interesting! wouldn't a "middle way" be to just call it "note on content"? I think the word "trigger warning" presupposes ppl will be triggered and I personally find it a bit childish for that reason. Content Note would be a bit more neutral. I must say I believe in the idea that exagerating the potential of harm in everyday discourse is making us less psychologically resilient, so I am coming from that kind of direction
It’s an interesting argument, but you seem to be defending a weak version of trigger warnings. In my mind, the debate was never about whether we should warn people about content that’s universally distressing (e.g., “hey look at this photo of a severed head”). I think it’s often useful to give people information about content, as you do in your syllabus, and I don’t think many anti-trigger warning folks would disagree. For example, no one’s seriously arguing that PG-13 labels on movies are coddling kids.
I think the more interesting debate is whether it’s helpful to 1. Warn individuals with PTSD about potential reminders of their trauma and 2. Warn individuals with no trauma history about potentially distressing (ambiguous but plausibly upsetting) content. In both cases, a trigger warning doesn’t just tell someone what they’re going to encounter but that it could trigger an intense negative emotional response.
Ultimately, whether or not trigger warnings are common courtesy should be premised on whether or not they’re effective. (If you try to help someone but end up doing nothing, or making things worse, you’re not doing them a service). I think there’s good evidence that trigger warnings are unhelpful for individuals with PTSD, as you allude to. I also think there’s good reason to suspect that they’re unhelpful in the second usage. For example, my colleagues have a cool new paper showing that content warnings decrease the aesthetic appreciation of art (DOI:10.31234/osf.io/6h5k8). The same argument has been made against warning people about distressing themes in literature: Telling people how they’re likely to react to difficult content draws their attention away from other themes they could have appreciated/learned from and might just make them distressed when they otherwise wouldn’t have been.
Of course, there’s another way that trigger warnings could be ‘effective:’ they could signal respect and support to students. Or they might just signal the professor’s ideological alignment and compromise their epistemic credibility. Who knows - some of my colleagues and I are prepping a study that will look at the interpersonal signals that trigger warnings send.
thanks for the gracious and interesting response, Sam. I agree with a lot of it, and, yes, I am defending a weak version of the trigger warning position. (This is why I call this my least controversial position). My only disagreement is with "Ultimately, whether or not trigger warnings are common courtesy should be premised on whether or not they’re effective." Sometimes common courtesy has a value that transcends utility. It can, as you point out, express respect. Holding the door for someone might turn out to be a net-negative in terms of time and effort, but, still, so long as people expect it and appreciate it, it's a nice thing to do.
Looking forward to hearing more about your study as it gets further along .
Thanks for the reply! The holding the door case is an interesting example. I intuitively agree that it's just a nice thing to do even if it's a net negative (kind of like unwanted gifts at Christmas). I guess it depends on how the action is received though - if the woman you're holding the door for thinks it's patronizing, it gets a bit murky. Which is why it will be interesting to dig into what signals trigger warnings actually send to students. Of course, anti-TW folks often agree that they send good signals but decry that as mere virtue signaling. We will keep you in the loop about our study!
I use trigger warnings (though I call them "content warnings") for exactly the same reason. I once showed my class a film about the Mai Lai massacre. One of my students, who was a combat veteran, came up to me after class and said that he had a hard time sitting through it, and that I should warn veterans before hand. That did it for me.
Interesting take. I don’t see the need for any such warnings, primarily because if we’re working under the assumption that the students are adult(ish), they can look things up themselves. The students know what’s going on. Not sure how the courteousness adds anything. This strikes me mostly as handholding designed to make professor’s lives easier by placating immature students (not an unreasonable goal in and of itself).
Appreciate your reasoned and nuanced piece. Thanks for writing.
I suppose statistically speaking, there exist professors of the type you described, but it’s not likely (is it?) that all professors share the same goals and priorities. There must also be professors who provide such warnings out of basic decency. And that’s a marvellous thing. If by courteousness you meant the lip-service kind, I’m not a fan either. But if by courteousness you meant the kind the writer meant — civility and respect — then it adds a lot! At the very least, it sets the stage for civil discourse and, dare one hope, a good conversation. As you said in ’35 Things Life Has Taught Me’, “Kindness is underrated. Common courtesy even more-so.”
Yes fair points. Of course people differ on what counts as civility in these cases but that’s fine. Ultimately I’m in favor of whatever gets a good discussion going.
Reasonable. The main issue in universities, as you discuss, is when the trigger warning's give students permission to be hyperbolic or oversensitive, or just skip class. I remember overhearing a conversation between two girls when I was in college, ecstatic that their sociology prof had announced the lecture on female slaves was optional due it to being potentially triggering (they went to the mall instead). I think an aspect worth discussing as well is just how sensitive and sheltered many students are today. It might not be worth a prof's trouble to have to shepherd them through material they can't stomach.
Just come across your writing, and thoroughly enjoying it. On the subject of trigger warnings, I agree that being considerate is a good thing - but not doing it in a way that lets students opt out of tackling difficult stuff.
Van Jones put it best for me when talking about students and safe spaces:
"But there's another view that is now I think ascendant, which I think is just a horrible view, which is that "I need to be safe ideologically. I need to be safe emotionally. I just need to feel good all the time, and if someone says something that I don't like, that's a problem for everybody else including the administration."
I think that is a terrible idea for the following reason: I don't want you to be safe, ideologically. I don't want you to be safe, emotionally. I want you to be strong. That's different.
