Well at the very least they educated me on the word “Cissexism”, never heard it before.
The problem with “acknowledging” stuff like this is that it could reinforce the notion that people who are not straight white men are presumptively special, sensitive flowers who need protecting from disturbing content, lest they get the vapours.
The downside of such paternalism is, of course, this: who would you rather be making the really tough decisions - someone who you think presumptively needs “warnings” to avoid being “triggered” by something as relatively innocuous as a University lecture, or someone who does not? Who would you rather have as a physician, lawyer, police officer or social worker?
You forgot “may contain peanuts”.
Regards,
Shodan
Not everyone who is taking a film or literature class is planning to go into these kinds of fields, though. Courses in the humanities are pretty much required for all kinds of majors, not just people who plan to go into the “helping” professions.
That said, I’m of two minds on this. I think college is full of triggering situations. If you’re sensitive, you’re sensitive. And that’s okay. But just like anyone who has an allergy, you are responsible for your own safety. Other people should be inconvenienced.
But it really isn’t that much of an inconvenience to put a warning in a syllabus. At least this gives the tender-hearted a chance to reconsider taking the class before they get in over their heads.
One thing I don’t get is what if a student asks to be excused from an assigment because they consider it too “triggery”? Or what happens if the professor writes an exam question that mentions the triggering subject matter and requires the student to write about it in detail? I’m sure this is something that comes up already. Does anyone have experience with it?
I want to use the standard “reasonable person” test they use in laws (“if a reasonable person would consider this…”).
It does have several problems in this case. Being triggered is, almost by definition, for people who are mentally ill. So by more or less definition whatever triggers them isn’t “reasonable.” Second, there are things that are extremely hard to avoid. Sure, you can avoid rape, but people with extreme body dysmorphic disorders could easily have their eating disorder triggered by looking at an attractive person in a swimsuit. It’s difficult to get anything done when attractive people may be a trigger you have to warn people about (especially subjective as that is). And it’s not like eating disorders are all that uncommon!
Still, I think the “reasonable person” test can apply somewhat and allow warning for rape/assault/abuse/violence without jumping into the eating disorder level, or even the far more inane pet death/four letter words/using god’s name in vain level of “triggers”.
I was excused in college from watching a film. I don’t remember what the film was, but the professor said beforehand that it involved dismemberment.
I can’t watch stuff like that (there have been barfing incidents. It’s just not a good idea). The professor gave me a different assignment. All was good.
So, I completely get where some people are coming from if they have a particular sensitivity.
But I also think that we have to be responsible for ourselves. If I had know the film and didn’t bother to look it up based on some assumption that someone would shield me, I don’t feel I can complain when I see something I wish I hadn’t.
It sucks to have the sensitivity. It’s a lot like my inability to eat gluten. If I don’t ask? Life sucks and I’m going to be really sick. But that’s not someone else’s responsibility.
I can’t be the only one that notices that “trigger warnings” generally apply to things that bother women. Rape? Eating disorders? Where are the warnings for war movies or street gang stories?
“And she also said she wished half the class would stop saying they had PTSD.”
Ain’t that the truth. It’s the new, cool self-diagnosis, the fad way to play the victim. There are real victims with real PTSD out there, and they aren’t served by everyone else jumping on the bandwagon.
What are we supposed to do if a student refuses to participate in an assignment due to a ‘trigger’? How can we be expected to accommodate them? I taught Things Fall Apart last semester. It was 1/3 of the class. If a student couldn’t handle racism, what should I have done instead? As it happened, my very diverse class really liked the book and we had respectful and interesting discussions about it. Including dealing with difficult material involving violence and colonialism. We need to trust student to manage their own emotions more, not less.
A)In the NPR thing I linked to a journalist said the students he talked to said they just wanted a warning, they wouldn’t sit out, they just wanted to be able to mentally prepare.
B)Let them sit out of they want to, but I’d say that the teacher shouldn’t have to offer anything to make it up with. If they don’t turn in something required for it of can’t answer questions on tests that are based on it or participate in discussions they need to get those questions marked wrong or fail those sections of the class. To compromise, the syllabus could be available to the students at least a week before they can sign up for the class, listing all reading/viewing/etc materiel. If you’re not familiar with a movie or a book, it’s on you to go read some online reviews or watch the movie before you sign up for the class.
C)My concern is that classes will get too dumbed down/vanilla if we allow too many ‘trigger warnings’. I’d worry that it might just be a stepping stone to removing those things all together. OTOH, that just might make those schools worse and the schools that don’t whine about it (or at least ignore the students whining about it) better.
