Use of the term "Triggered"

[Xray the Enforcer]

1 hour ago, Kelli Fury said:

I think any person with a modicum of kindness would rather humor someone being dramatic than contribute to a traumatized person feeling unsafe.

A very important point that the keyboard warriors in this thread would do good to remember. 

[Commodore]

the goal is to promote the notion that words can trigger mental/psychological harm, and can therefore be considered violent or unsafe, which justifies restrictions on them

[Week]

3 minutes ago, Commodore said:

the goal is to promote the notion that words can trigger mental/psychological harm, and can therefore be considered violent or unsafe, which justifies restrictions on them

That meaning (and conclusion) has not been provided or supported by anyone here.

What has been said is that certain situations or discussions may 'trigger' a physiological or psychosomatic response. That response should be respected and one can choose to remain in discussion or extricate themselves. 

Intentional 'triggering' is trolling and that should be treated with the level of respect it deserves.

[Fez]

I see the word used a lot, but only ironically, and almost only on Twitter. I understand the original usage behind the word, but does anyone still use it that way?

[Week]

1 minute ago, Fez said:

I see the word used a lot, but only ironically, and almost only on Twitter. I understand the original usage behind the word, but does anyone still use it that way?

In terms of genuine use, I've seen it discussed in college courses often as 'trigger warnings'.

http://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2016/09/21/493913099/content-notice-here-are-a-few-ways-professors-use-trigger-warnings

The podcast on this topic is interesting as well. There is reasonable and thoughtful discussion both for and against warnings.

[Commodore]

13 minutes ago, Week said:

That meaning (and conclusion) has not been provided or supported by anyone here.

What has been said is that certain situations or discussions may 'trigger' a physiological or psychosomatic response. That response should be respected and one can choose to remain in discussion or extricate themselves. 

The problem is the type/degree of speech that merits a trigger warning, and those warnings being employed not to prevent harm, but to prevent unpopular speech from being heard.

If anything, the Streisand Effect often makes people more curious about speech tagged with trigger warnings. 

[Week]

24 minutes ago, Commodore said:

The problem is the type/degree of speech that merits a trigger warning, and those warnings being employed not to prevent harm, but to prevent unpopular speech from being heard.

If anything, the Streisand Effect often makes people more curious about speech tagged with trigger warnings. 

Nice straw-man. The problem seems to be your perception and not what is being argued here. You are trying to make this about censorship - it should not be. That is not what has been argued here. Streisand Effect is not pertinent here. 

The point made is that if you trigger someone else to treat them with respect instead of disdain - no matter how legitimate you think their reaction is. 

[zelticgar]

My teenager and her friends use the word a lot. It started at the beginning of the school year and continues.  I drive once a week for the car pool  and I can't make it through the ride without one of them jokingly using it to describe how a teacher did something that triggered them and they need to go to guidance for a safe space. They use "special snowflake" a lot as well. I understand that there are real mental health reasons why these terms exist but when the 13 year old crew has adopted them to be used in humorous conversations it may be time to retire them from serious conversation. 

 

[Dr. Pepper]

1 hour ago, Week said:

Nice straw-man. The problem seems to be your perception and not what is being argued here. You are trying to make this about censorship - it should not be. That is not what has been argued here. Streisand Effect is not pertinent here. 

The point made is that if you trigger someone else to treat them with respect instead of disdain - no matter how legitimate you think their reaction is. 

Yeah, I've never felt censored at all when I'm asked to respect someone's reaction.  Probably the only time I've felt censored when triggers come into effect is when the Commodores of the world try really hard to shut down all conversation so they can be an asshole and then become enraged when they realize they don't have a license for free- range assholing.  

13 minutes ago, zelticgar said:

My teenager and her friends use the word a lot. It started at the beginning of the school year and continues.  I drive once a week for the car pool  and I can't make it through the ride without one of them jokingly using it to describe how a teacher did something that triggered them and they need to go to guidance for a safe space. They use "special snowflake" a lot as well. I understand that there are real mental health reasons why these terms exist but when the 13 year old crew has adopted them to be used in humorous conversations it may be time to retire them from serious conversation. 

 

Then we'd basically be retiring every term from the language because 13 year old, you know, use words just like you or I do.  Further, they are 13 and are exploring concepts.  It's the way they learn and grow.  So no, we shouldn't retire words just because a person who happens to be 13 is using them. 

[zelticgar]

14 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Then we'd basically be retiring every term from the language because 13 year old, you know, use words just like you or I do.  Further, they are 13 and are exploring concepts.  It's the way they learn and grow.  So no, we shouldn't retire words just because a person who happens to be 13 is using them. 

You are extra cranky today Dr. P.  

I simply meant that when they have become so prevalent that they are part of the everyday joking nomenclature of 13 year olds it may be time move away from those terms when having serious discussions. It takes away from the effectiveness when trying to have serious discussions about important issues like mental health problems. 

[kairparavel]

35 minutes ago, zelticgar said:

I understand that there are real mental health reasons why these terms exist but when the 13 year old crew has adopted them to be used in humorous conversations it may be time to retire them from serious conversation. 

