Imagine a person who has a suppurating sore on her forearm but refuses to get it treated because she “doesn’t believe” in modern medicine. Can people who come into casual contact with her – co-workers, neighbors, passers-by – be expected to remember where her sore is located and make efforts not to brush against it by accident to avoid causing her pain? Or is it her responsibility to manage her own body and its ailments? I think everybody will agree that people who refuse to treat their broken feet, suppurating sores, and pus oozing out of their eyes shouldn’t expect others to arrange their lives around these untreated ailments.
Why should it be any different for the suppurating sores of the psyche, then?
See the following example:
A good friend once wrote about a traumatic experience involving her former partner’s death and how that trauma still impacts her to this day. Thus, when a professor in her grad program said something about how students would probably “rather slit your throat than do this assignment,” it literally triggered a horrifying response in her. She was violently ill, riddled with crippling anxiety and unable to function.
The “good friend” in question seems to believe that it is the responsibility of others to manage her illness and crippledom. She chooses to keep her suppurating sores untreated and farms out the costs of treating them onto complete strangers. She must expect people to walk around with lists of traumas every casual contact of theirs might have experienced.
Jack, the janitor at work. Parents had a messy divorce. Don’t mention parents, divorce, or color orange (don’t rememebr why) around him.
Lisa, the neighbor from across the street, 4 houses down. Don’t bring up broccoli or aunts because her favorite aunt choked on a piece of broccoli and died when Lisa was 5.
Aaron, the co-worker in the cubicle across the room. Don’t mention parrots, the name Lisa, and broccoli because Lisa the neighbor killed his favorite parrot when he accidentally mentioned broccoli and reminded her of the horrible trauma of her aunt’s death.
Clearly, nobody can live this way. Maybe instead of expecting strangers to keep lists of our ailments and treat them even though they have no idea how to do that, we can take responsibility for our own bodies, at least, and seek medical help for our violent illnesses and excruciating martyrdoms.
Clarissa's Blog 
My favorite part is when refers to someone who”finds a way to persist in day-to-day life”
Call me crazy, but if a casual comment from a stranger can cause you to be “violently ill, riddled with crippling anxiety and unable to function” you are not persisting in day-to-day life you are falling apart at the seams and need to address that ASAP.
In Florence King’s indispensable book on traditional (white) southern sex roles, she takes about “Never got over it” old maids (one of several common varieties of women who never married) and recalls someone urgently whispering in her ear moments before joining a group of people for a dinner party “Whatever you do, DO NOT say anything about boats or boating or lakes!”
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It’s like people have begun to see such reactions as normal. It’s beyond weird. It is now up to strangers not to say something innocent like this in case one is a total neurotic and will get crippled by the comment.
It’s totally Gone with the Wind and the ladies who enacted fragility to demonstrate their femininity.
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I think you’re exaggerating a bit. The examples you give are ridiculous and over the top, and I don’t think any reasonable person expects that sort of accommodation. Unfortunately there are always some unreasonable people. And of course people who have experienced significant mental trauma should be getting appropriate health care – those with legitimate needs for trigger warnings due to panic attacks usually do (eventually) seek counseling because it is so disruptive. I think people have taken the good part of content warnings and taken them far beyond their original scope (a significant number of women are raped in their lifetime, but not so many had their grandma choke to death on broccoli). I think its entirely reasonable to say at the beginning of class “Some of the literature we will be discussing deals with rape, racism, and suicide. These topics are marked on the syllabus. If such topics make you uncomfortable for any reason, please take the appropriate steps to steal yourself up before the corresponding class discussions. I remind you that the University provides mental health counseling and number of other resources which are linked to on the course website. If you think it will be better for you to skip a particular class, you will still be responsible for learning that material.” It takes 30 seconds to say that, and makes it clear that they are responsible for their own reactions to the material, but is still kind to students who have experienced trauma. Does that sort of “trigger warning” still sound ridiculous to you?
I think people who expect you to keep lists of traumas for casual contacts is unreasonable, but I definitely do that for friends and colleagues…. Doesn’t everyone? I find that it doesn’t take that much effort.
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“Does that sort of “trigger warning” still sound ridiculous to you?”
Yes, very much so. Especially since the second you open the door to this kind of thing, people will consider it normal to put on the kind of show you can see in the linked quote. The linked quote is real, written by an actual person who believes there is nothing out of the ordinary in her friend’s behavior. People are already expecting to be mothered by professors to an extreme degree. Adding even more fuel to the fire of their neediness will not help them. It will make their needs worse.
The problem is that these trigger warnings try to address the problem it is not within the power of any professor to address. But by accepting the practice of trigger warnings, we make a tacit promise that we will try to address it. That promise will have to be broken and students will have to be disappointed. Why promise what we can’t deliver at all? Why not just tell them honestly from the start that emotional care is not the business we are in?
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Interesting… That’s why I read your blog – always something to think about!
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