It’s Dead Week, and it’s hitting hard. Students are huddled in the library, ignoring the suddenly perfect weather in order to pump out papers instead. This week, not only am I struggling to prep for finals along with everyone else, but I’m also caught up in a media whirlwind involving something I did two weeks ago.
Two weeks ago, I was focused on campus issues instead of homework. The sexual assaults at our school were all over the news and the campus community was in an uproar. It was the perfect time to present a resolution I wanted to pass through A.S. Senate. “A Resolution to Mandate Warnings for Triggering Content in Academic Settings” asked that teachers mark trigger warnings on any content on their syllabi that could elicit a reaction from students with PTSD. This was never designed or intended to censor anyone or to restrict academic freedom. There have been plenty of accusations in this vein, but once I can explain the misunderstanding, most people realize they are in support of the resolution.
However, there have been a few who found trigger warnings to be so counterproductive to the people with PTSD who are learning to face and deal with their traumas that they just had to take action, even when that action meant false accusations and reports. The most notable of these people is Jenny Jarvie, who wrote an article for the New Republic. In the article, she condemned my actions ⎯ actions that she read about in a Daily Nexus article ⎯ then condemned the resolution … that is, the resolution she never bothered to read. Ms. Jarvie pulled all her information out of one Nexus article, and when it didn’t answer all her questions, she created her own answers. When I addressed that in a response, she complained that Googling the resolution hadn’t given her the information she wanted. Well, the fallible quality of a narrow, front-page Google search has sparked a growing debate. Salon issued a response, followed by hoards of individual bloggers and then some bigger voices – The Guardian, Raw Story, The American Conservative, FlavorWire, The Nation even Dan Savage jumped in.
What started as one badly researched article has become a slew of them. On some sites I have been demonized or framed as hypersensitive and reactionary. My life has been recreated in comment sections and my resolution has been presented as something so extreme and changed that it is unrecognizable. So let me clear some things up:
1. I was not triggered by my classroom experience. It was disturbing and sickening to watch, but I could watch it. However, I recognized the triggering nature of the material, and it inspired action.
2. I did not “go above teachers’ heads.” I took the most efficient route, backed by many teachers, students and campus entities. This was a collaborative effort.
3. We are not encouraging UCSB to act like Oberlin or Rutgers by censoring any and all triggering material, or providing passage-by-passage trigger warnings. Nor, as one website suggests, are we banning content based on mile-long lists of hyper-inclusive triggers, like clustered holes. There are publications reporting fabricated lists of trigger warnings that UCSB supposedly now requires. I’ve learned a lot in the last week about how warped and twisted “facts” are spread and accepted so easily. It’s scary. And suddenly, I’m the bad guy. And suddenly, I’m not anonymous.
On Wednesday March 12 at 11:45, I’m calling into an interview with NPR on 89.3KPCC, the biggest indication of how much of a debate this issue has sparked. Jenny Jarvie has declined to be on air with me because she is microphone-shy. However, they are attempting to bring in Jill Filipovic, the writer of a similar article for The Guardian. To an extent, I have been thrust into a public spotlight. I’m forced to make quick decisions for long-term issues: If I don’t speak now, what’s going to stop the spread of misinformation? But if I do, and this gets even bigger, how will this affect my image and career path? Do I suddenly get a Tumblr and a Twitter and ride this media wave as far as it will go? Or do I refuse any more interviews and hope this goes away? I don’t feel right doing the latter, so for now I will speak. I will not discuss my personal life or experiences in any further depth, but I will speak on this issue and what it positive impact it can have for college students and our society at large.
I encourage everyone to read the resolution in its entirety. This is the version submitted to the A.S. Senate: http://www.as.ucsb.edu/senate/resolutions/a-resolution-to-mandate-warnings-for-triggering-content-in-academic-settings/.
One positive thing has really stood out to me through all of this, and that is the outpouring of support I have received from my fellow Gauchos, who have not hesitated to express their gratitude for the passing of this resolution. Thank you all for being the encouragement I need to continue.
Bailey Loverin is a second-year literature major.
I really appreciate your efforts for this, I had PTSD from some traumatic medical experiences, and would get flashbacks and panic attacks in class whenever teachers discussed the subject, and I was unprepared mentally to be able to deal with it.
But that is not what a teacher can deal with. You have to present this in an impersonal way – pointing out that such experiences are indeed traumatic – I’ve had some myself during World War II. I can be impersonal about these because the information is relevant to many others. You do have to find a way to note some of your experience and feelings in a paper. When I was learning the “classics” at Brooklyn College there was poetry assigned so I had to think through whether I wanted to introduce my own experience or make it work… Read more »
The ‘trigger warning’ hysteria is just one more step down the deep, dark tunnel of totalitarian tyranny…brought to us by your favorite fascist 1-in-4 Gender Bigots. The only interesting theme here is how women NATURALLY tend to rape others’s rights to free speech thanks to Woman’s Way of Communicating. For more on that topic see Woman’s Inhumanity to Woman by Phyllis Chessler or read all about HOW fascist feminist professors criminally attack other women over ‘triggering’ free speech on campus.
