The Coddling of the American Mind

[General Zod]

I'm just going to leave this here

Something strange is happening at America’s colleges and universities. A movement is arising, undirected and driven largely by students, to scrub campuses clean of words, ideas, and subjects that might cause discomfort or give offense. Last December, Jeannie Suk wrote in an online article for The New Yorker about law students asking her fellow professors at Harvard not to teach rape law—or, in one case, even use the word violate (as in “that violates the law”) lest it cause students distress. In February, Laura Kipnis, a professor at Northwestern University, wrote an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education describing a new campus politics of sexual paranoia—and was then subjected to a long investigation after students who were offended by the article and by a tweet she’d sent filed Title IX complaints against her. In June, a professor protecting himself with a pseudonym wrote an essay for Vox describing how gingerly he now has to teach. “I’m a Liberal Professor, and My Liberal Students Terrify Me,” the headline said. A number of popular comedians, including Chris Rock, have stopped performing on college campuses (see Caitlin Flanagan’s article in this month’s issue). Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Maher have publicly condemned the oversensitivity of college students, saying too many of them can’t take a joke.

Two terms have risen quickly from obscurity into common campus parlance. Microaggressions are small actions or word choices that seem on their face to have no malicious intent but that are thought of as a kind of violence nonetheless. For example, by some campus guidelines, it is a microaggression to ask an Asian American or Latino American “Where were you born?,” because this implies that he or she is not a real American. Trigger warnings are alerts that professors are expected to issue if something in a course might cause a strong emotional response. For example, some students have called for warnings that Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart describes racial violence and that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby portrays misogyny and physical abuse, so that students who have been previously victimized by racism or domestic violence can choose to avoid these works, which they believe might “trigger” a recurrence of past trauma.

Some recent campus actions border on the surreal. In April, at Brandeis University, the Asian American student association sought to raise awareness of microaggressions against Asians through an installation on the steps of an academic hall. The installation gave examples of microaggressions such as “Aren’t you supposed to be good at math?” and “I’m colorblind! I don’t see race.” But a backlash arose among other Asian American students, who felt that the display itself was a microaggression. The association removed the installation, and its president wrote an e-mail to the entire student body apologizing to anyone who was “triggered or hurt by the content of the microaggressions.”

According to the most-basic tenets of psychology, helping people with anxiety disorders avoid the things they fear is misguided.
This new climate is slowly being institutionalized, and is affecting what can be said in the classroom, even as a basis for discussion. During the 2014–15 school year, for instance, the deans and department chairs at the 10 University of California system schools were presented by administrators at faculty leader-training sessions with examples of microaggressions. The list of offensive statements included: “America is the land of opportunity” and “I believe the most qualified person should get the job.”

READ FOLLOW-UP NOTES
Haidt and Lukianoff respond to critics
Debating the campus protests over race and free speech
The press has typically described these developments as a resurgence of political correctness. That’s partly right, although there are important differences between what’s happening now and what happened in the 1980s and ’90s. That movement sought to restrict speech (specifically hate speech aimed at marginalized groups), but it also challenged the literary, philosophical, and historical canon, seeking to widen it by including more-diverse perspectives. The current movement is largely about emotional well-being. More than the last, it presumes an extraordinary fragility of the collegiate psyche, and therefore elevates the goal of protecting students from psychological harm. The ultimate aim, it seems, is to turn campuses into “safe spaces” where young adults are shielded from words and ideas that make some uncomfortable. And more than the last, this movement seeks to punish anyone who interferes with that aim, even accidentally. You might call this impulse vindictive protectiveness. It is creating a culture in which everyone must think twice before speaking up, lest they face charges of insensitivity, aggression, or worse.

We have been studying this development for a while now, with rising alarm. (Greg Lukianoff is a constitutional lawyer and the president and CEO of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which defends free speech and academic freedom on campus, and has advocated for students and faculty involved in many of the incidents this article describes; Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist who studies the American culture wars. The stories of how we each came to this subject can be read here.) The dangers that these trends pose to scholarship and to the quality of American universities are significant; we could write a whole essay detailing them. But in this essay we focus on a different question: What are the effects of this new protectiveness on the students themselves? Does it benefit the people it is supposed to help? What exactly are students learning when they spend four years or more in a community that polices unintentional slights, places warning labels on works of classic literature, and in many other ways conveys the sense that words can be forms of violence that require strict control by campus authorities, who are expected to act as both protectors and prosecutors?

