Kathleen Faherty's CON: Trigger Warnings

Colleges across the United States are constantly undergoing changes to the way classes function in order to improve the education process. A more recent concept being implemented in a handful of colleges is also a topic of major debate. A trigger warning is a way to warn students about graphic material that may be disturbing for some students. In theory, trigger warnings allow students to be prepared for content that may trigger unexpected emotions that would interrupt the student’s ability to focus on the lesson. In reality, however, the results of trigger warnings damage not only the student’s education, but their ability to be prepared to join society in the real world. In some cases trigger warnings not only warn students but censor valuable material that is important to the class. In the article, “CON: ‘Trigger Warnings’ Impose Censorship in the Name of Sensitivity” it states “Or they could censor the course material in the name of sensitivity. Small acts of censorship could lead to much larger ones. Already, trigger warnings have been applied to such works as ‘The Great Gatsby,’ ‘The Merchant of Venice’ and other classics.” Here the author Donald Down, who is a researcher at the
In Colleen Flaherty’s article “survey sheds new light on faculty attitudes and experiences toward trigger warnings” he mentions one example of “a student at Crafton Hills College and her parents called for several graphic novels she’d been assigned to be banned for what the student called their ‘shocking’ sex and violence.” In this example, the student calls for the graphic material to not be flagged but banned although it is important to the lesson. If college level students are allowed a free pass on a lesson due to its graphic material, then they will enter an uncensored society with a false sense of