[hvdijk]

Ah, thanks for the clarification, I think we've been talking about two slightly different things, then. For you, std::optional would have to make C++ more memory-unsafe than it already is in order for "anti-memory-safety" to be a fair characterisation. For me, that label merely implies that memory-safer alternative designs of std::optional were considered, and the current design was picked despite its memory-unsafety being a known potential issue. I think I would likely agree with you that std::optional does not make C++ less memory-safe than it already was before that got added.