Campus Politics
Power, identity, and speech in the new American university
Read more

There’s a saying common in education circles: Don’t teach students what to think; teach them how to think. The idea goes back at least as far as Socrates. Today, what we call the Socratic method is a way of teaching that fosters critical thinking, in part by encouraging students to question their own unexamined beliefs, as well as the received wisdom of those around them. Such questioning sometimes leads to discomfort, and even to anger, on the way to understanding.

But vindictive protectiveness teaches students to think in a very different way. It prepares them poorly for professional life, which often demands intellectual engagement with people and ideas one might find uncongenial or wrong. The harm may be more immediate, too. A campus culture devoted to policing speech and punishing speakers is likely to engender patterns of thought that are surprisingly similar to those long identified by cognitive behavioral therapists as causes of depression and anxiety. The new protectiveness may be teaching students to think pathologically.

How Did We Get Here?

It’s difficult to know exactly why vindictive protectiveness has burst forth so powerfully in the past few years. The phenomenon may be related to recent changes in the interpretation of federal antidiscrimination statutes (about which more later). But the answer probably involves generational shifts as well. Childhood itself has changed greatly during the past generation. Many Baby Boomers and Gen Xers can remember riding their bicycles around their hometowns, unchaperoned by adults, by the time they were 8 or 9 years old. In the hours after school, kids were expected to occupy themselves, getting into minor scrapes and learning from their experiences. But “free range” childhood became less common in the 1980s. The surge in crime from the ’60s through the early ’90s made Baby Boomer parents more protective than their own parents had been. Stories of abducted children appeared more frequently in the news, and in 1984, images of them began showing up on milk cartons. In response, many parents pulled in the reins and worked harder to keep their children safe.

The flight to safety also happened at school. Dangerous play structures were removed from playgrounds; peanut butter was banned from student lunches. After the 1999 Columbine massacre in Colorado, many schools cracked down on bullying, implementing “zero tolerance” policies. In a variety of ways, children born after 1980—the Millennials—got a consistent message from adults: life is dangerous, but adults will do everything in their power to protect you from harm, not just from strangers but from one another as well.

These same children grew up in a culture that was (and still is) becoming more politically polarized. Republicans and Democrats have never particularly liked each other, but survey data going back to the 1970s show that on average, their mutual dislike used to be surprisingly mild. Negative feelings have grown steadily stronger, however, particularly since the early 2000s. Political scientists call this process “affective partisan polarization,” and it is a very serious problem for any democracy. As each side increasingly demonizes the other, compromise becomes more difficult. A recent study shows that implicit or unconscious biases are now at least as strong across political parties as they are across races.

So it’s not hard to imagine why students arriving on campus today might be more desirous of protection and more hostile toward ideological opponents than in generations past. This hostility, and the self-righteousness fueled by strong partisan emotions, can be expected to add force to any moral crusade. A principle of moral psychology is that “morality binds and blinds.” Part of what we do when we make moral judgments is express allegiance to a team. But that can interfere with our ability to think critically. Acknowledging that the other side’s viewpoint has any merit is risky—your teammates may see you as a traitor.

Social media makes it extraordinarily easy to join crusades, express solidarity and outrage, and shun traitors. Facebook was founded in 2004, and since 2006 it has allowed children as young as 13 to join. This means that the first wave of students who spent all their teen years using Facebook reached college in 2011, and graduated from college only this year.

It's a long article, but I think it makes a lot of valid points and I've seen similar behavior creep up on the internet. Thoughts? Flames? Insults?

[Alyrium Denryle]

According to the most-basic tenets of psychology, helping people with anxiety disorders avoid the things they fear is misguided.

This line right here lets me know that the author is being an idiot. Yes, exposure helps people with anxiety disorders and phobias or PTSD. But it has to be controlled and at a pace they are comfortable with. In other words, be done under the guidance of an actual fucking therapist. You dont do gradual exposure therapy on the fly.

Yes, concern regarding microaggressions can go a bit far (see the issue regarding the display. Sometimes the over-analysis that goes into some of the specific complaints devalues the term or gets oddly recurssive. This is what happens with college students, frankly. They lack the intellectual maturity to go about this sort of thing intelligently, find something they are passionate about, and take it too far), but the basic complaint is not invalid. Try dealing with microaggressions day in and day out. While they dont do a whole lot of damage, they are annoying as fuck.

