I noticed that in people’s blogs, particularly social justice type blogs, they will post trigger warnings. While this made sense at first, the trigger warning subject matter has gotten so obscure and niche it makes me wonder if people post some kinds of trigger warnings simply to deflect any criticism from their writing.
I’ve heard you don’t neccessarily have to read something for it to trigger some bad memory- it could be some completely benign association. I think people are really overusing the hell out of trigger warnings and its bad when the terminology gets so obscure I have to start googling how some article/blog/fanfic is about to warp my fragile little mind
I actually had to look up what “trigger warning” referred to. The only use I knew was “don’t put your finger on the trigger until you are ready to shoot”.
FWIW it seems to me that “social justice” type blogs might be the sort of places where folks get oh so concerned about being enlightened that such warnings may well be overused, but I’m hardly the target audience for blogs like that (no offense intended).
If I’m thinking of the same thing, the only place I’ve seen these is on mental health message boards, blogs, and websites. They’re statements to warn people that the content of the post might contain something that will “trigger” negative feelings, thoughts or behaviors. For a sexual abuse survivor, for example, a triggering post might be a description of a child molestation case.
Reminds me of the old Usenet tradition, on the jokes pages, where it was permitted to post offensive (to somebody) jokes. But the post title commonly contained a warning like “(Offensive to elderly)” or “(Offensive to Italians)”, etc., so you’d know before opening it. Typically, such jokes were also rot-13’d.
Do they still do that? (I haven’t looked much as Usenet for 20-some years now.)
I’ve seen them posted for posts on eating disorders, too. They seem really prevalent on feminist blogs/sites – I know one that won’t even let people mention sizes (like weight/height, or clothing sizes) when commenting.
Back when I was writing more fanfic, there was at least one person who had known triggers (I believe it was animal abuse). He didn’t write things with it and preferred not to read it. So we all warned for it if it came up.
I don’t use the actual term ‘trigger warning’ but when I’m giving the rating I tell what it’s for (sometimes getting silly, like ‘homosexual sex, heterosexual sex, no sex’ in a porn). There’s nothing that really bothers me, but there are things I prefer not to read and I consider it polite to warn.
It’s not about warning the reader that their feelings might be hurt. It’s about recognizing that they have an audience with a higher likelihood of having some traumatic experience. Yes, just reading about discussions of rape can trigger PTSD episodes in survivors.
I’ve always hated the term “trigger warning.” I’m not quite sure why, but I think somewhere along the line I feel like it suggests people should be triggered. Almost like it isn’t okay for somebody to eventually cope with / move past / heal from their triggers.
I always hear “Trigger warning: x y z” in my head in the same voice I’d hear the phrase, “Oh, you poor thing.”
But how do you decide what does and doesn’t get a trigger warning? For example, we don’t put trigger warnings on people talking about war, or on the news, but many people have PTSD from that.
I don’t use trigger warnings. I thought about it, and decided that, particularly as I don’t typically write about graphic bad things, I couldn’t reasonably make myself responsible for what someone does or does not get upset about when they read my writing. I have seen them, and respect them, on more directed blogs, like those devoted to recovering from some kind of psychological trauma or eating disorder. Those blogs are meant to be more of a ‘safe place for sharing’ than my general-purpose drivel.
I do, however, try to make it clear what the post will be about in either the title or the first paragraph. It’s both good writing style, and a courtesy to people who I presume have much better ideas of what will upset them than I ever could.
