"I'm Triggered By Your Triggers"

[Sasha]

I'm Triggered By Your Triggers

Posted by Danielle Henderson (http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/danielle-henderson/Author?oid=18503347) on Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 10:13 AM

http://www.thestranger.com/binary/c6d1/1395104632-shutterstock_155209307.jpg
I’ve been watching this conversation about trigger warnings take shape for a while. Trigger warnings are used to warn others that there might be something you're about to say or post could cause a negative reaction (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Trigger+warning). I first heard the phrase in a college classroom when I was an undergrad. Then I started seeing it on feminist blogs a lot; it really came from feminist spaces as a way to have tough conversations without alienating people, and it was always a useful way to be inclusive while still talking about intense topics like rape, abuse, and trauma. It’s difficult to comment on trigger warnings—too little interest in them means you’re being insensitive, too much interest means you’re overreacting and being absurd. Trigger warnings are used as weapons against individuals (did you know people have argued that mentioning Dan Savage should be preceded by a trigger warning?) and now, entire universities (http://tressiemc.com/2014/03/05/the-trigger-warned-syllabus/).
At my core, I think trigger warnings are weird. It’s strange to go through life assuming every space is suitable for you, and if it isn’t then you can do something to change it so that it is. That’s just fundamentally untrue, and a new level of privilege I can’t even comprehend. It’s also strange to me that people want to be shielded from pain not by changing themselves, but by influencing everything around them.
But I also have personal experience with trauma, and I often think about what a more compassionate world would look like. I was sexually and physically abused as a child over a period of years. No one knew about it (threatening children is still a remarkably effective way to ensure silence), and by the time I was able to drag myself to therapy in my 20s I’d already been suicidal, depressed, and sort of dead inside. Aside from wishing it never happened, I wished that I would be able to find a way to get through it, to not live with the pain of assault every single day. It seemed impossible—for the first few sessions I just sat on my therapist’s couch and paid $45 and hour to sob. But then my therapist, knowing I liked to read, gave me a few books that she thought would help, things like Dorothy Allison’s Bastard Out of Carolina and The Courage to Heal. And it did—reading about survivors helped me survive. I could finally see a way through to talking about it, then putting in the work to do something about it, and finally becoming the badass motherfucker you’re reading right now.
Imagine if those books were deemed too triggering, and I never had a chance to read them.
I know that my experience is specific to me, but I think there’s something to be said for learning about trauma without experiencing it all over again. The only way I figured out how to do that was with therapy. When I see people who require trigger warnings, my first thought is to pay attention to what they’re saying, but my second thought is “Are they getting the help they need?” I think we’re missing a bigger point here, because trigger warnings are really about mental health. The world is shitty and unyielding and not likely to bend to your will, and your best offense is a good defense. With the right tools, it’s possible to live in a sea of assholes and thrive.
But we’re not giving people the right tools with trigger warnings—we’re giving them a way out of their pain by avoidance and deflection. Having a way out isn’t enough when it’s situational, because you never know what’s going to bring up your issues again. Is it easier to step into a suit of armor, or cover the world in bubble wrap?
Trigger warnings in the classroom (http://tressiemc.com/2014/03/05/the-trigger-warned-syllabus/) are trickier. I used to teach gender studies, and difficult topics are likely to come up because women are treated like garbage the world over. I didn’t want my students to feel like they had to suffer through something that made them feel terrible, but learning about the world was their job, and teaching them about it was mine. I tried to walk the line—I told students one semester that if they had any difficulty with the topics we were covering to please come and see me so we can get them the help they need, but that I would also come up with a different assignment for them. That quickly backfired, as I was suddenly writing up tailor-made assignments for 50 individuals. I was also taken advantage of completely—one student who hadn’t read the book I assigned told me that she couldn’t even start it because she was told there was a character in it who had bulimia. She admitted that she didn’t have bulimia herself—she just didn’t want to read about it.
I empathize with people who have experienced trauma. I’m compassionate, and I want them to get help to feel better. But I think the path to healing is not avoidance, and trigger warnings have gone way off the rails.



http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2014/03/18/im-triggered-by-your-triggers

[Quail]

I think there is a huge difference between reading a book about something traumatic as part of a course of therapy and accidentally stumbling upon a graphic rape scene which triggers flashbacks and a huge dip in your mental health, because nobody thought to put a warning that it was there. We have to acknowledge that not everybody has access to adequate mental health care, and that the reasoning that people need to get used to the triggering nature of the real world doesn't really wash with me. As comrades we should be looking after each other, and that includes treading carefully when it comes to discussing graphic and difficult topics.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I think there is a huge difference between reading a book about something traumatic as part of a course of therapy and accidentally stumbling upon a graphic rape scene which triggers flashbacks and a huge dip in your mental health, because nobody thought to put a warning that it was there. We have to acknowledge that not everybody has access to adequate mental health care, and that the reasoning that people need to get used to the triggering nature of the real world doesn't really wash with me. As comrades we should be looking after each other, and that includes treading carefully when it comes to discussing graphic and difficult topics.

Right - the argument seems to be "well why should I do anything in order to make you not feel horrible?" It really reeks of the worst sort of tough-guy pseudo-individualism. That said, I think the overuse of trigger warnings, for situations that are not remotely triggering, has contributed to their poor reputation.

[Tenka]

I think *TRIGGER WARNING*s are mostly a waste of space. One can usually tell from the title of an article whether one can tolerate the subject.

edit: in cases where there are graphic pictures or description obviously that can be made clear in the title...

[Sasha]

@ quail, absolutely; someone in the comments to that piece writes
"We live in a world where people flip out over spoilers in reviews of movies and TV, where critics have for years put spoiler warnings at the start of their work, yet to extend that basic 30 second worth of effort to victims and survivors is considered the end of all journalism and composition." and they are ofcourse right, it should not be a yes or no question, and i think the OP article is also not argueing that.
but its getting out of hand and that is hurting the cause, obviously articles with graphic descriptions of rape etc should and could have some form of warning, esp on a presumed progressive board as this, but i have seen triggerwarnings longer than the actual content at times, trigger warnings for a single quoted slur, etc etc.
its like the power of definition and privilege debates, the concepts are good, but people ran with it and abuse it to enforce a "your only allowed to be a feminist if" hivemind and false dichotomy against allies.

[Rosa Partizan]

In some ways, she is right. There are hardly posts in feminist fb-groups (at least the ones I know) where there is NO trigger warning. I caught myself several times thinking, wtf is triggering about that, but then again, can I know? I don't share other people's actualities of life, so why should my opinion matter? I guess it's a bit short of an argument to be like "you have to get help to be able fo face all this stuff", when all these blogs and articles can't provide this help. And unless they can't do so, they should be obliging and empathetic. Only because the world can't be respectively doesn't want to be, doesn't mean that nobody has to be. I guess there's folks being VERY sensitive, even about stuff that really doesn't seem that much big of a deal. Having said that, those sensitive people are far less part of the problem than the ones that think that all these people with cases of abuse in the past should "just not be so whiny about it". Because reality is a VERY subjective thing. I don't share no ones life and experience, so why should I decide on what's allowed to be painful to them and what not.

Does this post make sense? I find it badly structured. Whatever.

[synthesis]

It seems to me to be sort of analogous to affirmative action: an inexpensive, superficial and often arbitrary solution to a huge societal problem, but better that than nothing at all.

[BIXX]

Like was said earlier, I think they have been overused, but they are important. There are some things that have triggered me in the past that I wish someone had mentioned would be triggering. On the other hand, I have known them to be used to head things that (as far as I can tell) weren't a big deal, but again, that is from my perspective so maybe it is really good for people to have those ones that don't seem like such a big deal to me.

I wish I had more perspective on this issue, but unfortunately I can't.

[Red Commissar]

When did Trigger Warnings become frequently used? I don't remember seeing it used a lot until a couple of years ago. Kind of reminds me of the usage of SPOILER ALERT that I've seen for a long time. Or 56k warning for heavy image load in a thread way back when.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

The Stranger is a newspaper for liberal hipsters.

[tallguy]

I more or less agree with your OP Sasha. Life can be tough and some of us get a shitty start in it. We can't change that, but we can decide whether to let it beat us. Some of us, myself included for while, can even spiral into a self destructive cycle of self pity and behavioural self harm. And, whilst there is certainly a short term psychological profit to be had from that, it costs far more in the long run.

Get busy living or get busy dying

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Trigger warnings are kind of a blunt instrument anyways. People's trauma is particular and unique. A soldier with PTSD and a rape victim with PTSD will have very different traumas. I think the main thing is to make it clear that the following article/story/series of words has graphic depictions of XYZ.

[Tigertilda]

I dont think "trigger warnings have gone way off the rails.".
People get anxious of different stuff, heterosex, rape descriptions, violence, eating disordersstuff etc. To put trigger warnings on things is a way to care about your fellows so they can be able to choose to read or not read / watch something that can trigger. TW:s can make a big difference to one's mental well-being.