A transgender student being misgendered or asked if they are a "real woman" all the fucking time.

A gay student constantly hearing their sexual orientation used as a pejorative by people playing X Box.

Women hearing most of the insults and various forms of peer pressure men use with eachother (calling eachother Pussy, telling them to Man Up etc) as attacking femininity (because the implication of those insults is that being a woman or having a vagina is Less Than being male or having a penis).

I dont think it is too much generally to ask that people be aware of these things and try--just try--to change their behavior a little bit. Guys, you can still insult eachother. Just try not to catch third parties in the crossfire. It is not hard. I manage to do it all the time.

...

With respect to trigger warnings, same thing. Yes, some people go overboard. That does not invalidate the concept.

When I teach, I have a mixed group.

I have women who may have been raped last week, or been the victim of domestic violence ten years ago (or been abused by their fathers 3 months before coming to my class). So when I start talking about forced copulation in nature, yeah, I let them know in advance and let them know that while they have to know the material, they dont necessarily have to come to class to get it. They can weigh their educational needs against their ability to deal with the material, and make an informed choice. They can come talk to me in office hours or make an appointment so I can get them the material in a way that might be easier to deal with.

Why? Because I am not an asshole, and I am not qualified to do the job of a fucking therapist.

When I talk about parasites, I have students from sub-saharan Africa. They may have watched relatives die from Malaria or Sleeping sickness. So I let them know that while I expect them to know the life cycles of the parasites, they dont have to sit through my presentation on the subject while it dredges up painful memories. They can get my class notes I study the material over a glass of brandy.

Why? Because I am not an asshole, and I am not a qualified grief counselor.

[Elheru Aran]

IMO:

Facts are facts. Science is science. Literature is literature.

It's the instructor's responsibility to teach the subject, not coddle the students. In turn, it's the student's responsibility to learn the material that's taught and pass the course. If they can't take the material as taught, then it's their responsibility to communicate with the instructor, who shouldn't be expected to know them personally to the point that they know what may set the student off.

Does that mean the instructor has no responsibility to be considerate towards his students? Of course not. But part of making sure that all the students receive a reasonably competent knowledge of the material, the instructor cannot be expected to fluff, castrate, censor, and otherwise mutilate their presentation for the benefit of any hypothetical students who may have bad associations with specific parts of the material.

No. I feel that it's better for the instructor to provide, in the syllabus and perhaps before new material is presented, to note a few 'trigger warnings' before undertaking the course. But after that, it's up to the students.

I mean, seriously. You cannot teach some subjects without talking about some things. You can't talk about Shakespeare without talking about violence, addiction, sex, and all that human bollocks. You can't talk about anthropology without talking about cultural differences and more human bollocks. Ignoring that stuff because it might 'trigger' painful memories or whatever for specific individuals is doing a disservice to the rest of the class and ganks the overall quality of their education.

[Ralin]

"Liberalism and political correctness is RUNNING WILD on college campuses!" articles have been a genre since before I was born. There are some dumb aspects to what is colloquially known as the social justice warrior crowd, I'll be the first to admit, but personally I'd say that the big difference in this particular iteration of that concept is that now the people pushing it have wised up and started blaming the students (and trying to turn faculty against them) instead of their professors.

Having a trigger warning on the syllabus for the days you are going to be covering "UNCLE ADOLF'S BIG BOOK OF RELEVANT RAPE AND RACISM STORIES" doesn't mean that the students get to opt out of learning that material. It by definition means that you are covering that material and you're giving the students fair warning so they don't run out of the room sobbing like when my old Western Civ teacher used to screen Schindler's List.

[Exonerate]

Arthur Chu of Jeopardy fame wrote a response that I'm partial to.

[Rogue 9]

Arthur Chu of Jeopardy fame wrote a response that I'm partial to.

I'm not comfortable with lumping Lukianoff and Haidt in with the Gamergate morons. I don't know much about Haidt, but I've followed Lukianoff's organization for most of its existence and their concern for that time has been punishment by the school administration for thinking or saying unorthodox things, not negative consequences from students for doing so. And that's absolutely right. A state university is an organ of the government; social consequences from fellow students is one thing, but when the school commences disciplining students and faculty for speaking on unpopular topics, there is a severe problem for both free expression rights and academic freedom.

