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Are Trigger Warnings Actually Harmful?
by Thomas Gallatin
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Trump urges Attorney General Sessions to end Russia probe
by Judson BergerVIDEO: https://fxn.ws/2v6tm6k #FoxNews
.Trump surprises Limbaugh to celebrate 30 years
by JOE KOVACS.
Trump administration sanctions
Turkish officials over detained American pastor
by Judson BergerTommy Robinson Free – MEF Heavily Involved
by meforum.org
{ meforum.org } ~ The Middle East Forum applauds the release of Tommy Robinson from prison this morning... after the UK anti-Islamist activist won his appeal over a contempt of court sentence. In June, Mr. Robinson, a long-time target of UK authorities, was covering a rape-gang trial involving Muslim defendants in England when he was arrested, tried, convicted, sentenced to 13 months prison, and jailed – all in the course of five hours, all while denied access to counsel. What precisely happened: In an extraordinary decision, the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales - the head of the judiciary in England and Wales, roughly equivalent to the American chief justice of the Supreme Court - himself wrote a judgment rejecting the kangaroo-court verdict that had Tommy Robinson instantly thrown in jail for over a year because of an obscure Contempt Act that a UK media guide says “in practice … is not enforced.” Lord Chief Justice Burnett denounced what he called "a fundamentally flawed process" and in a further rebuff to the kangaroo-court judge, assigned Tommy Robinson's case to someone else. MEF president Daniel Pipes commented: “This validates the #FreeTommy campaign's claim that Tommy Robinson, yet again, had been treated in the words of his autobiography's title as an enemy of the state. We at the Middle East Forum are delighted by this turn of events and look forward to the charges against Tommy Robinson being considered in a sober, neutral, and un-rushed manner.” ... https://www.meforum.org/articles/2018/tommy-robinson-free-mef-heavily-involved?utm_source=Middle+East+Forum&utm_campaign=b40ba19a7b-ROBINSON_CAMPAIGN_2018_08_01_04_51&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_086cfd423c-b40ba19a7b-33703665&goal=0_086cfd423c-b40ba19a7b-33703665Court rules Trump order threatening
to withhold funding from sanctuary cities is unconstitutional
by EMILY BIRNBAUM.
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Are Trigger Warnings Actually Harmful?
by Thomas Gallatin: Three Harvard University psychologists recently released a study wherein they researched the effects of “trigger warnings” on students. What are “trigger warnings”? Back in 2014, when the idea was metastasizing, Jonah Goldberg described them thusly: “They started on left-wing and feminist websites. Like a ‘spoiler alert’ in a movie review or a more specific version of the movie rating system, trigger warnings are intended to alert very sensitive people that some content might set off, or trigger, their post-traumatic stress disorder or simply offend some people.” So you can see why they became of a favorite tool of the social justice warriors.
In conducting their study, the researchers subjected two groups of students to literary passages that contained potentially disturbing violent content. Prior to reading the material, one group received a trigger warning about the content they were about to read, while the other group received no such warning.
The results: Participants in the trigger warning group believed themselves and people in general to be more emotionally vulnerable if they were to experience trauma. Participants receiving warnings reported greater anxiety in response to reading potentially distressing passages, but only if they believed that words can cause harm. Warnings did not affect participants’ implicit self-identification as vulnerable, or subsequent anxiety response to less distressing content.
The researchers’ conclusion: Trigger warnings may inadvertently undermine some aspects of emotional resilience. Further research is needed on the generalizability of our findings, especially to collegiate populations and to those with trauma histories.
In other words, it appears that overuse of trigger warnings can actually heighten an individual’s anxiety levels and fears rather than mitigate them. Consider us shocked — shocked.
Social psychologist Craig Harper writes, “This finding could have significant implications in the context of ongoing cultural debates about the power of language in reinforcing perceived oppression. That is, if we are telling students that words are akin to violence and can cause harm, and then giving them trigger warnings to compound that message, we risk increasing immediate anxiety responses rather than decreasing them.”
In a larger sense, this study’s findings appear like common sense to many people, especially those of an older generation. Just like any learning endeavor, there are fears to overcome. And often these anxieties come from a lack of exposure to a new experience. For example, for a child first learning to ride a bike, the prospect of the experience can be scary because it will more than likely include falls and scrapped knees. However, the benefit gained in learning to ride that bike far exceeds the trauma of the initial learning experience. Similarly, for students to grow into well-rounded, educated adults who are ready to take on the challenges and responsibilities of interacting in the real world, they should be encouraged to confront their anxieties rather than be warned to avoid them.
In conducting their study, the researchers subjected two groups of students to literary passages that contained potentially disturbing violent content. Prior to reading the material, one group received a trigger warning about the content they were about to read, while the other group received no such warning.
The results: Participants in the trigger warning group believed themselves and people in general to be more emotionally vulnerable if they were to experience trauma. Participants receiving warnings reported greater anxiety in response to reading potentially distressing passages, but only if they believed that words can cause harm. Warnings did not affect participants’ implicit self-identification as vulnerable, or subsequent anxiety response to less distressing content.
The researchers’ conclusion: Trigger warnings may inadvertently undermine some aspects of emotional resilience. Further research is needed on the generalizability of our findings, especially to collegiate populations and to those with trauma histories.
In other words, it appears that overuse of trigger warnings can actually heighten an individual’s anxiety levels and fears rather than mitigate them. Consider us shocked — shocked.
Social psychologist Craig Harper writes, “This finding could have significant implications in the context of ongoing cultural debates about the power of language in reinforcing perceived oppression. That is, if we are telling students that words are akin to violence and can cause harm, and then giving them trigger warnings to compound that message, we risk increasing immediate anxiety responses rather than decreasing them.”
In a larger sense, this study’s findings appear like common sense to many people, especially those of an older generation. Just like any learning endeavor, there are fears to overcome. And often these anxieties come from a lack of exposure to a new experience. For example, for a child first learning to ride a bike, the prospect of the experience can be scary because it will more than likely include falls and scrapped knees. However, the benefit gained in learning to ride that bike far exceeds the trauma of the initial learning experience. Similarly, for students to grow into well-rounded, educated adults who are ready to take on the challenges and responsibilities of interacting in the real world, they should be encouraged to confront their anxieties rather than be warned to avoid them.
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