I am also involved in many feminist groups on fb which triggerwarns alot, I think it's good because patriarchal anxiety is not easily treated. I appreciate feminists that do not blame, oppress or reduce the problems of others.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I hate to use "common sense" as a reference point, since so-called "common sense" is basically predicated on hegemonic patriarchal white supremacy, but . . .

Literally anything can be triggering, and that something is triggering doesn't make it "bad". I have a friend who is triggered by a particular colour of orange since it's the colour of the caps her rigs came with when she used to shoot up. "TW: Orange" would be utter nonsense.

However, something like, "rape scene" or "description of a lynch mob" - a graphic depiction of violence that is likely to disturb people probably warrants a heads up.

Like, duh.

[tallguy]

Completely coincidental to this thread, my wife told me this morning of something that happened to her in Tescos just yesterday. She was at the cheese isle looking for cheese and was singing an old disco song out loud to herself that she used to love when we were kids. It had a line in it that went something like "babe, you're just sex machine"

At which point, a woman grabbed hold of my wife’s shoulder from behind and aggressively informed her that she had been abused as a child and my wife singing those lyrics were offensive to her.

I mean, what the fuck?

I am completely sick of this passive aggressive "you're not allowed to offend me" victim-hood bullshit that is being pushed in our culture at the moment. Here we are, in the midst of a growing global crisis of capitalism with the shit kicking off across the globe from Cairo to Kiev and beyond. And, at precisely the same time, we are getting an ever growing push on the identity politics front where everyone has to now be afraid of ever offending anyone else with anything and everything they say or express.

Fear, it's all about the promotion of fear and anger about anything and everything except the things we should be angry about. Non of which is to disparage the suffering of victims of abuse of any kind. But that suffering is currently being co-opted and manipulated for the purposes of taking people's eye off our real enemies and, instead, look for the enemy in the eyes of everyone around us. It's just the latest version of a very old game of getting the peasants to turn on each other.

And, as usual, the whining liberals and even so-called laughable little "revolutionary left" internet backwaters like this place are being played like fiddles in all of this by being kept nice and busy and distracted

What a fucking surprise.

[Tigertilda]

I am completely fucking sick of this passive aggressive victim hood bullshit that is being promoted in our culture at the moment. Here we are, in the midst of a growing global crisis of capitalism with the shit kicking off from the bottom up by people from Cairo to Kiev. And, at precisely the same time, we are getting a growing push on the identity politics front where everyone has to now be afraid of ever offending everyone else with anything and everything they say or express. Fear, it's all about fear and anger about anything and everything except the things we should be angry about. Non of which is to disparage the suffering of victims of abuse of any kind. But that suffering is currently being co-opted and manipulated for the purposes of taking people's eye off the ball.

And the whining liberal left are being played like fucking fiddles in all of this by being kept nice and busy and distracted

What a fucking surprise.
Just so you know, there is no contradiction between using TW:s and organize politically. No one has said that we should put the class struggle aside just because we triggerwarn.

Triggerwarnings are designed to prevent people who have an extremely strong and damaging emotional response, for example, post-traumatic flashbacks or urges to harm themselves to certain subjects from encountering them unaware. If I could prevent someone from getting panic attacks by a TW, it's worth it. Why is that a problem?

Sometimes, it feels like that word identitypolitics is hijacked by privileged groups who want to avoid self-examination when marginalized groups points out their privileges, or as a derogatory term for political analysis that includes skin color or gender for example.

[tallguy]

Just so you know, there is no contradiction between using TW:s and organize politically. No one has said that we should put the class struggle aside just because we triggerwarn.

Triggerwarnings are designed to prevent people who have an extremely strong and damaging emotional response, for example, post-traumatic flashbacks or urges to harm themselves to certain subjects from encountering them unaware. If I could prevent someone from getting panic attacks by a TW, it's worth it. Why is that a problem?

Sometimes, it feels like that word identitypolitics is hijacked by privileged groups who want to avoid self-examination when marginalized groups points out their privileges, or as a derogatory term for political analysis that includes skin color or gender for example.Utter drivel. The world is a place full of things you might not like or want to see and sometimes is has things in it that are downright bloody unpleasant to see or hear. Grow a fucking backbone and live with it. This growing meme of promoting such insipid whining is pathetic at best and, when it is suddenly popping up everywhere at precisely the same time people are beginning to rise up and shout all kinds of things our authorities want us to shut the fuck up about, is more than a bit sinister.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Utter drivel. The world is a place full of things you might not like or want to see and sometimes is has things in it that are downright bloody unpleasant to see or hear. Grow a fucking backbone and live with it. This growing meme of promoting such insipid whining is pathetic at best and, when it is suddenly popping up everywhere at precisely the same time people are beginning to rise up and shout all kinds of things our authorities want us to shut the fuck up about, is more than a bit sinister.

If anything is sinister, it's the idea that people rising up is somehow held back by critical attitudes toward cultural norms of bourgeois society (like, in your example, shitty degrading pop-music). The denigrating of such criticism with statements like "grow a fucking backbone" is, of course, an echo of ruling class tropes like, "Get a job!"

We have to draw a line between liberalism (which imagines a fantasy world without triggers) and revolutionary struggle (which demands that we confront patriarchy and white supremacy).

If you can't take someone saying, "Stop singing your shitty sexist disco song!" because it hurts your feelings, it's not the complainant who needs to "tough up".

[Dagoth Ur]

People do need to grow a thicker skin however, not for other people's benefits but so they can survive in this world. Anything else is liberal infantile nonsense. The patriarchy must be crushed but crying over hurt feelings doesn't help anyone least of all yourself. It's self-pity writ large and with a political component.

Third-wave feminism is the worst one ever. So sickeningly liberal.

[tallguy]

People do need to grow a thicker skin however, not for other people's benefits but so they can survive in this world. Anything else is liberal infantile nonsense. The patriarchy must be crushed but crying over hurt feelings doesn't help anyone least of all yourself. It's self-pity writ large and with a political component....Yes, and, further than that, I do believe that there are forces at the very top of our societies that are more than happy to encourage and facilitate such self destructive, infantilising bollocks since it serves their interest nicely.

[Dagoth Ur]

I agree. I think this shit is more an outgrowth of paternal feminism in a modern context. We must coddle the poor little victims of patriarchy because they are small minded children who cannot handle conflict. :rolleyes:

I wish that rolleye emoticon didn't smile because I am not.

[Quail]

Yup, it is definitely self-destructive, infantilising bollocks when people want to avoid stuff that triggers flashbacks/panic attacks/binging and purging/self-harming/etc...

Honestly I don't get the big deal with warning people about graphic content which is likely to be triggering.

[Dagoth Ur]

I've seen things I wish I hadn't seen. Life has no "trigger warning". This is just some internet bullshit that blogs made popular.

[Quail]

Yeah, life has no trigger warnings blah blah blah, but to be quite honest it seems like you're being a massive arsehole if you can't be bothered to type a few words to warn someone that you're posting a graphic description of rape.

[Tigertilda]

Why reduce anyone's anxiety in this way? Patriarchal oppression is not easily treated and you can not "shake it off." (it's impossible to cure patriarchal oppression today because one always gets exposed to it every day in this society)
A trigger warning could be the difference between spending the afternoon in the fetal position or to avoid having to do it.

I think it is important to understand that the experience of example men and women differ in a fundamental way, that there are large differences in the conditions of our very existence. That which a man stands out as a joke/just a text/just a movie, even if it is a rough one, can for a woman be a reminder and an extension of an ever-present patriarchal oppression, and thus difficult to "shake off " .

[Dagoth Ur]

I don't post graphic description of rapes and I don't see the need. It may be cathartic for a person to relate these things but I hardly see how, and even less why they feel the need to post it on the internet instead of telling real people in the real world. You can call me a massive arsehole all you like but this doesn't change that "trigger warnings" and other such nonsense are purely-internet based and have no relationship to the actual world.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Utter drivel. The world is a place full of things you might not like or want to see and sometimes is has things in it that are downright bloody unpleasant to see or hear. Grow a fucking backbone and live with it. This growing meme of promoting such insipid whining is pathetic at best and, when it is suddenly popping up everywhere at precisely the same time people are beginning to rise up and shout all kinds of things our authorities want us to shut the fuck up about, is more than a bit sinister.

"Hello, I am an internet tough guy. I get over my feelings of inadequacy now that the left is slowly moving away from Wohlforthian masturbatory workerism by offering unsolicited advice about how traumatised people can avoid inconveniencing me, which makes me shit myself and cry like a baby.

I also have no grasp of Marxist theory and think that Islamist and fascist 'people's revolutions' are epochal events that leave the bourgeoisie shaking with fear."


I've seen things I wish I hadn't seen. Life has no "trigger warning". This is just some internet bullshit that blogs made popular.

The phrase "trigger warning" is Tumblr-speak, but the concept of warning people about things that might cause them massive discomfort is probably as old as the printed word.


People do need to grow a thicker skin however, not for other people's benefits but so they can survive in this world.

Except, of course, "growing a thicker skin" isn't something that happens overnight, and avoiding panic attacks and so on in the mean time is what any rational person would do.

