Atlantic: I was wrong about trigger warnings
(archive.is)
Comments (29)
sorted by:
I think the only person who actually needs a trigger warning is Alec Baldwin
Trigger warnings were actually first used by groups of people with Dissociative Identity Disorder to prevent them from "triggering" their condition. It's just that it got picked up by mental illness tumblr and they used it for attention.
To be fair, it was also used for legitimate and serious cases of PTSD where a trigger could result in rather serious reactions, namely from things like war veterans that would enter into some form of aggressive mentality. What's important to note is that trigger warnings in this instance was less about avoiding the triggers, but more to ease a person into re-acclimatise to what is otherwise normal situations.
The idea of isolation from """triggers""" is actually counter-intuitive and results in worse situations, not improvement as they can never actually get used to normal life due to the constant avoidance of these otherwise normal circumstances.
around Alecs, never relax
Wait, is this author seriously going to say trigger warnings are causing this?
Is that how they are going to ignore the real problem, scapegoat trigger warnings and pronouns? The two things that nobody likes?
Boy, how convenient!
Adressing the real problem would be loosening their grip on speech and they can't allow that
It is well-documented that ''avoidance strategies'' and anticipation worsen anxiety disorders. Trigger warnings do both avoidance and anticipation. It primes the person for hyperawareness to seek the anxiety-inducing stuff, which is itself, anxiety-inducing.
Eventually, the mentally-weakened students need a soft pre-warning before reading the trigger warnings, because those give them high anxiety too.
Phobias are treated with controlled, sustained exposure.
So trigger warning are a real cause of this growing intolerance to mild discomfort among ( Leftist ) students.
That mind-virus needs to be taken to the back of the shed and shot.
I can see the reasoning behind it. Trigger warnings imply that merely being exposed to ideas is harmful. Trigger warning begin propagating and so the easily influenced become convinced they’re being harmed.
I don’t know if there’s a word for this phenomenon, but some people obviously conceive of language as a collection of passwords rather than a means of communication. The migrants says “asylum” or “refugee” not because these things are true but because saying these things gets the migrant what he wants. The leftist says “microaggression” or “triggered” not because these words describe a genuine feeling but because saying these words grants the leftist power over you. The idiot accuse you of fallacies not because you have committed any but rather because he has seen someone else succeed with similar accusations. This behavior is rampant in low IQ groups, who are simply parroting the actions of others in order to receive the same resources. Such tactics are also frequently deployed by bad actors who cynically abuse such “passwords” to achieve their most self-serving goals.
I don’t know how you engage or counteract such people.
This makes me think of NPC scripting as 'spells' or a kind of 'word magick' that is supposed to create the desired effect. It's an aping of language by intellects not sufficient to generate their own arguments. And calling it out gets you branded a bigot, because any discrimination at all is bigotry to the left. All standards are oppression, etc. etc. It's very tiresome.
And heaven forfend you should go after the anointed ones who are writing said codes!
It's not too dissimilar to kids who learn how to manipulate their parents (and other adults sometimes). Or women who learn the very blatant and workable angles with which they can easily manipulate a man into simping out for her benefit. Or male pickup artists who figure out just what kind of tricks appeal to a woman's sentiment and sense of self.
It's about manipulation and knowing what tricks get past a person's defenses, and some people just operate off of this principle as default behavior.
Another fun example: To appeal to a typical lefty NPC, all you need to do is impress upon them how X impacts the homeless, poor, minorities, etc. to get them to buy into an idea hook line and sinker.
In a way, maybe one part of why logical, sensible, sane people ended up getting so easily shoved off to the sidelines is specifically because they have little interest in falling for these mindgames or being active participants/users.
They aren't entirely wrong, considering that it's been working.
"The only way to win is not to play the game", which we started manifesting in tactics like "chad yes" and entirely rejecting their framing on things.
Yeah and once you realize this exists you start seeing it everywhere - people who have no idea of the meaning, use, or intention of words (or even actions) but invoke them anyway. They could be trying to create a result (crying racism for their own benefit), they could be using them habitually (like meaningless niceties in conversation) or they might use them in lieu of argument, as though they're imbued with some sort of sacred, infallible authority and are true just because (leftist academia buzzwords).
You see it with pedestrians waiting at a red light even though there are no cars, you see it with people using their turn signals for half a second before turning, because they don't understand the purpose of them, they just know they have to do it before turning the car.
It's depressing when you realize just how much of the population think like this, although it's kind of a spectrum. At one end you have people who never think at all, and by all accounts seem barely sentient; on the other end you have people who rigorously think and question, but will inevitably have a blind spot or two.
Shibboleths might be the closest word to what you're describing, but it's still a little insufficient a descriptor.
Haven't we been saying this since like 2014? That trigger warnings and safe spaces (i.e. pathologizing and avoiding sources of discomfort) just create an illusion of danger and harm your ability to cope?
Fear mongering is central to any victim complex
How bigoted of you
😂😂😂
You mean lying whores who had to complain on the internet because otherwise they would be smacked silly by a defamation lawsuit?
When they criticise the right or the centre, it's an "intellectual critique of my lessers". When the right or centre criticise them, it's "dangerous and harmful content".
ctrl+f sorry phrase not found
get fucked and die in this hell you created. you were warned.
I like how they admit toxic positivity echo chambers have done more harm than good and teens need to toughen up... Just to go back to the same old tired muh PoC LGBTBBQ wahmen discourse and how we achkyually need to cultivate spaces where wahmen can toughen up safely.
Have I told you the definition of madness?
This is why no one respects mainstream "conservatives" when they complain about something. Because in 10 years they'll do a complete 180, so what's the point in listening to them anyway? Just steamroll over them and let them eventually change their tune.
The mainstream left does something similar, except they use mockery instead of direct opposition. But the result is the same: in 10 years they'll line up to defend what they once mocked.
Leftists understand they can do anything they want to conservatives and never face any retribution for it.
This woman is particularly vile