[Darth Yan]

Arthur Chu is an idiot. He honestly said Karen Traviss was treated badly because she was a woman, ignoring that other female writers weren't treated with disdain, even bad ones like Vonda McIntyre. Even shitty male writers like KJA had the courtesy not to lash out at their critics.

[Civil War Man]

Arthur Chu is an idiot. He honestly said Karen Traviss was treated badly because she was a woman, ignoring that other female writers weren't treated with disdain, even bad ones like Vonda McIntyre. Even shitty male writers like KJA had the courtesy not to lash out at their critics.

That has absolutely nothing to do with the point of the article he wrote. He's saying that it's hypocritical when someone ridicules other people for being offended by something, because oftentimes that same person will turn right around and go ballistic as soon as they encounter something that offends them.

[Balrog]

It also goes hand in hand with the recent Pew poll which showed 40% of Millennials were in support of the government banning "offensive" speech. While a majority still have their heads on straight, it still means a dangerous number are on board with curtailing rights because their feelings are hurt or their self-diagnosed PTSD (because who are doctors to tell you what's wrong with you, you know yourself better than anyone you special snowflake) was 'triggered'.

[Simon_Jester]

In fairness, I'm pretty sure you could find a large minority or even majority of people in many previous generations with similar attitudes.

The big difference is that Millenials in favor of censorship are likely to favor using censorship as a weapon against what they see as the prevailing sort of oppression, rather than as a weapon to enforce it. Revolutionary censorship rather than counterrevolutionary censorship, in other words.

This is still a worrying thing, but it's not new. The boomers were relatively tolerant of many kinds of outrageous speech, but that's something of an anomaly historically and may have a lot to do with the sexual revolution and the changes in American culture in the '60s and '70s. And even they had their limits.

[Alyrium Denryle]

It also goes hand in hand with the recent Pew poll which showed 40% of Millennials were in support of the government banning "offensive" speech. While a majority still have their heads on straight, it still means a dangerous number are on board with curtailing rights because their feelings are hurt or their self-diagnosed PTSD (because who are doctors to tell you what's wrong with you, you know yourself better than anyone you special snowflake) was 'triggered'.

Because obviously, idiots who think they are special snowflakes mean we get to completely dismiss the need to actually address issues related to PTSD--diagnosed or undiagnosed--in university classrooms with wherein the percentage of people with PTSD is disproportionately high (military veterans are one example, hell the percentage of rape victims goes UP significantly as the college years progress, LGBT people are also well represented in university).

[Balrog]

In fairness, I'm pretty sure you could find a large minority or even majority of people in many previous generations with similar attitudes.

They put the question to the other generations too, and the Millennials by far had the largest number who were in favor of this. Interestingly at the opposite end were the 70 and older types with a measly 12% support.

The big difference is that Millenials in favor of censorship are likely to favor using censorship as a weapon against what they see as the prevailing sort of oppression, rather than as a weapon to enforce it. Revolutionary censorship rather than counterrevolutionary censorship, in other words.

Which is all well and good when there is common agreement about what constitutes actual oppression. Unfortunately the more vocal of the activists perfectly embody the old adage of a hammer and nails.

Because obviously, idiots who think they are special snowflakes mean we get to completely dismiss the need to actually address issues related to PTSD--diagnosed or undiagnosed--in university classrooms with wherein the percentage of people with PTSD is disproportionately high (military veterans are one example, hell the percentage of rape victims goes UP significantly as the college years progress, LGBT people are also well represented in university).

As someone with a loved one who was in the military, does have PTSD and is able to live a full and productive life without bemoaning the lack of adequate safe spaces and trigger warnings (and in fact has mocked such things), I have no problem saying a fair number of internet denizens claiming to suffer from the condition and requiring their lives be wrapped in bubble wrap are full of shit, in one form or another.

[Alyrium Denryle]

As someone with a loved one who was in the military, does have PTSD and is able to live a full and productive life without bemoaning the lack of adequate safe spaces and trigger warnings (and in fact has mocked such things), I have no problem saying a fair number of internet denizens claiming to suffer from the condition and requiring their lives be wrapped in bubble wrap are full of shit, in one form or another.

And as someone who has watched students of mine flip right the fuck out, I can say that your sample size of one means nothing in terms of my obligations as an instructor. Different people have different tolerances, and the fact that some people are douches who want to be treated like special snowflakes does not mean that it is not reasonable for me warn students before certain materials are covered.