One thing that I find really interesting is the massive difference in the treatment victims of rape etc. receive, and the treatment veteran soldiers with PTSP receive. Obviously, if you're a woman that got raped, it's your own damn fault if you don't grow a thicker skin immediately, and how dare you inconvenience someone by *gasp* asking them to think about what they're saying and how they present it, but if you're a darling little Keystone stormtrooper...

[Quail]

What is the problem with having safer spaces on the internet for discussion though? I really don't understand the hostility. I want to look after my comrades and if that involves typing a few words to warn about the content I'm posting or using spoiler tags then I'll do it. Why is it better to take the attitude "there are horrible things in the world, deal with it" than to create an atmosphere where people feel safe posting (online) or discussing things (in the real world). It doesn't take much if any effort to put a content warning on something, and if it's going to help someone to take care of their mental health then I don't understand why you wouldn't bother.

[Dagoth Ur]

The phrase "trigger warning" is Tumblr-speak, but the concept of warning people about things that might cause them massive discomfort is probably as old as the printed word.
If rape stories made me feel uncomfortable or bad, as they do, I would avoid them, as I do. It is quite simple. If you are reading about rape expect something that is going to be graphic, and if you have some humanity about you, will be hurtful to hear. I do not expect people to take my feelings into account when they are writing about their own.


Except, of course, "growing a thicker skin" isn't something that happens overnight, and avoiding panic attacks and so on in the mean time is what any rational person would do.
Oh of course I don't mean to sound like this is a sudden change that anyone can just effect. My issue is with people advocating the idea that people shouldn't have to toughen up in the face of adversity. There is a tendency among many of these types to wallow around in self-pity and misery.


One thing that I find really interesting is the massive difference in the treatment victims of rape etc. receive, and the treatment veteran soldiers with PTSP receive. Obviously, if you're a woman that got raped, it's your own damn fault if you don't grow a thicker skin immediately, and how dare you inconvenience someone by *gasp* asking them to think about what they're saying and how they present it, but if you're a darling little Keystone stormtrooper...
Victims of rape should get counseling from the state. That's a given. But you don't have to go after what are essentially working class kids, who just wanted to go to school having their whole brain chemistry jacked up by people who used them up, to make that point.

Part of the problem is victimization itself. Even those sympathetic to rape victims place them into a separate "they got raped" box. This divide is a huge problem. Even in benign cases you've assigned them "you're different" status and in worse cases you get the blame for being "different". I think this is largely a defense mechanism with most people so they can keep on believing that they couldn't ever get raped because of whatever.

The whole thing is a tragedy, from every conceivable angle, but I think that we'd better help everyone if our goal was getting everyone to accept that rape happens not just the victims. Shit like trigger warnings are impediments to these things, and sounds frankly childish.

[Redistribute the Rep]

Yes, and, further than that, I do believe that there are forces at the very top of our societies that are more than happy to encourage and facilitate such self destructive, infantilising bollocks since it serves their interest nicely.

Hmm? I don't see how this serves the interests of the bourgeoisie. At least in America, this "liberal hysteria" myth is largely exaggerated by the media and used to silence anyone who wants to address relevant social issues.

Observe: the 700 club compares Sweden to North Korea for attempting to address racial issues:
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BeiLMrvKoc8

I just fail to see how wanting to address certain issues is in the interest of the ruling class, sorry.

[Quail]

Except getting mental health treatment and counselling is actually really hard, and yes, even in the UK where you don't have to pay for these things. It's a fact that loads of people right now are suffering from untreated PTSD, eating disorders, and so on. It makes sense to me to label content appropriately so that such people don't have to deal with unnecessary distress.

Also, it's fine trying to avoid depictions of rape (or other traumatic stuff), but without content warnings you can't really do that. Being caught off guard is unpleasant to say the least.

[Redistribute the Rep]

If rape stories made me feel uncomfortable or bad, as they do, I would avoid them, as I do.

That's the whole point of the trigger warning, if I'm not mistaken? So people can avoid reading it?

[tallguy]

Except getting mental health treatment and counselling is actually really hard, and yes, even in the UK where you don't have to pay for these things. It's a fact that loads of people right now are suffering from untreated PTSD, eating disorders, and so on. It makes sense to me to label content appropriately so that such people don't have to deal with unnecessary distress.

Fine, then you should continue to do so. Any decent person will always try and take account of the weaknesses of others where it's practical and possible to predict them. Though not always. Sometimes it's not possible and sometimes it's just necessary to tell shit how it is.


Also, it's fine trying to avoid depictions of rape (or other traumatic stuff), but without content warnings you can't really do that. Being caught off guard is unpleasant to say the least.That's called being alive in the world. Get used to it and stop bloody whining. More's the point, stop trying to infantilise others such that they need people like you to "protect" them. I'm sure it gives you a sense of purpose, but you’re not helping them. You're just creating a job for people like you and it's pathetic.

[consuming negativity]

Imagine if those books were deemed too triggering, and I never had a chance to read them.

The author says this as if trigger warnings delete the content after them. Or, in this case, set an entire library on fire. It is the people posting who are overusing trigger warnings, not the people they are intended to protect. This article is just attacking traumatized persons from some weird holier-than-thou "I know what's best for you" stance.

[Dagoth Ur]

It's all a bunch of bullshit where Victimization has become a badge to be shown to give a new form of "privilege". I can attest to the fact that being trans sometimes gets you leeway that you otherwise wouldn't have, among the right people of course.

@Russian Red: From what I've seen it is so they can read it without being shocked that there is a graphic element to a story about fucking rape.

@quail: Maybe if you're afraid of having a mental collapse over certain topics you should avoid those topics altogether. At least until you can anyways.

[Redistribute the Rep]

The trigger warnings are so that people can avoid reading the threads that contain intense material. If someone knows they will be triggered by that sort of content, they will see the warning and won't click on it. At least this is how it worked on the ED recovery websites I used to go on.

[Dagoth Ur]

You should be able to tell from the title. And if the title is misleading the poster should be punished. No need for trigger warnings at all.

[Quail]

Fine, then you should continue to do so. Any decent person will always try and take account of the weaknesses of others where it's practical and possible to predict them. Though not always. Sometimes it's not possible and sometimes it's just necessary to tell shit how it is.

That's called being alive in the world. Get used to it and stop bloody whining. More's the point, stop trying to infantilise others such that they need people like you to "protect" them. I'm sure it gives you a sense of purpose, but you’re not helping them. You're just creating a job for people like you and it's pathetic.
I'm not infantilisng others or fucking whining over nothing you complete and utter wanker. Most of what I say on the topic of trigger warnings is based on my own experience and what I find helpful. Seriously all I'm asking is that people post potentially triggering stuff with content warnings to make it easier for survivors of sexual violence and other people with mental health problems to avoid stuff that exacerbates those issues. I'd rather not suffer a mental health relapse just because you think I should grow a backbone or something.



@quail: Maybe if you're afraid of having a mental collapse over certain topics you should avoid those topics altogether. At least until you can anyways.
That's what I do. And that's why I find trigger warnings helpful.

...And that's me ducking out of this thread because fuck you guys.

[tallguy]

I don't have so much of a problem with sites that are specifically geared towards dealing with intense topics and where certain protocols of behaviour (such as a requirement for trigger warnings) are built-in to such sites (although, I am bound to say, that I am somewhat perplexed that someone deliberately visiting such a site would need a warning about the possible content). Where I have much more of a problem is when this bleeds out into general discourse in sites not specifically geared for the purpose. And when it start to further bleed out into everyday cultural life when some idiot feels at liberty to aggressively tell a woman in a supermarket to stop singing the completely innocuous lyrics from a 70s disco song because it has hurt her feelings is when it crosses a line from being culturally silly to being culturally sinister.

[Dagoth Ur]

Oh jesus don't run off like that. That's the opposite of dialogue. I mean why even contribute to this thread if you're just going to get mad when people disagree?

[tallguy]

I....Most of what I say on the topic of trigger warnings is based on my own experience and what I find helpful....

Hey, we can all play the "my wounds are bigger than your wounds" game Quail. Do you think you have the market cornered on bad shit happening to you? Think again. Get busy living out in the world or get busy dying inside Quail. Personally, I choose living. I genuinely hope you can get to a point where you can do the same.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

If rape stories made me feel uncomfortable or bad, as they do, I would avoid them, as I do. It is quite simple. If you are reading about rape expect something that is going to be graphic, and if you have some humanity about you, will be hurtful to hear. I do not expect people to take my feelings into account when they are writing about their own.

The problem is that rape is going to be mentioned, and sometimes described in stomach-churning detail, in texts that are not explicitly rape stories. Trigger warnings, as much as I detest the sort of "trigger warning: blue" idiocy that reigns on some parts of Tumblr, are extremely useful for people that want to avoid certain themes.


Oh of course I don't mean to sound like this is a sudden change that anyone can just effect. My issue is with people advocating the idea that people shouldn't have to toughen up in the face of adversity.

