Kate Manne, Why I Use Trigger Warnings?

A trigger warning is most commonly found on internet articles, and blogs. It serves the purpose of warning the reader of any potentially triggering material that they may find offensive or may be sensitive toward due to post traumatic experiences in their life. They are essentially created to prevent readers from accidently encountering the material without some sort of warning. An example of this would be, an article that discusses the topic of self harm can cause unwanted flashbacks in a person that has personally experienced this themselves and would not like to be reminded of it, or an image included in an article that reminds a war veteran of the things that they saw while on deployment. Although trigger warnings sound like a harmless idea to many, there is an extreme controversy about whether or not they should be used in college lectures. Many college professors have conflicting views about trigger warnings; some agree on using them while others are against it. This debate topic is particularly intriguing in Kate Manne’s article in the New York Times titled, “Why I Use Trigger

Manne’s begins her article discussing how trigger warnings are not meant to “enable — let alone encourage — students to skip these readings,” but rather to provide a simple warning in order to “prepare” for the material. To further support this idea, Manne also points out the idea that instead of encouraging students to skip readings, trigger warning simply prepare the student to “better manage their reaction.” On the other hand, Filipovic is strongly against using trigger warnings and states that there is actually harm in doing so. Filipovic states that not only do trigger warnings serve as a “literary spoiler” they also “skew students perceptions.” What she means by this is that it shifts the focus onto a single but theme that the professor has deemed