It costs me exactly nothing to do so, and can help make it possible for people to actually learn in my classes.

[Edi]

As someone with a loved one who was in the military, does have PTSD and is able to live a full and productive life without bemoaning the lack of adequate safe spaces and trigger warnings (and in fact has mocked such things), I have no problem saying a fair number of internet denizens claiming to suffer from the condition and requiring their lives be wrapped in bubble wrap are full of shit, in one form or another.

And as someone who has watched students of mine flip right the fuck out, I can say that your sample size of one means nothing in terms of my obligations as an instructor. Different people have different tolerances, and the fact that some people are douches who want to be treated like special snowflakes does not mean that it is not reasonable for me warn students before certain materials are covered.

It costs me exactly nothing to do so, and can help make it possible for people to actually learn in my classes.

Indeed. And if someone flips out despite that, then there is no need to hesitate in bringing down the hammer as needed.

[Zixinus]

I get the impression that part of the "sensitivity" isn't so much about microaggressions or anxiety from traumatic memories, but using them as weapon against bullshit these people are fed up with.

The bit about "I am colorblind to race" in particular seems to suggest stuff like that. Modern sexism, racism and similar ideologies hide behind fluffy epitaphs, enthusiasms and veiled expressions. To me it seems that part of the actual intent is to prevent such people to hide behind epitaphs and enthusiasms like that, not allowing a fluffy pretension around their ideas and forcing them them for what they are.

As for "trigger warnings", it does seem relatively reasonable as long as it does not hinder actual requirements. A parasitology professor warning that they are going to view body-horror stuff as part of their studies is a given but it does give an opportunity for the people who have real issues with that to psychologically prepare themselves.

Beyond that, the article kind of stinks of "Wah! Today's generation isn't like our generation, they do stuff we didn't and we don't like!" mentality, up to glorying their own generation's.

[Purple]

The bit about "I am colorblind to race" in particular seems to suggest stuff like that. Modern sexism, racism and similar ideologies hide behind fluffy epitaphs, enthusiasms and veiled expressions. To me it seems that part of the actual intent is to prevent such people to hide behind epitaphs and enthusiasms like that, not allowing a fluffy pretension around their ideas and forcing them them for what they are.

This is exactly the reason why SJW movements are receiving the kind of backlash that they are. Fact of the matter is that most if not all of the people who say that are genuinely honest and not closet sexists, racists or what ever. In fact most of the people in the world are not secretly evil. And your movements start and end with the opposite assumption. For you it's either with you or against you. And everyone who does not join your crusade must actually be evil but hiding it.

And it does not take too much of a brain to realize why this sort of attitude can piss a lot of people off. I for example genuinely do not discriminate against other people as a mater of principal. And when someone like you says what you just did I am genuinely pissed off because you are in no uncertain terms lumping me together with sexists and racists. All because I am not willing to join your little crusade against the windmill that is omnipresent secret racism.

As for "trigger warnings", it does seem relatively reasonable as long as it does not hinder actual requirements. A parasitology professor warning that they are going to view body-horror stuff as part of their studies is a given but it does give an opportunity for the people who have real issues with that to psychologically prepare themselves.

If people have issues with body horror than they really should not go into parasitology or most of medicine in general. And that I feel is the point of the article and the whole discussion. Every line of work and education has things that might upset people. Especially those easily upset. And these people should inform them self in advance and avoid those lines of work as opposed to requesting the world be changed to accommodate them. Because the bottom line is that when you accommodate these people and remove the pieces that upset them you are in fact damaging the quality education for everyone. You do not ban kicking the ball from football in order to accommodate the person with no legs.

[Civil War Man]

I get the impression that part of the "sensitivity" isn't so much about microaggressions or anxiety from traumatic memories, but using them as weapon against bullshit these people are fed up with.

The bit about "I am colorblind to race" in particular seems to suggest stuff like that. Modern sexism, racism and similar ideologies hide behind fluffy epitaphs, enthusiasms and veiled expressions. To me it seems that part of the actual intent is to prevent such people to hide behind epitaphs and enthusiasms like that, not allowing a fluffy pretension around their ideas and forcing them them for what they are.

As for "trigger warnings", it does seem relatively reasonable as long as it does not hinder actual requirements. A parasitology professor warning that they are going to view body-horror stuff as part of their studies is a given but it does give an opportunity for the people who have real issues with that to psychologically prepare themselves.