Except literally no one on this thread has advocated that idea. People have been derisive toward tallguy's "you need to grow a thicker skin" nonsense because it's a blatant attempt to blame traumatised people for inconveniencing his esteemed self by asking for minimum consideration.


Victims of rape should get counseling from the state. That's a given. But you don't have to go after what are essentially working class kids, who just wanted to go to school having their whole brain chemistry jacked up by people who used them up, to make that point.

I don't have to - but it is interesting nonetheless. And yes, many people in the imperialist armies have a Sad Story (TM). Just as many cops do. It doesn't matter. Objectively, they're the enemy of the workers and of the oppressed, an arm of the bourgeois state. They're not a conscript army we could split.


Part of the problem is victimization itself. Even those sympathetic to rape victims place them into a separate "they got raped" box. This divide is a huge problem. Even in benign cases you've assigned them "you're different" status and in worse cases you get the blame for being "different". I think this is largely a defense mechanism with most people so they can keep on believing that they couldn't ever get raped because of whatever.

But they are different - in this specific scope. If you want to address concrete social problems, the first thing you have to do is dispense with platitudes about how Everybody is the Same. Just as you can't fight racism by being "colour-blind".

[synthesis]

I also rage at "viewer discretion advised" warnings on television


If rape stories made me feel uncomfortable or bad, as they do, I would avoid them, as I do. It is quite simple. If you are reading about rape expect something that is going to be graphic, and if you have some humanity about you, will be hurtful to hear. I do not expect people to take my feelings into account when they are writing about their own.

I used to sort of think like this, although I hope I didn't come across this douchey. The problem with this line of thinking is that "being triggered" isn't equivalent to "having your feelings hurt." It's a physiological response to trauma and trigger warnings help prepare the survivor for this response.

I didn't understand it until I went to rehab and learned the lingo about "being triggered" in the drug addiction sense of the term, which is also a physiological reaction. It's not the same as the term being used in the context of sexual abuse and violence, although they do overlap, of course, but the gist is similar: it's going to let you know that you're about to engage in something that might have genuinely harmful effects on your psyche, and that you can step away if you're already feeling on edge because of other factors.

[Hermes]

Hey, we can all play the "my wounds are bigger than your wounds" game Quail. Do you think you have the market cornered on bad shit happening to you? Think again. Get busy living out in the world or get busy dying inside Quail. Personally, I choose living. I genuinely hope you can get to a point where you can do the same.

do you just come into these threads to be an asshole? I've seen similar posts of yours in at least three different threads

all you're doing is demeaning other users, though at least you're not doing it in the PYHO thread this time

[Quail]

Oh jesus don't run off like that. That's the opposite of dialogue. I mean why even contribute to this thread if you're just going to get mad when people disagree?
I'm not "getting mad" because people disagree. I'm actually very angry and upset by your suggestion that people should just "toughen up in the face of adversity". I obviously can't speak for everyone, but on a personal level I am tough and I have dealt with a lot and finally I'm at a place where my mental health is good enough not to bother me too much - however, I still find certain things triggering and unexpectedly coming across them can throw me off for weeks. I have triggers which are specific to me and obviously I don't expect people to factor those in, but I don't see why content warnings about sexual violence are so controversial. So many people have been affected by sexual violence, and I'd be willing to bet that a lot of those people can have flashbacks etc triggered by depictions of sexual violence, so it makes sense to give them the information they need to avoid that stuff.


Hey, we can all play the "my wounds are bigger than your wounds" game Quail. Do you think you have the market cornered on bad shit happening to you? Think again. Get busy living out in the world or get busy dying inside Quail. Personally, I choose living. I genuinely hope you can get to a point where you can do the same.
You're such an insufferable arse I am at a loss at how to respond to this. I should probably just ignore you, but it's hard to leave this shit unchallenged.
1) I recognise that my issues are in fact very common especially amongst women so no I'm not trying to claim I'm special because I've lived through bullshit.
2) I am living in the real world. I am studying for a masters and raising a 4 year old.
3) Who the fuck are you to patronise me and use your fake pity as a fucking polemical device?

[BIXX]

Hey, we can all play the "my wounds are bigger than your wounds" game Quail. Do you think you have the market cornered on bad shit happening to you? Think again. Get busy living out in the world or get busy dying inside Quail. Personally, I choose living. I genuinely hope you can get to a point where you can do the same.


I've never realized how much I hate you until now. I mean, god damn dude. This whole "toughen up" bullshit can go elsewhere. In fact it has been well know knowledge even amongst the conventional crowd that "toughen up" isn't sound advice. Fuck off.

[Sinister Intents]

I've never realized how much I hate you until now. I mean, god damn dude. This whole "toughen up" bullshit can go elsewhere. In fact it has been well know knowledge even amongst the conventional crowd that "toughen up" isn't sound advice. Fuck off.

People have told me to "toughen up" before and it just pisses me the fuck off and then they wonder why I'm pissed with them. This thread is a fucking trainwreck and it pisses me off every thread like this becomes like this

[tallguy]

Firstly, I would not insult you with pity, fake or otherwise Quail. Pity is utterly destructive, for either oneself or anyone else. Secondly, you don't need to tell me about your kid or your masters. I didn't ask for that information just like I didn't ask for information about how you have suffered abuse. Your argument stands or falls on it's merit, not on your personal story. Your personal story does not in any way affect what I think of your argument one way or another and, frankly, it shouldn't be in any way implicated what you think of it either. Or, at least, not if you think it has any universal applicability and not merely something that applies to your personal circumstances. Similarly, my personal story has nothing to add to my argument save for allowing me to use it as a get out of jail free card. And there's no point in that game because the long term cost outweighs the short term profit.

As a human being, I care about the individual suffering of any person who I am conversing with, including you Quail. In terms of debating an argument on it's intellectual merits, I could not care less Quail. On it's intellectual merits, trigger warnings are a terrible means by which real people who have really suffered are being infantilised into being perpetual, helpless victims who need protection from the big bad world. In other words, in complete opposition to it's implied aim of building people back up, it does precisely the opposite. It's a fucking wet dream for all those otherwise unemployable bourgeoisie social scientists out there I am sure. But, that's about all it's good for.

[Quail]

Trigger warnings are useful because they allow people to avoid stuff that fucks them up until they have dealt with their issues (which not everyone can do easily because it's hard to access mental health treatment and/or find therapy services). I don't know why that won't get through your stupid skull. You don't have to be a "perpetual infantilised victim" to need to take care of yourself sometimes. The road to recovery is long and difficult, and during that time trigger warnings give people the information they need to decide whether or not they can handle something.

[consuming negativity]

Get busy living out in the world or get busy dying inside Quail.


On it's intellectual merits, trigger warnings are a terrible means by which real people who have really suffered are being infantilised into being perpetual, helpless victims who need protection from the big bad world.

Disagreement is one thing, but this is genuinely rude. A few people getting emotional over an issue that resonates deeply with them isn't an excuse to make personal attacks of this nature. You ask if the arguments of others can stand without personal stories; can your argument stand on it's own without resorting to insulting people's character? You're making philosophical statements about other people's lives. Regardless of your background - which I do not presume to know - that is something to be done with reservation.

[Redistribute the Rep]

As a human being, I care about the individual suffering of any person who I am conversing with, including you Quail. In terms of debating an argument on it's intellectual merits, I could not care less Quail. On it's intellectual merits, organizing the working class is a terrible means by which real people who have really suffered are being infantilised into being perpetual, helpless victims who need protection from the big bad capitalists. In other words, in complete opposition to it's implied aim of achieving socialism, it does precisely the opposite. It's a fucking wet dream for all those otherwise unemployable proletarians out there I am sure. But, that's about all it's good for.

Makes a lot of sense.

[tallguy]

Makes a lot of sense.
I'm glad it makes sense to you RR, cos you've lost me. Or, at least, if you are trying to say what I have said is analogous to decrying organising the working class against capitalist oppression, I think you could not be more wrong in your analogy. Organising the working class is (or should be) about empowerment. Trigger warnings (at least to the extent that there is an argument about them being ubiquitous in everyday culture rather than in specialised settings, which I have less of an issue with), whilst claiming to be about empowerment, are about precisely the opposite. If I've misunderstood your post, however, then please explain.

[Redistribute the Rep]

I'm glad it makes sense to you RR, cos you've lost me. Or, at least, if you are trying to say what I have said is analogous to decrying organising the working class against capitalist oppression, I think you could not be more wrong in your analogy. Organising the working class is (or should be) about empowerment. Trigger warnings (at least to the extent that there is an argument about them being ubiquitous in everyday culture rather than in specialised settings, which I have less of an issue with), whilst claiming to be about empowerment, are about precisely the opposite. If I've misunderstood your post, however, then please explain.

Just telling everybody to toughen up is not going to help them, they require extensive support and counseling, which not everybody has access to, and being exposed to intense material just makes it that much harder for them. You're not "empowering" them by just ignoring their issues and calling them "liberal whiners."

