talks of speakers they didn't like, but that wouldn't make as dramatic a statement as creating an explicit "safe space" where they could congregate.