Beyond that, the article kind of stinks of "Wah! Today's generation isn't like our generation, they do stuff we didn't and we don't like!" mentality, up to glorying their own generation's.

I think there is some truth to this. It's less about "Oooh my poor delicate sensibilities" and more being fed up with being told that they should just accept horrible things that happen because trying to do anything about it might impact someone's vague sense of freedom.

The truth is, much of the pearl clutching about how these spoiled and entitled millennials are destroying everyone's freedom is done in defense of violent or hateful language or behavior and tries to silence anyone who objects to it (ironically trying to deprive the person complaining of the same freedom the apologist is claiming to be defending).

In extreme cases, like when it results in someone's death (for instance, a gay teen who is abused and bullied to the point of committing suicide), it is sending the message that someone's right to, in that example, spout homophobic slurs without consequence trumps the right of their victim to live. It prioritizes the comfort of the abuser over the life of the abused. It's easy to see how someone, when regularly confronted with something like that, begins to question whether the freedoms being lionized are actually worth defending.

[Simon_Jester]

In fairness, I'm pretty sure you could find a large minority or even majority of people in many previous generations with similar attitudes.

They put the question to the other generations too, and the Millennials by far had the largest number who were in favor of this. Interestingly at the opposite end were the 70 and older types with a measly 12% support.

Ah, but there's a difference between "do you favor censoring speech" and "do you favor censoring speech offensive to minorities?

You said:

"the recent Pew poll which showed 40% of Millennials were in support of the government banning "offensive" speech. "

You said "offensive." You did not say "offensive to minorities."

I suspect that a huge proportion of people who are now over 70 (that is, people born before 1946) are now or were at one time in favor of censoring speech. It's just that the speech they wanted to censor was speech offensive to the dominant culture of the era. Not speech offensive to blacks or sexually harassed women or gay people.

As someone with a loved one who was in the military, does have PTSD and is able to live a full and productive life without bemoaning the lack of adequate safe spaces and trigger warnings (and in fact has mocked such things), I have no problem saying a fair number of internet denizens claiming to suffer from the condition and requiring their lives be wrapped in bubble wrap are full of shit, in one form or another.

Since a military veteran's PTSD is likely to be most heavily 'triggered' by things not commonly found in everyday society (e.g. gunfire and explosions), I would not be surprised if military veterans are less vulnerable IN everyday society than people who suffered from other traumas.

[Thanas]

Such warnings are not the standard in Germany and in some way - at least in my field - they are unnecessary IMO. If I teach a course about, say, the Roman military, then a trigger warning should not be necessary because students voluntarily signed up for a course about war in an age where the Geneva convention was not a thing.

That said, I think it largely depends on how you teach. For example, I oftentimes leave out gory details like the mass executions described in Roman sources because they add nothing to the teaching, except for if you have a lecture on the treatment of civilians in ancient war times. Even then, you can do a lot with language to avoid it becoming a gorefest.

[Zwinmar]

I had one guy worried about broaching a subjects because he was anti military, and his subject the same, while I was present because he thought it would offend me.

Needless to say, once I found out about his reluctance I encouraged him to speak out and attempted to explain to him that I really would not get offended by his beliefs and was more than willing to talk about it. The subject was brought up but I think he was still scared to offend me for some reason.

[Zixinus]

This is exactly the reason why SJW movements are receiving the kind of backlash that they are. Fact of the matter is that most if not all of the people who say that are genuinely honest and not closet sexists, racists or what ever. In fact most of the people in the world are not secretly evil. And your movements start and end with the opposite assumption. For you it's either with you or against you. And everyone who does not join your crusade must actually be evil but hiding it.

Can you please explain what the flying fuck are you talking about? What movement am I supposed to be a member of? What is this crusade I am supposed to be doing?

You are accusing "my" movement of being a "with me or against me" mentality, but you are suspiciously very quick to identify my political alliances.

If people have issues with body horror than they really should not go into parasitology or most of medicine in general.

Yeah, except that the actual images and displays of said body horror (which are the stuff that acts on people's imagination, which I venture to be likely "triggers") are a small portion of the actual subject. Once that is overwith, they deal with the parasite in more abstract terms, like they do with any science (although I'd be happy to get a clarification from Alyrium Denryle). They deal with statistics, biopsy samples, biochemistry and so on.

