Free Speech and Creepy Liberalism

there's a push pull with literature as an elective slash some english as a mandatory slash the ideals of a liberal arts education transforming. i think this was covered upthread already, but.

like there's a notion that it is _important_ for students to experience other perspectives, and to be discomfited, and work through, so to speak, some heavy shit, so that they are inducted into a genuine adulthood with a wider field of vision. and this is supposed to make students uncomfortable, and challenge them, and confront them.

and then there is also the service university which is an expensive summer camp with a nice certificate at the end.

and this stuff is somewhere in between, because precisely it impacts what the "canon" is and what the mandatory lit curriculum shapes up like.

even in high school and jr. high like _tons_ of what we read were all coming of age war novels of some kind (which is actually really weird, and speaks to a great deal about when and why the curriculum was set!).

then you get to college and you're supposed to read all this stuff with emotions and settings and feelings and craft and just dive headlong into the sea of common experience of people of a certain class and social position and aesthetic sensibility and refinement and then you can learn to like things and develop taste (oh god) and you're told this is what grown people read. so if you opt out, what does that say about you? its a violent act. it believes in the power of the word more than the curriculum does, that's for sure!

that's the problem. they're teaching you this because it is supposed to be important. but simultaneously it's not important, it is claimed, in the sense that it can _matter_. and if it _is_ important, and _can_ matter, then you are allowed to say no to it.

its this false debate playacting as though humanities education actually resembles the captain my captain romanticism it occasionally aspires to.

(but that would be even worse, wouldn't it?)

the captain my captain romanticism

I don't get this phrase; as in the spirit of Whitman?

The spirit of Robin Williams, is how I took that.

Great posts Spectrum. The timing of this suggests it has a lot more to do with the current wave of social justice activism than it does with PTSD.

What I find strange is the echoes of the PMRC arguments 25 years ago. I remember most of the left being furious about the stickers and not buying the line that it was just informing people, not censorship, and they were right because the stickers led to records not being stocked in certain stores and the manufacture of clean versions, which are mild forms of censorship. At least the PMRC and MPAA are only concerned about under-18s. I'm uneasy with the idea that universities should be the first bodies to start labelling art for over-18s.

That's a crucial distinction, DL.

ive skimmed, has anybody waltzed in here to say tw: are basically viewer discretion is advised type shit and its rly not a big deal to do this?

ya

ok cool has anyone posted this yet> http://tressiemc.com/2014/03/05/the-trigger-warned-syllabus/

like there's a notion that it is _important_ for students to experience other perspectives, and to be discomfited, and work through, so to speak, some heavy shit, so that they are inducted into a genuine adulthood with a wider field of vision. and this is supposed to make students uncomfortable, and challenge them, and confront them.

But there's another notion endemic in most universities and colleges in the last 15 years that students enduring discomfiting pain must have services available, and professors are no less responsible than administrators for mitigating those painful experiences.

The explicit aim of the original Oberlin guidelines (which may have changed over time) was something along the lines of 'widening access to the classroom for past victims of sexual violence'. The idea that English Lit professors automatically know more about the harsh realities of life than all their students doesn't really stand up.

Also seems a little dishonest for the article linked above to equate this with a previous example of reactionary students complaining about having to think about issues of gender and oppression from a position of privilege.

Would it be nice & thoughtful to include trigger warnings on potentially troubling texts? Sure, of course. That part's easy.

The implications of this discussion, however, quickly get a good deal thornier. Do institutions (such as those of higher learning) have an obligation to provide such warnings on the material from which they teach? If so, what kind of obligation? What should be labeled and how? Whose decision is it? And is the likelihood that one might be triggered a disability? If so, what sort of accommodations should be required?

Taking the line of inquiry a bit further, do those who might be triggered have the authority to police discourse so as to protect themselves from triggers? If so, how so, and to what extent? And is it truly harmful to be triggered? If so, is it then assaultive to expose others to potentially triggering material without providing warnings or heeding their protestation? Etc...

There's an edge of hand-wringing hysteria to all that what-if-ing, but such questions must, I think, extend from a conception of PTSD as a medical condition with vulnerability to triggering its symptom. Especially in a moral climate that attaches special significance, in some cases legal significance, to our sense of having been wronged by the language and ideas of others (not faulting such attachment, btw).

