Trigger warnings are becoming the new thing to hate in the Social Justice community. So much so that even liberals are rising up against them as if they were actually the scourge of the first amendment the right loves to caricature them as. Apparently people who have an instructive knowledge surrounding psychology are also not fans of trigger warnings, seeing that some of them are willing to write heavily charged articles that pass off a series of presuppositions and errant psychology concepts as actual research. I am an adherent defender of trigger warnings, however even I see some cracks in the logic social justice community uses for trigger warnings and how differentiation could easily clear up a lot of misuse that trigger warnings have seen lately.
First let's ask ourselves what is a trigger warning and why do we have them? Trigger warnings believe it or not have always existed. It's merely the precautionary dealing with a specific topic that allows someone who may have had experiences with the topic to either remove themselves from a potentially harmful situation or brace themselves for a period of vulnerability. Stripping away all the verbiage, it's a friendly heads up that you're going to be talking about something that might be painful for others to hear about. Many have considered it to be an unnecessary barrier to learning, but the reality is that someone who isn't ready to deal with a difficult topic really isn't going to receive the information well if forced to hear it in a compromised position. Furthermore, Trigger warnings do not bar people from receiving difficult information. In fact, one could argue they help people better receive difficult information. In the same way that it's not considered good practice to plunge someone back into their phobia for therapy, forcing someone to discuss rape/abuse/war without any warning is also unhelpful. Remember when there's a death in the family and you made sure not to bring up the person who died to the person that was closest to them? That's you employing the logic of a trigger warning. Eventually you will discuss that person with them, but instead of an awkward mention of their name followed by a fleeting look of despair, hoping that the other person doesn't respond in a volatile manner, you encroach the topic with care. That's what a trigger warning is. It's encroaching a topic with care.
Hopefully you generally agree with my definition of a Trigger Warning. Now let's talk about what isn't triggering. Racist and sexist comments, especially microaggressions, tend not to be triggering. Now I say this with particular focus on magnitude. Someone discussing with me the overall trend of Puerto Ricans in poverty and ignorantly ascribing blame on Puerto Rico itself, while also absolving the United States of all responsibility is not triggering for me. It's obnoxious. And after minute 1, I get flustered. Minute 2 goes by and I begin to clench my fist. Finally, the person is on the floor with a bewildered look on their face as I begin to shout angrily about how they are ignorant and foolish and yada yada (probably, not, I fight with words and arguments, physical violence is reserved for a select few). The point is that trigger warnings are intended to protect us from a traumatic experience. Someone dropping ignorant bullshit on me is not traumatic. It's annoying. As these annoyances build up, it becomes an experience with a magnitude that could possibly be compared to that of a traumatic experience (honestly at that point the experiences are inextricably different, but let's roll with it). The point is that I don't need a trigger warning for your dumbass vote for Trump post.
Now you might think that I basically gave carte blanche to all racists out there to post their ignorant shit online. I haven't. You see people who do shit like that are toxic. Toxicity is something we put up with all the time. We can't avoid it. People just like spewing their toxic shit because they're inconsiderate. Toxicity and trigger warnings are similar in that they become an issue when people are inconsiderate. Toxicity is a reality we have to live with. However, that doesn't mean we always need to put up with toxicity. We can always choose to walk away. No trigger warning prevents toxicity, it's just a build up of all the negative things in your life. From a friend who jokingly implies that you're not smart enough to achieve something because you're fat to a waiter who assumes you will tip poorly because you're black, toxic behavior is everywhere. Microaggressions are specific examples of toxic behavior, but an environment itself can be toxic. This is why safe spaces become necessary. If I have to live in an unhealthy environment because people refuse to change, I at least deserve a refuge. The notion that I'm trapping myself in an echo chamber is ridiculous. As I've said in previous posts, you cannot mute oppression, it's the dull hum that permeates through our lives.
But the trend in the social justice community has been to conflate topics that are triggering and topics that are toxic. I find this to be inappropriate. Trigger warnings exist because they talk about incredibly intense and powerful experiences that could have an adverse affect on someone. Talk of microaggressions and toxicity, while not peaches and cream, do not have the same magnitude. The response someone might have to toxicity might be just as volatile as someone who is triggered, but that's usually due to an unhealthy build up and not a particular painful vein of memory that had been unexpectedly activated. It's important that when we tell someone to fuck off, we're giving them genuine reasons as to why (if you're bothering to explain at all, you don't have to). When we mischaracterize "toxic" material as triggering, then the perception of trigger warnings being unreasonable becomes affirmed.
An afterword for the assholes. There may be some who read this and take from it that all topics dealing with racism and sexism are not triggering. This is incorrect. For example, and this is a particularly painful history for African Americans (notice how I trigger warned without the TW), discussions surrounding lynching can be triggering for those who have suffered violence due to hate crimes (or violence in general). One experience that I will never forget is when I went to a competition for Model UN and how I was accused of stealing stuff in a room where 4 guys were sleeping. As the only non- white/asian there it became completely clear what the selection criteria for the person's suspicion was. I asked him why he wasn't checking anyone else's area to which he replied " people like you tend to do this sort of thing." I spent the rest of the night on the phone with my father crying. What was even worse was how the higher ups in the organization brushed it off as a "boys will be boys" altercation. The point is that stories that reflect that particular experience might draw a strong and negative response from me. Cautioning me that it might be discussed actually gives me time to gain composure.