I do think it is analogous to ignoring class issues. By your logic the working class should just toughen up, I mean they could just start their own businesses right? Helping them abolish private property and classes would be infantilising them, after all. In the words of Mitt Romney,

http://i.imgur.com/5DC11.jpg

[tallguy]

Quail.

The user Synthesis is following my posts on threads and then deliberately making up false quotes and assigning my user name to them. I have made a formal complaint to the mods using the reporting function on the first post this was done on another thread, and yet I see this user in question doing it on this thread as well. I've reported this one as well and will now continue to do so every time I see it happen. Can we get this sorted please.

[tallguy]

Just telling everybody to toughen up is not going to help them, they require extensive support and counseling, which not everybody has access to, and being exposed to intense material just makes it that much harder for them. You're not "empowering" them by just ignoring their issues and calling them "liberal whiners."

I'm calling liberal whiners, those who posit that we should all put a flashing warning sign in front of anything we might say in everyday life that might have even the remotest possibility of offending someone else. Quote apart from the logistical impossibility of being able to predict everything that might offend anyone else (for example, should I issue a trigger warning if I intend to use the word "orange" in any communication with anyone else since someone might correlate the colour orange with the colour of the pants of their erstwhile oppressor?), it is also deeply sinister that at precisely the time that some hard shit needs to be shouted from the rooftops by as many people as possible to do with our corrupt and broken socio-economic systems, is precisely the time we are seeing all this shit about "trigger warnings" popping up all over our culture. It's no mere coincidence.


I do think it is analogous to ignoring class issues. By your logic the working class should just toughen up, I mean they could just start their own businesses right? Helping them abolish private property and classes would be infantilising them, after all. In the words of Mitt Romney,
Helping to abolish private property is about helping people with real stuff in the real world. It's not about playing with communication after the fact of that stuff happening, which is all that "trigger warnings" are, at best. At worst, they are a small part of a growing cultural phenomena far more sinister. Shit happens, shit needs to stop happening. Playing with words doesn't change that. Indeed, it is counter productive to changing that.

[Quail]

Verbal warning to synthesis for trolling. Please don't intentionally wind up other users.

----


I'm calling liberal whiners, those who posit that we should all put a flashing warning sign in front of anything we might say in everyday life that might have even the remotest possibility of offending someone else. Quote apart from the logistical impossibility of being able to predict everything that might offend anyone else (for example, should I issue a trigger warning if I intend to use the word "orange" in any communication with anyone else since someone might correlate the colour orange with the colour of the pants of their erstwhile oppressor?)
It's not about offending other people. It's about triggering flashbacks or causing someone to do actual damage to their body with self-injury, eating disorder behaviours, drugs or other forms of self-harm. Those are vastly different situations. The idea of trigger warnings is to warn people about content that is likely to affect a large number of people, not to warn about everything that might possibly trigger one person. You're arguing against a massive straw man.


it is also deeply sinister that at precisely the time that some hard shit needs to be shouted from the rooftops by as many people as possible to do with our corrupt and broken socio-economic systems, is precisely the time we are seeing all this shit about "trigger warnings" popping up all over our culture. It's no mere coincidence.
Why can't we fight against capitalism and also look after our comrades by giving them the information they need to choose to look after themselves?


Helping to abolish private property is about helping people with real stuff in the real world. It's not about playing with communication after the fact of that stuff happening, which is all that "trigger warnings" are, at best. At worst, they are a small part of a growing cultural phenomena far more sinister. Shit happens, shit needs to stop happening. Playing with words doesn't change that. Indeed, it is counter productive to changing that.
How is it counter productive to changing, for example, rape culture, by acknowledging that survivors of sexual violence often end up with mental health problems that occasionally make it necessary to avoid reading about/watching certain things?

[tallguy]

Verbal warning to synthesis for trolling. Please don't intentionally wind up other users.

----


It's not about offending other people. It's about triggering flashbacks or causing someone to do actual damage to their body with self-injury, eating disorder behaviours, drugs or other forms of self-harm. Those are vastly different situations. The idea of trigger warnings is to warn people about content that is likely to affect a large number of people, not to warn about everything that might possibly trigger one person. You're arguing against a massive straw man.


Why can't we fight against capitalism and also look after our comrades by giving them the information they need to choose to look after themselves?


How is it counter productive to changing, for example, rape culture, by acknowledging that survivors of sexual violence often end up with mental health problems that occasionally make it necessary to avoid reading about/watching certain things?Because you don't change rape culture, or any other cultural phenomena, by pissing about with the minutiae of the linguistic expression of that phenomena via something like "trigger warnings". You change it by changing the underlying power differentials that give rise to it.

None of which is to dismiss the moral imperative, out of a sense of decency that any reasonable person should have, of attempting, where possible and practicable, to spare the feelings of others in terms of one's communications. However, to try to formally culturally coerce others into doing so (or even legislate, cos that's where this kind of shit leads) becomes far too Orwellian for my liking.

[Bad Grrrl Agro]

Utter drivel. The world is a place full of things you might not like or want to see and sometimes is has things in it that are downright bloody unpleasant to see or hear. Grow a fucking backbone and live with it. This growing meme of promoting such insipid whining is pathetic at best and, when it is suddenly popping up everywhere at precisely the same time people are beginning to rise up and shout all kinds of things our authorities want us to shut the fuck up about, is more than a bit sinister.

Grow a fucking heart and gain some empathy!

[Bad Grrrl Agro]

I'm calling liberal whiners, those who posit that we should all put a flashing warning sign in front of anything we might say in everyday life that might have even the remotest possibility of offending someone else.
Offend =/= triggering someone's trauma

If someone says something that offends me, I argue against the offensive ideas that they are portraying.

If someone says something that triggers me I may experience flashbacks or panic attacks and my fight or flight portion of my brain may take over, I may also have an increase in night terrors. This is real medical fact.


Helping to abolish private property is about helping people with real stuff in the real world. It's not about playing with communication after the fact of that stuff happening, which is all that "trigger warnings" are, at best. At worst, they are a small part of a growing cultural phenomena far more sinister. Shit happens, shit needs to stop happening. Playing with words doesn't change that. Indeed, it is counter productive to changing that.
Trauma is real stuff in the real world. Once again, medical fact. It is the reason I am prescribed a PRN of klonipin.

So take your manarchy or brocialism and shove it up your ass!

[slum]

You know, back when I posted on this forum more often I was accused a few times of advocating 'separatist feminism' as a political tactic, which puzzled me seeing as I neither identify as a woman or ascribe to a 'patriarchy above all' analysis of women's oppression in class society.

I think I'm starting to see where this phantom boogey-feminist of me comes from, though, because every time any kind of safe space (or political space that makes even the barest allowance for the needs of radicalizing poor people beyond the immediately visible) is mentioned there comes a backlash from certain self-professed "revolutionaries" against the very idea that women, the disabled, etc. might sit in a group on their own for a few moments and create theory around their oppression that I can only describe as ragingly penetrative. How dare women organize! And here, even the merest scent (trigger warnings, for god's sake) of a trauma-sensitive politic (and how "revolutionaries" like tallguy must shudder at the very word "sensitive", it's implied emasculation, it's demonic femininity- somebody here is deeply attached to liberal binarist concepts of gender and it isn't Quail et.al.)


There's something going on here that brings to bear a sense of helplessness and encroachment in these comrades greater than those created by the bourgeoisie- why? Because the presence of "lumpen" elements in "your" movement, the disabled, the reviled, the women workers who make demands like an end to sexual harassment, free abortion and sexual healthcare, paid maternity leave, etc. are gaining revolutionary consciousness? You ignore us at your peril. We are the bulk of the world's poor and we grow the bulk of it's crops. We educate the world's children. We care for the world when they are sick and old. We provide the vast majority of reproductive labor without which neither a capitalist society nor the movement to overturn it is possible. What happens if our theory, our praxis, "perverts" your Marxism? I can only conclude that they, at root, want a uniform working class movement, purged of women, queers, minorities, the long-term unemployed and the disabled. There is something bizarrely chauvanist in their diatribes- "we suffer more, or at the very least we suffer all the same, as workers! I don't cry about it! I don't call myself a victim! I keep my head down and fight capital the right way, the traditional way, MY WAY!"


Why is trauma-sensitive politics radical? Why are safe-spaces GOOD TACTICS? Because people radicalize in spaces that are set aside for them, when they can recognize their experiences as shared experiences among others who are oppressed in similar ways, and discover that their daily experiences are political and demand a political- a MATERIAL- response. When they can create theory. White male radicals have difficulty understanding this- the world is their safe space. Public space belongs to them by birthright. But for women, the disabled, etc. our inherited safe spaces are private- the home, where we are not really safe. The hospital, where we are made poorer. The jailhouse, where we are traumatized further and isolated from one another. These spaces put women, the disabled, the mentally ill, the "lumpen" in isolation from one another. We cannot create theory. We cannot develop revolutionary consciousness.