^ goes back to bison an hour ago

There is no blanket obligation to provide warnings. There may be an obligation to engage with a student body that has requested that warnings be put on the agenda but the nature of that dialogue and the expectations it creates going to be different for every institution.

Leaving aside hyperbole about the marketisation of education (and if you're charging tens of thousands of dollars in tuition, idk if the students are the ones instigating that marketisation), there are legitimate questions over whether students should be ignored when they've requested input into classroom and behaviour.

I've not seen much that suggests there's an attempt to police discourse, rather than give an opportunity for students to remove themselves from the situation if they feel they need to without suffering any penalty and having a common-sense approach to whether the graphic materials that you are using in class are necessary.

The example that keeps coming up is a student who felt she wasn't able to leave a screening of a film with a traumatic rape scene because she thought it would draw attention but could have chose not to attend if she had known in advance. Is that hand-wringing?

Of course not. Absolutely nobody itt has called that particular clear-cut example hand-wringing or said that a warning shouldn't have been given.

I mean, no issue seems complicated if you only focus in the most cut-and-dried cases. That's easy.

it seems like everyone agrees that a TW would have been appropriate in the rape scene example. What's concerning to me is the wording of the Oberlin guildlines that objectionable material should be removed from the syllabus if it not of educational value--who is making that judgement, the instructor, the students or the administration? Also, looking again at the guidlines, the scope of what is considered harmful seems to be expanding to include not just traumatic scenes of sexual assault or violence, but a general feeling of racism, sexism, cis-ism that some people see in everything. I'm reminded here of some of the recent online social justice dust-ups in which people who have done something insensitive or offensive are told they have caused "harm"--which seems to take things out the realm of ideas and to treat unwanted ideas as assaults. (I'm also annoyed when libertarians claim that people are forcing them to do things at the point of a gun.)

The video example evidently wasn't clear-cut enough for the teacher to understand that they should have flagged it, in the absence of guidelines telling them that they needed to. That kind of thoughtlessness (or failure to understand that what may be an abstract idea for you isn't going to be for everyone) is why there's a case for things like this. Drawing the line might be challenging but the conversation about what is and isn't appropriate needs to happen.

Oberlin's guidelines are an extreme example and only exist in draft form at the moment.

Also seems a little dishonest for the article linked above to equate this with a previous example of reactionary students complaining about having to think about issues of gender and oppression from a position of privilege.

those complaints are similar to but have to be distinguished from those of their actually-triggered (here's where the criterion for what 'triggering' is has to be put into institutional practice!) counterparts. in that way this is in fact a test case for the trigger-ED project, since they can't exactly just deny students' experiences ('you're calling me a racist just because i'm white! that hurts me!'), especially from an evidently substantial moral/political position, but also don't want to be in the business of determining whose claims to oppression etc as a basis for trigger vulnerability excuse slips are legitimate.

wtf this bullet point from Oberlin:

Try to avoid using graphic language yourself within the trigger warning, but do give students a hint about what might be triggering about the material. If you say something like, “This movie might be upsetting to some of you,” that can a) sound patronizing and b) lead everyone who’s experienced trauma to feel like they might have a terrible time. Try instead saying, “This movie contains scenes of racism, including slurs and even physical violence, but I believe that the movie itself is working to expose and stand against racism and I think it is important to our work here.”

I believe The Birth of a Nation is working to expose and stand against racism and I think it is important to our work here.

'this thing might fuck yall up'

'this bitch really gets it bad in the next chapter, so… watch out'

'Birth of a Nation' is an explicitly racist movie that we are watching because adults can study things that they don't always agree with.

Try to avoid using graphic language yourself within the trigger warning, but do give students a hint about what might be triggering about the material. If you say something like, “This movie might be upsetting to some of you,” that can a) sound patronizing and b) lead everyone who’s experienced trauma to feel like they might have a terrible time. Try instead saying, “This movie contains scenes of racism, including slurs and even physical violence, but I believe that the movie itself is working to expose and stand against racism and I think it is important to our work here.”

― guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, May 20, 2014 4:22 PM (7 minutes ago)

this was written by a student, right

You may hesitate to issue a trigger warning, or try to compose a vague trigger warning, because you feel it might also be a “spoiler.” A trigger warning does not need to give everything away. If you’re warning people about the issue of suicide in Things Fall Apart, you can write, “Trigger warning: This book contains a scene of suicide…” You don’t necessarily need to “give away” the plot. However, even if a trigger warning does contain a spoiler, experiencing a trigger is always, always worse than experiencing a spoiler.

the "always, always" really makes me feel like they gave this to a grad student to do

here's the whole thing

http://web.archive.org/web/20131222174936/http:/new.oberlin.edu/office/equity-concerns/sexual-offense-resource-guide/prevention-support-education/support-resources-for-faculty.dot

"educate yourself"!!! ok, i can't

always, like, waaaay worse

you there, in the purple shirt

it is always, always worse to misattribute a gender to someone than it is to call attention to their wardrobe

may i have your permission to direct your body using physical contact with my own?

clear trigger warnings are not reducible to "content warnings" otherwise there would be no controversy. "this is the same as saying 'there's some rough content here', right?" isn't cutting it, as much as it gets repeated. merely giving such a warning is not at issue (well, it is, among people with an investment in harshness...)

two aspects of trigger warnings are meeting skepticism and resistance or "reaction" in political terms: what is proposed to deserve a warning, and what a student is permitted to do once the warning is given.

first, trigger warnings, if put into practice, would institutionalize consideration of things like racism and sexism and other forms of bigotry on the same plane as individual experiences of violence or victimization (war, abuse, etc) that cause PTSD. post-trauma is the model. it insists that politics and psychology are indivisible. conservative and universalist-liberal objections tend to fall here

second, (and things are fuzzier here) students at risk of being triggered will have some kind of avenue or resources to complete the course in an alternate way. disability is the model here: dyslexia, and so on. if a text is so "warned" then pedagogy and the surrounding administration have to provide multiple options. academics, as a class, already have a self-conception as tough-minded and justice-aware people, but aren't exactly inviting of another administrative headache, to put it very generously...

it is always interesting to me that these kinds of controversies always spring up in English departments.

This response is going around.

But learning about these topics are all necessary forms of education. And trigger warnings won’t solve or ameliorate the problems that open, frank, guided discussion by well-trained, competent instructors can. Every semester, I gird up my loins to address the range of defensive and uncomfortable reactions that students have to material they have been taught never to discuss in polite company.

well, what if such an instructor isn't available?

go stand in the fuckin corner

Now go home and get your fuckin shine box

historians will write about how liberal humanism finally collapsed when it was no longer able to effectively distinguish between trigger warnings and spoiler warnings.

one was always, always worse than other, but no one could remember which

schoolchildren will be taught a mnemonic they will call 'the warning warning'

re goole: yeah, that's exactly what i was trying to say-by-asking, but like, clearerer

back to one of mordy's questions iirc, CDC report (haven't found a link yet) says 30% of inner-city children suffer PTSD which makes it harder for them to learn

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/05/16/hood-disease-inner-city-oakland-youth-suffering-from-post-traumatic-stress-disorder-ptsd-crime-violence-shooting-homicide-murder/

but supposedly some people are suggesting it is a more complex form that is going by the unfortunate name 'hood disease'

http://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2014/05/inner_city_youth_suffer_from_hood_disease_also_known_as_ptsd.html

and of course that's not a good idea

http://gawker.com/can-we-stop-trying-to-make-hood-disease-a-real-thing-1579145911

I've posted a link before to a study about a high percentage of Native American kids having PTSD, but on phone now and can't find it. Studies are out there.

http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2014/05/what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-trigger-warnings

laurie penny

There is some debate over where precisely the term "trigger warning" entered common parlance. I first encountered it on Livejournal and in related online communties that were sensitive to mental health issues; mental health bloggers in particular used the term to signal that what was about to be discussed or described might be harrowing for those with PTSD. One of the many crucial things that has been missed, deliberately or otherwise, is that "trigger warnings", at least initially, were almost always attached to personal narratives. They became a way to share stories of trauma, anger and extreme experience whilst preserving a space which did not alienate the vulnerable.