First let's ask ourselves what is a trigger warning and why do we have them? Trigger warnings believe it or not have always existed. It's merely the precautionary dealing with a specific topic that allows someone who may have had experiences with the topic to either remove themselves from a potentially harmful situation or brace themselves for a period of vulnerability. Stripping away all the verbiage, it's a friendly heads up that you're going to be talking about something that might be painful for others to hear about. Many have considered it to be an unnecessary barrier to learning, but the reality is that someone who isn't ready to deal with a difficult topic really isn't going to receive the information well if forced to hear it in a compromised position. Furthermore, Trigger warnings do not bar people from receiving difficult information. In fact, one could argue they help people better receive difficult information. In the same way that it's not considered good practice to plunge someone back into their phobia for therapy, forcing someone to discuss rape/abuse/war without any warning is also unhelpful. Remember when there's a death in the family and you made sure not to bring up the person who died to the person that was closest to them? That's you employing the logic of a trigger warning. Eventually you will discuss that person with them, but instead of an awkward mention of their name followed by a fleeting look of despair, hoping that the other person doesn't respond in a volatile manner, you encroach the topic with care. That's what a trigger warning is. It's encroaching a topic with care.
Hopefully you generally agree with my definition of a Trigger Warning. Now let's talk about what isn't triggering. Racist and sexist comments, especially microaggressions, tend not to be triggering. Now I say this with particular focus on magnitude. Someone discussing with me the overall trend of Puerto Ricans in poverty and ignorantly ascribing blame on Puerto Rico itself, while also absolving the United States of all responsibility is not triggering for me. It's obnoxious. And after minute 1, I get flustered. Minute 2 goes by and I begin to clench my fist. Finally, the person is on the floor with a bewildered look on their face as I begin to shout angrily about how they are ignorant and foolish and yada yada (probably, not, I fight with words and arguments, physical violence is reserved for a select few). The point is that trigger warnings are intended to protect us from a traumatic experience. Someone dropping ignorant bullshit on me is not traumatic. It's annoying. As these annoyances build up, it becomes an experience with a magnitude that could possibly be compared to that of a traumatic experience (honestly at that point the experiences are inextricably different, but let's roll with it). The point is that I don't need a trigger warning for your dumbass vote for Trump post.
Now you might think that I basically gave carte blanche to all racists out there to post their ignorant shit online. I haven't. You see people who do shit like that are toxic. Toxicity is something we put up with all the time. We can't avoid it. People just like spewing their toxic shit because they're inconsiderate. Toxicity and trigger warnings are similar in that they become an issue when people are inconsiderate. Toxicity is a reality we have to live with. However, that doesn't mean we always need to put up with toxicity. We can always choose to walk away. No trigger warning prevents toxicity, it's just a build up of all the negative things in your life. From a friend who jokingly implies that you're not smart enough to achieve something because you're fat to a waiter who assumes you will tip poorly because you're black, toxic behavior is everywhere. Microaggressions are specific examples of toxic behavior, but an environment itself can be toxic. This is why safe spaces become necessary. If I have to live in an unhealthy environment because people refuse to change, I at least deserve a refuge. The notion that I'm trapping myself in an echo chamber is ridiculous. As I've said in previous posts, you cannot mute oppression, it's the dull hum that permeates through our lives.
But the trend in the social justice community has been to conflate topics that are triggering and topics that are toxic. I find this to be inappropriate. Trigger warnings exist because they talk about incredibly intense and powerful experiences that could have an adverse affect on someone. Talk of microaggressions and toxicity, while not peaches and cream, do not have the same magnitude. The response someone might have to toxicity might be just as volatile as someone who is triggered, but that's usually due to an unhealthy build up and not a particular painful vein of memory that had been unexpectedly activated. It's important that when we tell someone to fuck off, we're giving them genuine reasons as to why (if you're bothering to explain at all, you don't have to). When we mischaracterize "toxic" material as triggering, then the perception of trigger warnings being unreasonable becomes affirmed.
An afterword for the assholes. There may be some who read this and take from it that all topics dealing with racism and sexism are not triggering. This is incorrect. For example, and this is a particularly painful history for African Americans (notice how I trigger warned without the TW), discussions surrounding lynching can be triggering for those who have suffered violence due to hate crimes (or violence in general). One experience that I will never forget is when I went to a competition for Model UN and how I was accused of stealing stuff in a room where 4 guys were sleeping. As the only non- white/asian there it became completely clear what the selection criteria for the person's suspicion was. I asked him why he wasn't checking anyone else's area to which he replied " people like you tend to do this sort of thing." I spent the rest of the night on the phone with my father crying. What was even worse was how the higher ups in the organization brushed it off as a "boys will be boys" altercation. The point is that stories that reflect that particular experience might draw a strong and negative response from me. Cautioning me that it might be discussed actually gives me time to gain composure.
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