So what. I’m glad we are all different from each other. It’s still a free country. Women can pronounce what they want to in public. That’s their right – but once those views are permanently on the page discussion is invited and we have been given permission to object. No one is saying “burn the books” which becomes increasingly unlikely since books of paper are disappearing from the planet. No, I don’t think teachers should be expected to sound alerts at possible “triggers” for those are very personal. Also, those who teach don’t necessarily notice what they might be. The… Read more »
Trigger Warnings Trigger Me: http://chronicle.com/blogs/conversation/2014/03/10/trigger-warnings-trigger-me/
How DO Holocaust survivors manage without PTSD?
This is such a trumped up excuse for getting attention.
I bet these special snowflakes watch crime/cop drama on tv (the mutilated woman of the week episodes) and read and see all the Vampire erotica.
Where did you go to school. Are you one of the Holocaust deniers. You know it cost David Irving, one of England’s most prominent historians, millions to defend himself – a denier – against Deborah Lipstadt – the expert on denial of the Holocaust. She was defended by Anthony Julius who wrote a 600 page book on the litter of anti-Semitism that runs through all English literature. Your statement is ignorant and offensive to anyone who has been broken by the Holocaust experience. It’s easier to defend against deniers than someone who derides a survivor with such flippancy. Well, there’s… Read more »
Here are my thoughts, as a feminist who has survived traumatic, gender linked events at an earlier stage of my life and who is also passionately anti-censorship. This is a variation on a post to my Facebook page: I just did the following quick experiment. I Googled the book title, “The Color Purple” + “trigger warning” and got about 86,600 results. For another book title, “The Kite Runner” – 1,660 results. For the term “religious persecution” + “trigger warning” – 8,660 results. For Islamophobic +”trigger warning” – 53,600 results. For “PTSD” + “trigger warning” – 40,000 results. For “racist language”… Read more »
As a feminist who is passionately anti-censorship!? You’ve got to be kidding. Your whole hysterical hate movement relies on the thuggish censorship of all things anti-feminist, pro male or objectively credible. Even worse, both it’s ideology and it’s applications are fascist to the core. That said, it’s refreshing to see that you are at least talking free speech in a world full of feminist fascists. Maybe you can help bring Male Studies to the New School or back down the Gender Bigots (feminists) who will most definitely oppose establishing a men’s center at your school. But please do remember that… Read more »
I thought her comment was very reasonable and productive. It seems you have your own issues to deal with. However, I appreciate you bringing your assholishness to bear as an example to the author of what the real world is like. No doubt she’d like a trigger warning on your comment. So I’ll provide one: “Trigger Warning: The previous comment was made by an asshole who doesn’t represent all people of his demographic, but is nevertheless the type of person who does exist in the world, and has a right to do so. Learning to deal with his type is… Read more »
You’ll note that I lauded her for the reasonable and productive portions of her comment…that is her call for grown up behavior from ‘triggered’ Gaucho boobs. As for you, if you don’t condemn fascist feminist gender bigots, you’ve got some serious issues to deal with because feminism is evil assholishness on a grand scale. You’ll also be happy to know that ‘my demographic’ is growing broader and deeper day by day thanks to the growing public awareness that feminism is a hysterical hate movement.
You are right on target. The students should play a major role here in supporting each other through readings. Because the “canon” is irrelevant to half the world and to millions of women. Further, it was white men who created the “canon” and all written history. OR uses certain groups to create negative characters. The finest literature reflects these facts but are considered universal because they are about events and people that are relevant to all groups. English literature is mandatory in education yet their literature is probably the most anti-Semitic in the world – except perhaps German literature before… Read more »
Wow, a middle class white chick with privileged parents wants ‘trigger warnings’ so she doesn’t have to think about the real world.
Yeah, I’ll get right on that, after I help my disabled vet neighbor get to the VA for treatment for his crippling migraines.
You’re quite a flippant young person, aren’t you. Well, I’m 83 years old have lived through World War II in which I became collateral damage with lasting physical and mental wounds. Women know something you don’t just BECAUSE THEY ARE WOMEN. I have worked with Vietnam veterans because of my expertise in post-traumatic stress disorder which affects millions of women including prostitutes most of whom were abused as children. Is that enough to trigger some deeper thinking on your part? I do hope so for you seem like a good and generous young man. But you really must restrain that… Read more »
Some trigger warnings will lead to more trigger warnings. It’s simply a bad idea. The slippery slope. Christians will want trigger warnings for evolution and abortion. Muslims will want trigger warnings for a photograph of a woman’s calf. Jews will want trigger warnings for texts that print out the name of G-d. Once someone is entitled to their little zone of comfort, everyone will be entitled. After trigger warnings comes censorship or bans on offensive language. If this grew out of the mind of an 18 year old, I get it — people with zero life experience devising rules for… Read more »
I discussed this issue with Bailey on facebook months ago. I am a (clinically diagnosed) victim of PTSD, but because my PTSD (victim of a pitbull attack) did not fall in Bailey’s parameters, she told me that my PTSD did not count for the exemptions she was seeking. According to Bailey, while she felt sorry for me, she did not think my attack, from which I still suffer on a nearly daily basis, qualified as being worthy of receiving a “trigger warning”. Bailey would like to place herself as the supreme arbiter of what IS and is NOT a “legitimate”… Read more »
Can’t talk this: http://reason.com/blog/2014/12/15/social-justice-bandits-vandalize-apartme