> I would not trust a pair of free goggles to protect my eyes from a 50 W laser.

FTFY: I would not trust a 50 W laser.

I wouldn't trust it not to blind me, not to blind someone else, not to make burn marks on my walls, not to catch fire randomly, and not to actually output 50W.

This article [0] is a 'fun' look at the laser regulatory environment. Unfortunately, that environment doesn't seem to have teeth yet.

0: http://www.funraniumlabs.com/2017/08/laser-products-hate/

I was once helping troubleshoot a UV laser in a lab. It was an IR Nd:YAG pulsed laser with two frequency doublers, and I think the rated output was something like 1 J. The measured UV output was essentially nil. We took off the second doubler and fired the laser at the side of a desktop computer we didn’t care about while wearing serious goggles. There was a little snap and the paint got replaced with a shiny metal spot. :) You do not want a laser like that anywhere near your eyes.

1 joule seems small, until you consider its of LIGHT.

The point of the goggles isn't to protect you from a 50W laser. Or even 1W laser (most googles will quickly melt).

The danger is reflections, at over a watt even the dot that the pointer produces on the wall can be bright enough to cause permanent blindness unless with goggles.