Well, okay, but most universities have disability centers that allow students with dyslexia or anxiety (or whatever) to take tests in isolated environments, with extra tools, or be given extra time or otherwise get benefits other students don’t depending on their disability.
If a student can provide a diagnosis of PTSD from a licensed professional, I say by all means provide an alternate assignment (as long as it’s an isolated assignment and not integral to the entire course). The “gray” cases where the student mainly claims triggers I agree with you, though.
Also, if a student has PTSD, they probably shouldn’t sign up for a class that’s specifically going to cover things that will trigger it. You watched your buddy get killed by a sniper in the war and you have flashbacks when you hear classical music…maybe don’t sign up for that Stanley Kubric Class.
True, but I’ve read some pretty dicey things in “normal” courses. In English 101 (literally), I read some pretty chilling shit about the Japanese occupation of Korea in WWII that could trigger the fuck out of the wrong person. I’m allowing for those courses rather than “Gender Studies 405 – Analysis of Rape of Sexual Assault” which, if you’re triggered by that stuff, you’re just not going to get through.
That’s different and I mentioned before (hyperboliclly using a math class as an example) that if something extreme is going to be discussed in a class where you wouldn’t expect it, a ‘trigger warning’ isn’t a bad idea. Though I’d be concerned that maybe the teacher is a poor fit for the class if they’re putting trigger warning worthy material in what I assume is class that every student needs to graduate (if they didn’t test out of it or skip it with AP credits).
As one psychiatrist (I think) commented, the term “trigger” is potentially misleading, because actual psychological triggers for conditions like PTSD are not necessarily content-related.
That is, if you were brutally raped by somebody wearing a yellow shirt, for example, suddenly seeing a yellow shirt might trigger terrifying flashbacks as much as or even more than suddenly seeing images of brutal rape. Post-traumatic stress can be triggered by superficial details from the traumatic experience as well as the traumatic situation itself.
So I don’t think we should call warnings about potentially disturbing or discomforting course content “trigger warnings”. The warnings themselves are not a bad idea, but they should be presented at the start of the course in the form of a general content overview. The message needs to be conveyed that encountering material that makes you feel uncomfortable is a necessary part of learning, and students shouldn’t be encouraged to think of themselves as too fragile or broken to handle that experience.
At the same time, there shouldn’t be any stigma attached to individual acknowledgements of serious incapacitating reactions to certain types of material. Students who are doing their honest best to cope with real problems can be counseled and advised on a case-by-case basis without giving undue encouragement to opportunistic shirkers and self-absorbed “special snowflakes”.
I think there’s two different things going on here:
Trigger warnings, which I may be wrong about, but I think they just started out on the internet as a way to say “this is graphic” or “this might bother you”. Nothing to do with actual PTSD triggers or PTSD at all for that matter.
Then there’s a little side discussion about PTSD since it was briefly mentioned in the NPR thing and I brought it up.
Some people might object to Christianity being discussed as just historical events rather than a divine message.
As one of the seriously incapacitated (though my reaction leads to barfing on your lap, not having PTSD), I think it’s kinda true that I’m a special snowflake when it comes to gore in movies. I mean, I come by it honestly, since my dad couldn’t watch anything with violence, including old Errol Flynn movies, but it’s still my issue.
Well, I recently wrote a ‘trigger warning’ to be included as part of our syllabus template. Why, you ask? Because we had special snowflakes initiate harassment proceedings against instructors for showing “lewd” artwork and for “deconstructing” Christianity during Fall semester. Bear in mind, the grievance process is man-hour intensive, regardless of cause or outcome.
So, the statement I wrote basically tells the student “You will encounter controversial subjects here that are relevant to this area of study. Discussion of these concepts is part of the rigor expected of study at an institution higher education. If you have concerns, we encourage you to speak to your instructor, etc. etc.”
I hate that we had to put it in, but it is a CYA document. We require the student sign and acknowledge it as well. All to save time on the back end.
That is not to say some instructors are not complete morons that use the classroom as a personal soapbox. But where it is relevant to the course material, I support academic freedom. Students need to learn to confront ideas they find abhorrent and either learn to defend their principles or adjust their thinking to accept a new paradigm.
Teaching your students that the Bible does not need to be true to be a work of literature or a motive for historical actions worth studying has genuine educational value. The rest is laughable.
Hear here!