Trigger Warnings, Again Again

[Content Note: Discussion of trigger warnings and censorship.]

There has been a flurry of articles the past few months on trigger warnings, in many of which the feminist authors expressed concern about the use of trigger warnings and their "chilling" effect on speech.

The latest entry is Meghan Murphy's "A slow slide into censorship," which opens by noting that trigger warnings were, "until recently...relegated to certain corners of the feminist blogosphere."

By paragraph two, we've already arrived at the dire and increasingly familiar prediction that "these warnings can veer into overuse in an attempt to protect individuals from any and every imagined offence."

There's honestly nothing I can say to this that I haven't already said before, multiple times.

I Write Letters

On Triggers, Continued

I Get Letters

Triggered

Triggered, Continued

On Trigger Warnings, Once More

Etc.

I will simply observe, again, that it is not my experience that using trigger warnings, or content notes, leads to censorship. To the absolute contrary, I feel much more able to write about and discuss difficult subjects knowing that readers who may be triggered by the content have some means by which to assess their own safety of engagement.

[H/T to Jessica Luther.]