Trigger Warnings

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Colleges and universities across the country are moving in the opposite direction in which they should be--”trigger warnings” are being used by professors as precautionary headings on material that may be offensive or controversial to students. “Trigger warnings” are brief statements made before discussion of material that may cause emotional distraught or discomfort. This movement is being driven heavily by the students to keep campuses free of discomfort. Some people in life have dealt with hardships that may be in regard to a topic of discussion in class that they don’t want to think about or participate in. This is understandable, because no student should feel uncomfortable or “triggered” to be put into the mindset they were in at the …show more content…
When students and the population in general are restricted from giving their opinion or discussing what is in mind, they build up anger/frustration and anxiety of what can be said. When improvement is done in hopes to alleviate this anxiety and people are pushed to give their opinion rather than stay withdrawn, they become less stressed out and angry. Thinking in a distorted manner is more commonly used than asking students to think critically. It causes them to think they have done something wrong and that an apology is needed somewhere during the discussion, when they were just giving their opinion. If somebody is allowed to be offended and require limited discussion topics, it isn’t really fair. Why should part of the population be coddled while the rest are punished for their beliefs and statements? This new way of handling education is rooted from the internet/social media, particularly blogs. People make posts to fuel the fire of trigger warnings to make the use of them stretch farther, and these beliefs get brought into the school setting. Most professors, surveys say, that they use trigger warnings to avoid losing their career. They fear that if they approach certain topics without warning and a student complains, it might end their professional contract. The majority of surveys state that trigger warnings will have a negative effect on classroom dynamics and make academic freedom impossible to
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