Here's Judith Herman, trauma psychologist on PTSD and the structural violence of capitalist society: "Combat and rape, the public and private forms of organized social violence, are primarily experiences of adolescent and early adult life... The period of greatest psychological vulnerability is also in reality the period of greatest traumatic exposure, for both young men and young women. Rape and combat might thus be considered complementary social rites of initiation into the coercive violence at the foundation of adult society. They are the paradigmatic forms of trauma for women and men.” Is this not a radical realization? Does it not demand a radical response? Does it not demand solidarity with, dare I say it SENSITIVITY TO the needs of comrades who have borne the brunt of Capital's violence, the comrades in who self-care and recovery and self-organization are acts of rebellion and protest against the society which would rather them be isolated, downtrodden, and silent?


Intense traumatic experience leaves in a person an encounter with their own annihilation. Retraumatization, "triggers", etc.; these re-activate that encounter in the primal back of the brain, the nervous system, the affect. Could you call yourself a communist without a thought for the comrade who stood face-to-face with his own annihilation, not just the first time at the behest of a State who used his body and risked his life for its corporate interests abroad, but every time after a chopper flew overhead? Without a thought for the young migrant worker who faced her annihilation at the hands of her employer not only once, but every time a man grabbed her by the arm or shouted to her in the street? These re-experiences, these re-traumatizations, these daily brushes with what the mind sees as a new death, are unknown to you. But I assure you, they do exist.


Is it truly too much to ask (but you're right to be antsy- we do not ask, we demand) that you, who profess to be comrades, walk by our spaces, our hard-won and hard-defended political territory, with a nod to the measures we, as a community, have taken to respect ourselves the way the public and private worlds of work and the home will not? Shame on you.

[blake 3:17]

it's garbage


Ohio’s Oberlin College now has a policy asking faculty members to “be aware of racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, cissexism, ableism and other issues of privilege and oppression,” and to make so-called triggering material optional if it does not contribute directly to learning goals, or even to excise it. As The New Republic pointed out, Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe’s brilliant novel about the great harms of colonialism, Things Fall Apart, now carries the warning that it “may trigger readers who have experienced racism, colonialism, and religious persecution, violence, suicide, and more.”

Last week, the student senate at UC-Santa Barbara (my alma mater) passed a similar motion, advisory at this time, asking professors to add trigger warnings to their course syllabi. In February, a Rutgers sophomore writing in the New Jersey university’s student newspaper called for a trigger warning on, among other works, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, because the book contains “suicide, domestic abuse, and graphic violence.”

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/education/trigger-warnings-the-latest-threat-to-academic-freedom/article17835103/

[blake 3:17]

capital the right way, the traditional way, MY WAY!"

Why is trauma-sensitive politics radical? Why are safe-spaces GOOD TACTICS? Because people radicalize in spaces that are set aside for them,

And you know where rapes went down and nobody could talk about it without looking over your back from cops and from fucking stoopid anarchists?

There are no safe spaces. None. NONE. We claim shit. Make a presence known. Find retreats. Nooks. Make a punch, take a punch. Shit happens.

Don't wait for the air to be gluten free and have the right degree of proletarian discourse to friggin breathe.


--------------

[#FF0000]

And you know where rapes went down and nobody could talk about it without looking over your back from cops and from fucking stoopid anarchists?

There are no safe spaces. None. NONE. We claim shit. Make a presence known. Find retreats. Nooks. Make a punch, take a punch. Shit happens.

Don't wait for the air to be gluten free and have the right degree of proletarian discourse to friggin breathe.


--------------


"idk what we're talking about I'm just mad about something"

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

"idk what we're talking about I'm just mad about something"

The usual political method of blake, goodness gracious he must have broken the record of double posts in that other thread!

[blake 3:17]

"idk what we're talking about I'm just mad about something"

And avoiding upsetting things by talking upsetting in a very round about way.

I'd written a thing about the film The Celebration coming with a trigger warning -- ha -- truth to power.

I'm very unconvinced by many of Quail's arguments in this thread and actually take an opposite view on several things.

[#FF0000]

Y'all know trigger warnings are for people with PTSD right?

[slum]

And you know where rapes went down and nobody could talk about it without looking over your back from cops and from fucking stoopid anarchists?

There are no safe spaces. None. NONE. We claim shit. Make a presence known. Find retreats. Nooks. Make a punch, take a punch. Shit happens.

Don't wait for the air to be gluten free and have the right degree of proletarian discourse to friggin breathe.


--------------
do you have something to say about my post because maybe you could quote the part you disagree with and provide an argument if you do

otherwise i am at a loss what exactly this post is saying and why you chose to quote mine in it.

i can assure you that people who have been traumatized are aware that shit happens. i'm confused why you'd think we don't realize this. generally you have PTSD because shit happened to you.

i'm also not a vegan or lifestylist anarchist or w/e you're trying to imply with that gluten crack, so try again.

[Bad Grrrl Agro]

do you have something to say about my post because maybe you could quote the part you disagree with and provide an argument if you do

otherwise i am at a loss what exactly this post is saying and why you chose to quote mine in it.

i can assure you that people who have been traumatized are aware that shit happens. i'm confused why you'd think we don't realize this. generally you have PTSD because shit happened to you.

i'm also not a vegan or lifestylist anarchist or w/e you're trying to imply with that gluten crack, so try again.

I am just glad to see someone post such awesome stuff. As someone with PTSD (possibly CPTSD) I just don't feel the thank you button is enough. Seriously thank you, you rock.

[tallguy]

And you know where rapes went down and nobody could talk about it without looking over your back from cops and from fucking stoopid anarchists?

There are no safe spaces. None. NONE. We claim shit. Make a presence known. Find retreats. Nooks. Make a punch, take a punch. Shit happens.

Don't wait for the air to be gluten free and have the right degree of proletarian discourse to friggin breathe.


--------------Yes

Stop trying to formally linguistically encode your victim-hood and trying to enforce that codification on everyone else because, not least, it doesn't work anyway and get off your knees and fight, for fuck's sake.

Fight

[blake 3:17]

Y'all know trigger warnings are for people with PTSD right?

I have PTSD.

Shit happens.

[blake 3:17]

do you have something to say about my post because maybe you could quote the part you disagree with and provide an argument if you do

otherwise i am at a loss what exactly this post is saying and why you chose to quote mine in it.

i can assure you that people who have been traumatized are aware that shit happens. i'm confused why you'd think we don't realize this. generally you have PTSD because shit happened to you.


I do have PTSD. That's my problem & too often inflicted on folks close to me. Will stop there.

I've been in radical Left circles for 20+ years now & there's been a lot of bad behaviour excused for bullshit reasons & people really really hurt because they were in a so called "safe space". I've probably got some residual guilt from saying that places were safe for folks, and then they turned out not to be.

Peace up. Fight the power!

[#FF0000]

The most confusing thing bout you two dummies is that you're acting as if being mindful of folks with PTSD (who perhaps can't deal with it as you can, blake) is somehow incompatible with fighting for revolutionary change.

Also how none of y'all have addressed slums excellent post and instead decided to go on with the "man up you pussies" angle without any actual substance.

[Quail]

I'm very unconvinced by many of Quail's arguments in this thread and actually take an opposite view on several things.

So... address them instead of posting incoherent nonsense and generally spamming up the thread.

[blake 3:17]

So... address them instead of posting incoherent nonsense and generally spamming up the thread.

My main objection to what you've been saying is that trigger warnings are helpful to people who've suffered trauma. I think trigger warnings are patronizing and very much in line with Tipper Gore's PMRC.

My primary objections to trigger warnings are they are either crying wolf or censorious. Ain't got time for neither.

On transit today, took a photo of a subway newspaper page:https://24.media.tumblr.com/06dcfe793536f4c7534ea8454b743eb8/tumblr_n43dia9wOe1sop0l0o1_500.jpg


There's a lot of potential triggers there.

[Hermes]

My main objection to what you've been saying is that trigger warnings are helpful to people who've suffered trauma. I think trigger warnings are patronizing and very much in line with Tipper Gore's PMRC.

My primary objections to trigger warnings are they are either crying wolf or censorious. Ain't got time for neither.

On transit today, took a photo of a subway newspaper page:https://24.media.tumblr.com/06dcfe793536f4c7534ea8454b743eb8/tumblr_n43dia9wOe1sop0l0o1_500.jpg


There's a lot of potential triggers there.

or, you know, it's protecting the well-being of others

not a clue where you get 'censorious' from, considering trigger warnings exist so that the content can still be accessed while allowing people who would rather not access it... not to?

unless you're just SO ANGRY whenever you see a trigger warning that you lash out and destroy whatever media you're currently using

[Psycho P and the Freight Train]

I have to side with the majority on this one. Why not just post a trigger warning? PTSD is a living hell. Well, I don't have it but that's all the more reason I shouldn't be in opposition to it. Just post a damn trigger warning, why's it a big deal? It's not like you need to post one for a story about someone getting into a fist fight or something.

And trust me, I am VERY against censorship and getting offended at everything. But this isn't a case of getting offended, it's a case of not wanting to be severely psychologically distressed. PTSD is a thing, you know...

