Safety means slower and this is viewed as a winner takes all game.
This isn't new either, the safety glass cracked the day OpenAI publicly launched ChatGPT. "Safety" was (and perhaps still is) a fall back for the models plateauing and LLMs failing to really make an impact..."we need more time while we focus on safety"
But after this latest round of models, it's a lot more fuel on the "this could be it" fire. Labs are eager to train on the new gigawatt scale datacenters coming online, and it's very hard to make a case right now that the we won't get another step-change up in capability. Safety just obstructs all that.
Research was being done slower, until OpenAI forced everyone to jump the gun or potentially be left behind. For a few months it looked like everyone was light years behind them.