In those spaces online, we spoke about rape and abuse, racism and gendered violence, discrimination and frightening mental health experiences, but these discussions were not designed to shock- indeed, part of the point of the discussion was that these things happened so often that they should not be shocking, happened to so many of us that there needed to be a way to talk about them. I honed my own writing in exactly those forums, discursive spaces where the personal and the political were raw and real, and "trigger warnings" were just a part of the shorthand I grew up with - and I may have got this entirely wrong, but I’m not known as a delicate, retiring person who’s reticent about speaking her mind.

http://m.xojane.com/issues/what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-trigger-warnings

jacqui shine

This stigma has persisted. Scholar Joshua S. Goldstein has thoroughly documented the long history of framing traumatized combat vets as emasculated and weak. And though we’ve seen some growth in public attitudes toward trauma and PTSD in military combat veterans, less than half of soldiers with PTSD seek treatment, largely due to fear of stigma--including the fear of being seen as weak and feminized. Likewise, men who survive sexual abuse struggle to reach out for help because they don’t want to seem weak or have their sexuality called into question. Despite the work of feminist physicians and researchers like Judith Herman, whose Trauma and Recovery challenged stigma and advanced evidence-based treatment for PTSD, we still view even trauma itself through a profoundly patriarchal lens.

Our contempt for the trigger warning comes from--what? A fear that people--particularly women--might insist on being fully seen and recognized, even if it’s inconvenient? That we might have to reckon with the pain of others, especially the most incomprehensible varieties of suffering? That sometimes it takes a long time to get better, that sometimes we don’t? That we might have to acknowledge our shared responsibility for a world that is still so profoundly hostile toward women of all genders that, as Dylan Farrow’s recent revelations demonstrate, we categorically refuse to believe survivors?

It may or may not be practicable or advisable to provide trigger warnings in college classrooms. Honestly, I don’t care much either way. What I do care about is the way in which the subject seems to provide a convenient excuse to pathologize and shame survivors. The conversation about trigger warnings is, in every way, a conversation about trauma survivors, and, in a small way, a conversation about what part we each play in creating communities in which all of us can fully participate. If we’re going to have that conversation--and I think it’s an important one!--we need to do it without diminishing or lionizing trauma survivors. Pain, even and especially the pain of trauma, is neither permanently damaging or inherently ennobling. It’s just a part of life. As with most things, we deal with it individually and communally, whether we like it or not.

And you know something? I don’t think that how we as individual survivors manage our struggles every day is the problem here. Let’s stop acting like it is.

agree completely w all that. to the extent i have concerns, it's about the intersection of the moral, social and legal in dealing with the idea of triggering, as framed by ongoing push-pull between bullshit, anti-intellectual constructions like "creepy liberalism" and "illiberal liberalism" (the accusation cast by the thread title as it might be smugly framed from the opposite direction).

more accurate would probably be 'creepy leftism' which makes a lot more sense

or at least more accurate to what the thread is now about. cardamon seems to be describing a different phenomenon in op

feel like shine is making the easy argument there ("we should be aware of and responsive to the varieties of suffering"--well of course!) without making the hard one: should this sort of thing be institutionalized, codified, compulsory?

and if so, what counts and what doesn't? who gets excluded from these protections and why? i feel like if you're not addressing those points you're keeping you're hands clean in the name of an all-inclusiveness which can't really be actualized to any pragmatic end at all. the point being that for TW to be of any use in the university, or to retain any coherence as an idea, some things have to count and some cannot. someone, some modes of suffering, will inevitably be excluded by any such scheme.

well, isn't part of the point of taking on the trauma-theoretic machinery that it allows for the consolidation of distinct, sometimes aligned, sometimes not, liberatory/anti-oppressive political praxes and discourses under one institutional lever / line of rhetorical attack? —with standing recognition (backed by scientific research) of forms of social oppression as the criterion for triggered suffering that counts and triggered suffering that doesn't (aside from, i suppose, the usual individualized medicalized/psychiatrized forms of same).