[tallguy]

I have to side with the majority on this one. Why not just post a trigger warning? PTSD is a living hell. Well, I don't have it but that's all the more reason I shouldn't be in opposition to it. Just post a damn trigger warning, why's it a big deal? It's not like you need to post one for a story about someone getting into a fist fight or something.

And trust me, I am VERY against censorship and getting offended at everything. But this isn't a case of getting offended, it's a case of not wanting to be severely psychologically distressed. PTSD is a thing, you know...
Who decides what does and does not constitute a trauma and, assuming that not insignificant little difficulty is negotiated successfully, who then decides what level of stress disorder passes the criteria for being included in the category of trigger warning requirement?

In terms of formally codifying this kind of bollocks into the culture rather than simply relying on a reasonably commonly shared sense of decency, it's bullshit at best. At worst, it's a thin end of a sinister wedge in terms of public communications; aided and abetted, surprise-surprise, by a co-opted, dumb-ass liberal left.

[Psycho P and the Freight Train]

Who decides what does and does not constitute a trauma and, assuming that not insignificant little difficulty is negotiated successfully, who then decides what level of stress disorder passes the criteria for being included in the category of trigger warning requirement?

In terms of formally codifying this kind of bollocks into the culture rather than simply relying on a reasonably commonly shared sense of decency, it's bullshit at best. At worst, it's a thin end of a sinister wedge in terms public communications; aided and abbeted by a co-opted, dumb-ass liberal left.

Usually I'd agree with your argument in relation to a hell of a lot of things, trust me. I know exactly what you are trying to argue, and I usually agree with this.

But I mean I think you're thinking it's just small little shit. I think they mean more like graphic images and graphic stories. I read a story the other month that seriously upset the fuck out of me that I wish I hadn't read. And I am by no means squeamish. At all. But this one really really got to me. I'm usually of the toughen up attitude, but you have to realize that PTSD is a serious mental illness, and it can be triggered by seeing really upsetting things. I don't think anyone's saying go around throwing out trigger warnings for a fight scene in a movie or something. I think it's more like, don't post a graphic image or graphic story about rape or something without putting a little notice warning people who might have PTSD, that's all.

When it comes to mental illness, we need to make sure we can help people out, because trust me, they wish they didn't have to have trigger warnings either, I'm sure.

[#FF0000]

Who decides what does and does not constitute a trauma

Probably a doctor who, you know, diagnoses people with PTSD.

I think y'all are getting a little hysterical over this. We're talking about a warning for people with PTSD. We're not talking about banning or censoring anything or people being offended. I don't even think we're talking about putting trigger warnings in all things, because not only is that more than a little unfeasible, its unnecessary. That headline on the paper linked is, I would think, warning enough.

I fail to understand why you two are so dearly upset over this.

[blake 3:17]

Probably a doctor who, you know, diagnoses people with PTSD.

I think y'all are getting a little hysterical over this. We're talking about a warning for people with PTSD. We're not talking about banning or censoring anything or people being offended. I don't even think we're talking about putting trigger warnings in all things, because not only is that more than a little unfeasible, its unnecessary. That headline on the paper linked is, I would think, warning enough.

I fail to understand why you two are so dearly upset over this.

See this post of mine: http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2740042&postcount=61

Anyways it is what is. Glad people are doing less of it. I have been grateful for one -- a post of Sasha's a while back.

Maybe at times they are right. If I go to a movie and it's so upsetting I just walk out. Last one was I Killed My Mother. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1424797/

The Celebration is incredibly distressing but speaks truth to power. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0154420/

I'm frigging triggered by candles. My house burnt down. I can't go around requesting that they're be no candles at things. I just go around and snuff them.

Revolution is not a tea party.

Edited to add: Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

[tallguy]

I have nothing further to add to this thread.

Carry on.

[synthesis]

Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

:lol:

I don't want to make fun of you in case this is some kind of mental illness thing, but I really can't tell if this is you fucking with us or not.

[#FF0000]

I'm frigging triggered by candles. My house burnt down. I can't go around requesting that they're be no candles at things. I just go around and snuff them.

Edited to add: Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

Yo, again, trigger warnings aren't about "removing" or blocking anything. You continue to misunderstand this. And "safe spaces" aren't places that are literally magically protected from Bad Things.

All you're doing here is intentionally misrepresenting or flat out ignoring what people are saying, coming out with non sequitur after non sequitur.

[#FF0000]

I have nothing further to add to this thread.


You didn't add anything in the first place

[Bad Grrrl Agro]

Edited to add: Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

What does this have to do with safe spaces for oppressed, exploited or marginalized peoples to come together to talk about the shit we face under anglo-centric, cishet, male dominated patriarchy?

[Quail]

See this post of mine: http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2740042&postcount=61

Anyways it is what is. Glad people are doing less of it. I have been grateful for one -- a post of Sasha's a while back.

Maybe at times they are right. If I go to a movie and it's so upsetting I just walk out. Last one was I Killed My Mother. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1424797/

The Celebration is incredibly distressing but speaks truth to power. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0154420/

I'm frigging triggered by candles. My house burnt down. I can't go around requesting that they're be no candles at things. I just go around and snuff them.

Revolution is not a tea party.

Edited to add: Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

I'm trying to make sense of your posts but in some cases I'm drawing blanks. But I'll respond to what I think you're saying and try to be very clear about what I mean.

1) The argument here is basically that things that are triggers for large numbers of people should come with some kind of content warning. For example, if a TV show has an unexpected depiction of rape, there should be a content warning so that people can be aware of that and choose whether or not they want to watch it. I think this is a matter of courtesy really and respect for other people and their well-being. I don't see why that should be controversial.

2) In response to your comment about candles - I'm triggered by the film Eurotrip, which is obviously very specific to me. I don't expect people to post things like "TW: mentions Eurotrip" because that would be frankly ridiculous. If it comes up in conversation I excuse myself to go to the bathroom or otherwise remove myself from the situation because again, it would be unreasonable to be like, "Guys please shut up about Eurotrip and never mention it again."

3) Regarding "safe spaces" you're correct to point out that nowhere is a truly safe space, and at times certain predatory people do abuse "safe spaces". I'm aware of it happening where I live. However, I don't see that as a reason to abandon the idea of safer spaces altogether (note safer, rather than safe). As women and LGBTQ people, and other marginalised groups, we need spaces where we can speak, share our experiences and plan how to act without the fear of being shouted down by misogynists, without being told how we should feel and how we should organise, without patriarchal behaviour going unchallenged by everyone else around us. We need these safer spaces not only so that we can protect ourselves, but so that we can challenge the dominant patriarchal values which are unfortunately all too prevalent within the movement that is supposed to liberate us.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

add: Regarding safe spaces -- There are none. We can make safes spacer. Good. As for spaces actually being safe? No. Want proof? Try the World Trade Center and Flight 93. Much respect to passengers who brought that one down.

Gentlemen, the Chewbacca Defense
xwdba9C2G14

[Redistribute the Rep]

Are the people who are against the trigger warnings also against those clips before tv shows that say things like "viewer discretion is advised"?

[Sinister Intents]

Are the people who are against the trigger warnings also against those clips before tv shows that say things like "viewer discretion is advised"?

I think a user already said so, and I wonder if they don't care about children seeing disturbing images and such because "Oh they're gonna see all of that eventually." They must hate keeping people happy and sane

[Lily Briscoe]

I've been super hesitant to post in this thread, but I guess I will take the plunge...

From what I understand, 'trigger warnings' are a largely internet- and University-based phenomenon that developed out of Tumblr blogs, and I'm not quite sure why they seem to be such a hot topic among some circles one way or the other... Honestly my impression of them is that they are kind of a meaningless symbolic gesture and a pretty superficial way of appearing to be 'accommodating', and I can certainly see why someone who has experienced traumatic events in their life might perceive them as being patronizing/infantilizing (and I don't just mean people like 'tallguy').

But ultimately, if some people insist they find trigger warnings helpful, fine--I'm not going to make it a point to argue against it. But I just feel like the whole thing is kind of a non-issue and comes across as another example of the sort of trivial stuff (sort of like advocating for changing the spelling of 'woman' to 'womyn' or for adding another letter to 'lgbtq' or whatever, etc.) that some people place a lot of undue importance on because participating in these kinds of subcultural rituals allows people to feel like they're making a difference and ignore their complete impotence to effect anything in terms of actual struggles against structural oppression in the real world (the last part of that sentence isn't a dig, BTW; everyone who posts on this forum is in that boat, i.e. practical/political 'impotence', as far as I'm concerned, but I think it's something that needs to be acknowledged and grappled with rather than glossed over in favor of a focus on shallow tokenistic gestures).

Sorry this post is majorly muddled/wordy, by the way; I've had a pretty ridiculous day and my brain is completely fried, so...

