Atlantic: I was wrong about trigger warnings
(archive.is)
You're viewing a single comment thread. View all comments, or full comment thread.
Comments (29)
sorted by:
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!
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.
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.