 

So, have you explained to them the real mental health issues to them? If you're nonchalant about these things, they will be too. And then we get to where we are now - a term derided/mocked by many because not enough people cared enough to step in on the behalf of those with real, valid responses to real triggering situations. 

[zelticgar]

4 minutes ago, kairparavel said:

So, have you explained to them the real mental health issues to them? If you're nonchalant about these things, they will be too. And then we get to where we are now - a term derided/mocked by many because not enough people cared enough to step in on the behalf of those with real, valid responses to real triggering situations. 

I have specifically talked about the seriousness of mental health issues with my daughter and she did write a debate paper covering safe places and trigger warnings last year during her english comp class. Clearly the seriousness of the terminology has not resonated with her or the friends. I personally don't spend a lot of time controlling or censoring language with my kids. I have a line of acceptable discourse that I will not allow the kids to move past but joking comments like the ones i mentioned previously don't seem to trigger my "acceptable discourse" radar.  

I think the issue of triggering losing its impact is due to media coverage of events like the University of Missouri and the Yale Halloween outbursts. The media was looking for cases to use to discredit campus culture and these events created a great visual to create an impression of overreach on behalf of students and academics. Those two soundbites did more damage to the trigger warning and safe space movement than anything else i can think of. 

[Dr. Pepper]

1 hour ago, zelticgar said:

You are extra cranky today Dr. P.  

I simply meant that when they have become so prevalent that they are part of the everyday joking nomenclature of 13 year olds it may be time move away from those terms when having serious discussions. It takes away from the effectiveness when trying to have serious discussions about important issues like mental health problems. 

What's next, blaming PMS for me calling you out on your shit?  

Sure, you can go ahead and let your daughter mock mental illness instead of explain things to her or allow her to explore concepts as 13 year olds do.  What's next?  She starts joking about nuclear this or that and we have to stop having serious discussions about nuclear weapons or nuclear energy? 

[mormont]

1 hour ago, zelticgar said:

Clearly the seriousness of the terminology has not resonated with her or the friends.

I think that this is not a conclusion you should reach. In fact, if she wrote a paper about if for school, assuming that paper got a good grade and that she's a smart person (which I think are both safe assumptions in context) I'm guessing she has a very good idea of the seriousness of the terminology - probably better than many adults.

The problem here, as already pointed out, is that you're expecting that to have the same effects in context of a group of 13 year old girls in the car joking around, as in serious adult discussion. In the latter case it, joking about trigger warnings would normally be inappropriate. In the former, as Dr P has pointed out, she's using what is in fact (ironically) a 'safe space' to explore. That's fine. It's perfectly possible to know how serious an issue is and still to do that.

[zelticgar]

1 hour ago, Dr. Pepper said:

What's next, blaming PMS for me calling you out on your shit?  

Sure, you can go ahead and let your daughter mock mental illness instead of explain things to her or allow her to explore concepts as 13 year olds do.  What's next?  She starts joking about nuclear this or that and we have to stop having serious discussions about nuclear weapons or nuclear energy? 

I thought it might be menopause but PMS works!  

I think it is possible to have serious conversations using trigger warnings and safe spaces but it is equally reasonable that they are used in a joking matter given how saturated the terms are within our society. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

So you people (speaking broadly to the entire board here) have no problem complying with a spoiler policy, because you wouldnt want to tip someone off to a fictional occurrence before they experience it first hand (be it in print, audio, or video); but the idea of giving the same heads-up for an explicit reference to a potentially traumatic event that someone could have likely actually experienced bugs you?  Wtf.

 

 

[zelticgar]

1 minute ago, larrytheimp said:

So you people (speaking broadly to the entire board here) have no problem complying with a spoiler policy, because you wouldnt want to tip someone off to a fictional occurrence before they experience it first hand (be it in print, audio, or video); but the idea of giving the same heads-up for an explicit reference to a potentially traumatic event that someone could have likely actually experienced bugs you?  Wtf.

 

 

Spoiler

I'm only talking about the packaging of the words. I think triggered has been turned into a joke. If they change the wording to say "traumatic warning" or something similar then I think it makes sense. 

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

2 minutes ago, zelticgar said:

  Hide contents

I'm only talking about the packaging of the words. I think triggered has been turned into a joke. If they change the wording to say "traumatic warning" or something similar then I think it makes sense. 

 

Appreciate the spoiler tags.  Wasn't directed at you, but at the idea that's been tossed around a few of the threads that this is some kind of freedom of speech issue 

[HexMachina]

Don't see why a term should be abandoned just because another group tries to take it and make it derisive/trivial/humorous and ignore the serious aspects of it.. Don't recall specifically but isn't that what happened with SJW? 

[Larry of the Lawn]

1 minute ago, HelenaExMachina said:

Don't see why a term should be abandoned just because another group tries to take it and make it derisive/trivial/humorous and ignore the serious aspects of it.. Don't recall specifically but isn't that what happened with SJW? 

I thought SJW was strictly a derogatory term used by Gamergaters, the alt-right, and lugubrious infant canines, beyond the special snowflake movement on this forum to appropriate the term for its natural rad beauty.