That and people can get used to stuff like this with time and they can overcome their problems. For some people it might take more. Getting a warning about the obvious isn't that terribly much to ask and does not automatically equate to not having to know them (there are always people in any subject that does not want to know XY). Not everyone who goes into a medical field has an iron stomach to start with nor does everyone retain one.

The truth is, much of the pearl clutching about how these spoiled and entitled millennials are destroying everyone's freedom is done in defense of violent or hateful language or behavior and tries to silence anyone who objects to it (ironically trying to deprive the person complaining of the same freedom the apologist is claiming to be defending).

I am reminded of Wong's blog post about his personal experiences of racism. I got the impression that he got the upbringing in the very environment that the article is glorying and how he was just told "suck it up" about the abuses and derailment he got because of his race.

[ray245]

I get the impression that part of the "sensitivity" isn't so much about microaggressions or anxiety from traumatic memories, but using them as weapon against bullshit these people are fed up with.

The bit about "I am colorblind to race" in particular seems to suggest stuff like that. Modern sexism, racism and similar ideologies hide behind fluffy epitaphs, enthusiasms and veiled expressions. To me it seems that part of the actual intent is to prevent such people to hide behind epitaphs and enthusiasms like that, not allowing a fluffy pretension around their ideas and forcing them them for what they are.

Part of the problem is no one is making a clear distinction between sexism/racism in modern society from the society back in the early 20th century. Racism can imply very different things to many people, especially if they aren't members of the minority. Most of the time when we are talking about racism, the image we think of was problems like black-lynching, the genocide and slavery.

The number of people who actually support this kind of racism is extremely narrow and people do get offended because you are lumping them as people of this group when you use terms like "racist". Same thing with sexism, which usually implies someone who refused to give women the right to vote.

On the other hand, there is racism being practiced by members of minorities that aren't being called out for what it is by other members of minorities. It becomes near impossible to talk about this issue.

[Crown]

I used to believe that the Village didn't re-arrange its self to cater for the Village Idiot, but apparently I was wrong...

[Purple]

Can you please explain what the flying fuck are you talking about? What movement am I supposed to be a member of? What is this crusade I am supposed to be doing?

You are accusing "my" movement of being a "with me or against me" mentality, but you are suspiciously very quick to identify my political alliances.

This is because I used the metaphorical "you" as opposed to the literal one. As in I was not directly directed at you, Zixinus but the metaphorical "you people who say and repeat these things". I thought that much was obvious from the context.

Yeah, except that the actual images and displays of said body horror (which are the stuff that acts on people's imagination, which I venture to be likely "triggers") are a small portion of the actual subject. Once that is overwith, they deal with the parasite in more abstract terms, like they do with any science (although I'd be happy to get a clarification from Alyrium Denryle). They deal with statistics, biopsy samples, biochemistry and so on.

I happen to have family members in parasitology. If it's the images that you think set people off you have not seen the work. Do I need to show you a picture of a worm slithering behind someones eye to trigger you or is the mere mention sufficient? I would argue that the mention is if anything more poignant because an image you can always disconnect and treat as being just another specimen sample where as being explicitly told "Yes, this happens to human beings too. And you might one day run into a case and have to take the eye out for examination." to be far more disturbing. And it is something that absolutely needs to be said because it absolutely happens to people and you absolutely might one day have to take someones eye out because of it.

That and people can get used to stuff like this with time and they can overcome their problems. For some people it might take more. Getting a warning about the obvious isn't that terribly much to ask and does not automatically equate to not having to know them (there are always people in any subject that does not want to know XY). Not everyone who goes into a medical field has an iron stomach to start with nor does everyone retain one.

True. But do you think it is smart to go into a field that you know is potentially traumatic to you in the hopes that you'll grow out of it? I find that to be a very risky investment in time, money and effort that has a chance of newer paying off. And if it does not the only thing you achieved was not only wasting your own resources but denying someone more deserving and capable their place.

[Ralin]

Such warnings are not the standard in Germany and in some way - at least in my field - they are unnecessary IMO. If I teach a course about, say, the Roman military, then a trigger warning should not be necessary because students voluntarily signed up for a course about war in an age where the Geneva convention was not a thing.

It must be so nice to live in a country where you can presume that college students know enough about their major that they can be expected to know or find out that much about the subject before going signing up for a class.