[Lily Briscoe]

I also wanted to address this really briefly:


There's something going on here that brings to bear a sense of helplessness and encroachment in these comrades greater than those created by the bourgeoisie- why? Because the presence of "lumpen" elements in "your" movement, the disabled, the reviled, the women workers who make demands like an end to sexual harassment, free abortion and sexual healthcare, paid maternity leave, etc. are gaining revolutionary consciousness? You ignore us at your peril. We are the bulk of the world's poor and we grow the bulk of it's crops. We educate the world's children. We care for the world when they are sick and old. We provide the vast majority of reproductive labor without which neither a capitalist society nor the movement to overturn it is possible. What happens if our theory, our praxis, "perverts" your Marxism? I can only conclude that they, at root, want a uniform working class movement, purged of women, queers, minorities, the long-term unemployed and the disabled.
Let me say off the bat that I'm not defending the poster that this was directed at in any way. But I think it's pretty disingenuous to imply, as I believe you're implying here (and please correct me if I'm wrong because I'm not out to misrepresent you), that trigger warnings are an expression of the "theory" or "praxis" of the masses of women workers, minorities, marginalized groups etc. Considering that trigger warnings are primarily a thing of Tumblrs and Universities, I would say the reality couldn't be a whole lot further from this.

[Quail]

From what I understand, 'trigger warnings' are a largely internet- and University-based phenomenon that developed out of Tumblr blogs, and I'm not quite sure why they seem to be such a hot topic among some circles one way or the other... Honestly my impression of them is that they are kind of a meaningless symbolic gesture and a pretty superficial way of appearing to be 'accommodating', and I can certainly see why someone who has experienced traumatic events in their life might perceive them as being patronizing/infantilizing (and I don't just mean people like 'tallguy').


I don't use tumblr (or even know what it is tbh), but as far as I'm aware the phrase "trigger warning" came from mental health support websites for people with a wide range of issues like self harm, eating disorders and PTSD. I'm not sure how old tumblr is but I've been using trigger warnings with stuff I post online for over 8 years.

The only reason they become a "hot topic" is because people argue so vehemently against what I personally think is just showing a basic level of respect for the people around you.

[#FF0000]

It's kinda weird that ppl attribute things like this to tumblr as if they never existed before. I mean, I didn't know about trigger warnings until tumblr was a thing but I know someone on here said the same thing about how privilege was a tumblrite thing too...

[Lily Briscoe]

Yeah I'd read that they (I.e. Trigger warnings) started on blogs, and I guess I just inferred the tumblr part since they're a pretty big thing on there. My bad.

[Redistribute the Rep]

I think a user already said so, and I wonder if they don't care about children seeing disturbing images and such because "Oh they're gonna see all of that eventually." They must hate keeping people happy and sane

Well you see, SI, protecting children from seeing disturbing images would be 'infantilizing' them :laugh:

[Slavoj Zizek's Balls]

If an article has graphic images then a bold title on the subject being presented in those images will suffice, as well as an additional (small) paragraph with a re-affirmation of how likely these images will affect people who have been affected in the past by whatever the topic is. The same goes for the verbal equivalent. These warnings don't need the label *TRIGGER WARNING*, they just need a simple, bold heads-up that is suited to the content. Thus words that serve to be a 'hot topic' can be sidelined for making something out of nothing. We should be in the situation where a thread like this is redundant, because people just get on and warn others because it's the decent, normalised thing to do.

As for people being affected by songs that recall flashbacks, it's NOT a case of 'OMG GROW A BACKBONE AND STOP WHINING'. It IS a case of 'reign in your emotions and politely inform the person singing that the lyrics are harmful and bring up horrible, painful memories'. Even if the person succumbs to the feeling of anger (and proceeds to aggressively tell someone their story), it would be helpful to remind the person in an empathic, considerate manner that they need to try to control their emotions. Support can come from anywhere with the right approach.

[Lily Briscoe]

I think a user already said so, and I wonder if they don't care about children seeing disturbing images and such because "Oh they're gonna see all of that eventually." They must hate keeping people happy and saneWell you see, SI, protecting children from seeing disturbing images would be 'infantilizing' them :laugh:

Considering that trigger warnings aren't typically directed at children (but rather, are often implicitly intended for adult women), I think drawing this parallel with protecting children from adult content actually ends up underscoring the point about infantilizing people, however unintentionally.

Anyway, if you want to address something I said in my post then maybe you could address it to me directly, rather than just cracking a passive-aggressive joke.

[slum]

I also wanted to address this really briefly:
Let me say off the bat that I'm not defending the poster that this was directed at in any way. But I think it's pretty disingenuous to imply, as I believe you're implying here (and please correct me if I'm wrong because I'm not out to misrepresent you), that trigger warnings are an expression of the "theory" or "praxis" of the masses of women workers, minorities, marginalized groups etc. Considering that trigger warnings are primarily a thing of Tumblrs and Universities, I would say the reality couldn't be a whole lot further from this.

you're right that my prior post had the scent of rhetoric about it. i was feeling speechy, mostly because certain posters have been acting like bullies in this thread and that pisses me off.

like quail, i first encountered safe spaces in mental health recovery; i was hospitalized as a teenager and eventually placed in an outpatient program that conducted group therapy that educated about trauma and ptsd, and encouraged people to talk about their experiences with having ptsd, rather than the exact trauma they underwent. these boundaries (i.e. don't talk about your specific trauma) were set up to keep the discussions focused on symptom management and making positive changes in the here and now, as well as to prevent breakdowns that would result in re-hospitalization for members who might have severe reactions to hearing about another patient's trauma history in great detail. unfortunately this was a very poorly funded program and even those of us with health insurance were kicked out quickly, but there did exist smaller groups set up for later stages of recovery where people were more stabilized to discuss personal trauma in more detail and help with processing memories. these groups were often specific to types of trauma, usually sexual assault, child abuse, and combat trauma. i imagine they had similarly arranged boundaries around what kind of information could be shared and how long a person would be allowed to remain 'in distress' before a moderator intervened.


in a sense you are correct to critique me on that; to say that these types groups all have theory that conceive of trauma recovery in an explicitly radical sense is incorrect. i would that it were so. what they do often have, though, and i've encountered this in literally every community of women with PTSD (admittedly the groups i've been part of have been mostly, not exclusively, women), is a common awareness that their sexual victimization, their verbal and physical abuse in the home as children as well as adults, their impoverishment, their difficulty obtaining and keeping employment and housing, their poor treatment by the mental health establishment and the expense of getting even the most rudimentary treatment, the stigmatization of their 'disease', etc. are connected and shared by nearly all of them. for many of these women these types of groups (and i imagine this is true for online groups as well, those groups being more accessible to people who don't have insurance or can't get transit to a place that has treatment, also they can provide long-term support), this was the first time they had EVER been truly validated in their experiences not just of physical and sexual abuse, but also of being rejected by society- unemployable, "crazy", dirty, sluts, junkies, etc. these settings are so few and far between that it's quite easy for people who really suffer under capitalist relations from a number of angles besides work (many of these folks are chronically unemployed or on disability and don't enter the workplace) to live out their lives in total isolation from one another, and thus have NO opportunity to recognize themselves as part of an oppressed group instead of just as a failed individual.


just as an anecdote, here's an example of how safe space that actually DID "censor" for material (rather than just warning for it) helped me out a whole lot. the last time i was hospitalized was in the winter of 2012. after i was released, i was lucky enough to find a trauma group for women at my community health center, which was being run as part of an experiment for a nearby psychology school. the bus lines did not run directly there and i lived about 2.5 miles away. the group was once weekly at 8pm so every thursday i walked there in the dark, sat in group (trauma groups are always fun because everyone tries to get there first so they can sit in the chair that faces all the doors), and at 9 i walked home in the dark, alone. had i been severely triggered by something in that group, i may not have been able to get home. i may have been incapacitated, or i may have wandered off and gotten lost, as i often do when i am dissociated. that's a fairly tame dissociative response to a trigger,- some people have much more risky behaviors.

does it always work? of course not. boundaries are constantly being renegotiated. everyone has different issues and sometimes asking that someone not mention something can actually impede their recovery. sometimes people break the rules, and quite often this causes distress and anger and sometimes even (as i think blake was implying) re-traumatization. no space is completely safe- thus the term "safer spaces", which i'm not used to using but does seem more apt. the point is that the people who organize in these spaces, who so often lack any kind of space set aside for them (and here i include not just cultural space but even physical space), get to discuss their material and political reality on their own terms, in a way that they find productive (this often includes minimizing distress caused by common triggers). if you don't think that's how political consciousness should develop, ok. i'd argue though that it's at least as effective a tactic as handing out newspapers full of terms familiar mostly to 19th century political economists and graduate students.

and if none of this convinced you (not you personally strix, just in general), you can try not being a jerk to people who have a practice of putting information they know might upset someone else below a header on an internet post.

[blake 3:17]

I very much appreciate your post above, slum. Safer spaces is great. And things are constantly negotiated.

People interested in this issue might be into this piece Sarah Schulman posted the other day on FB: http://entropymag.org/on-trigger-warnings-part-i-in-the-creative-writing-classroom/

[Wuggums47]

I feel like trigger warnings help to prevent people from getting upset. The only things that trigger me are generally seen as benign, but I'd like it very much if there was a way to never read about them again.