I'm not going to pave the jungle for you. Put on some boots, and learn how to deal with adversity. I'm not going to take all the weights out of the gym; that's the whole point of the gym. This is the gym."
interesting! wouldn't a "middle way" be to just call it "note on content"? I think the word "trigger warning" presupposes ppl will be triggered and I personally find it a bit childish for that reason. Content Note would be a bit more neutral. I must say I believe in the idea that exagerating the potential of harm in everyday discourse is making us less psychologically resilient, so I am coming from that kind of direction
Hi Paul, big fan of your work.
It’s an interesting argument, but you seem to be defending a weak version of trigger warnings. In my mind, the debate was never about whether we should warn people about content that’s universally distressing (e.g., “hey look at this photo of a severed head”). I think it’s often useful to give people information about content, as you do in your syllabus, and I don’t think many anti-trigger warning folks would disagree. For example, no one’s seriously arguing that PG-13 labels on movies are coddling kids.
I think the more interesting debate is whether it’s helpful to 1. Warn individuals with PTSD about potential reminders of their trauma and 2. Warn individuals with no trauma history about potentially distressing (ambiguous but plausibly upsetting) content. In both cases, a trigger warning doesn’t just tell someone what they’re going to encounter but that it could trigger an intense negative emotional response.
Ultimately, whether or not trigger warnings are common courtesy should be premised on whether or not they’re effective. (If you try to help someone but end up doing nothing, or making things worse, you’re not doing them a service). I think there’s good evidence that trigger warnings are unhelpful for individuals with PTSD, as you allude to. I also think there’s good reason to suspect that they’re unhelpful in the second usage. For example, my colleagues have a cool new paper showing that content warnings decrease the aesthetic appreciation of art (DOI:10.31234/osf.io/6h5k8). The same argument has been made against warning people about distressing themes in literature: Telling people how they’re likely to react to difficult content draws their attention away from other themes they could have appreciated/learned from and might just make them distressed when they otherwise wouldn’t have been.
Of course, there’s another way that trigger warnings could be ‘effective:’ they could signal respect and support to students. Or they might just signal the professor’s ideological alignment and compromise their epistemic credibility. Who knows - some of my colleagues and I are prepping a study that will look at the interpersonal signals that trigger warnings send.
thanks for the gracious and interesting response, Sam. I agree with a lot of it, and, yes, I am defending a weak version of the trigger warning position. (This is why I call this my least controversial position). My only disagreement is with "Ultimately, whether or not trigger warnings are common courtesy should be premised on whether or not they’re effective." Sometimes common courtesy has a value that transcends utility. It can, as you point out, express respect. Holding the door for someone might turn out to be a net-negative in terms of time and effort, but, still, so long as people expect it and appreciate it, it's a nice thing to do.
Looking forward to hearing more about your study as it gets further along .
Thanks for the reply! The holding the door case is an interesting example. I intuitively agree that it's just a nice thing to do even if it's a net negative (kind of like unwanted gifts at Christmas). I guess it depends on how the action is received though - if the woman you're holding the door for thinks it's patronizing, it gets a bit murky. Which is why it will be interesting to dig into what signals trigger warnings actually send to students. Of course, anti-TW folks often agree that they send good signals but decry that as mere virtue signaling. We will keep you in the loop about our study!
I use trigger warnings (though I call them "content warnings") for exactly the same reason. I once showed my class a film about the Mai Lai massacre. One of my students, who was a combat veteran, came up to me after class and said that he had a hard time sitting through it, and that I should warn veterans before hand. That did it for me.
Interesting take. I don’t see the need for any such warnings, primarily because if we’re working under the assumption that the students are adult(ish), they can look things up themselves. The students know what’s going on. Not sure how the courteousness adds anything. This strikes me mostly as handholding designed to make professor’s lives easier by placating immature students (not an unreasonable goal in and of itself).
Appreciate your reasoned and nuanced piece. Thanks for writing.
I suppose statistically speaking, there exist professors of the type you described, but it’s not likely (is it?) that all professors share the same goals and priorities. There must also be professors who provide such warnings out of basic decency. And that’s a marvellous thing. If by courteousness you meant the lip-service kind, I’m not a fan either. But if by courteousness you meant the kind the writer meant — civility and respect — then it adds a lot! At the very least, it sets the stage for civil discourse and, dare one hope, a good conversation. As you said in ’35 Things Life Has Taught Me’, “Kindness is underrated. Common courtesy even more-so.”
Yes fair points. Of course people differ on what counts as civility in these cases but that’s fine. Ultimately I’m in favor of whatever gets a good discussion going.
Reasonable. The main issue in universities, as you discuss, is when the trigger warning's give students permission to be hyperbolic or oversensitive, or just skip class. I remember overhearing a conversation between two girls when I was in college, ecstatic that their sociology prof had announced the lecture on female slaves was optional due it to being potentially triggering (they went to the mall instead). I think an aspect worth discussing as well is just how sensitive and sheltered many students are today. It might not be worth a prof's trouble to have to shepherd them through material they can't stomach.
Just come across your writing, and thoroughly enjoying it. On the subject of trigger warnings, I agree that being considerate is a good thing - but not doing it in a way that lets students opt out of tackling difficult stuff.
Van Jones put it best for me when talking about students and safe spaces:
"But there's another view that is now I think ascendant, which I think is just a horrible view, which is that "I need to be safe ideologically. I need to be safe emotionally. I just need to feel good all the time, and if someone says something that I don't like, that's a problem for everybody else including the administration."
I think that is a terrible idea for the following reason: I don't want you to be safe, ideologically. I don't want you to be safe, emotionally. I want you to be strong. That's different.
I'm not going to pave the jungle for you. Put on some boots, and learn how to deal with adversity. I'm not going to take all the weights out of the gym; that's the whole point of the gym. This is the gym."