Excuse me while I vomit.- Trigger Warning for Rape and Rape Culture.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I'm kind of disappointed that Faust bowed out of the conversation about the whole trigger warning issue.  They may be annoying for some people, but for other people they are a tool to help them decide if they can cope with the subject matter

Rat, as for your assertion here

ETA: Oh and I have a simple opinion on 'trigger warnings'. If people want to post them they should, if they don't then they shouldn't.

This, to me, is overly simplistic. Personally I think that here, on PeeDee, knowing that THIS discussion has triggered one member's PTSD, that we should put some kind of trigger warning (hell, you could just have a "this link contains [insert possibly triggering subject here] so be aware", rather than the specific phrase "trigger warning" on this type of thread.

While I defend the idea of putting "trigger warnings" on threads, I will not be forced to do it myself.

If there is NSFW material, I will say so.  If it is merely an upsetting subject, then the nature of the subject (example:  AZ rape statistics, etc) will reveal the subject matter in advance.  I am most emphatically not going to put warning labels on my threads unless the thread could get someone in trouble at work (NSFW, etc).

Nobody here, as far as I can tell, wants to force anyone to do anything.

And you DO put trigger warnings on your threads, you just don't call them that. You, as many people do, tend to label potentially gut-wrenching threads in such a way that the content is clearly identifiable. You even label/hide images that might trigger my epilepsy, and anything involving graphic images of people being hurt or killed. I don't use the words "trigger warning", but I, as you do,  try to be descriptive so that nobody clicks a link or is faced with content that could land them in therapy, or cause them to have a panic attack, or get fired, or even to load content that their kids probably shouldn't see. All of these things are day to day courtesies that thoughtful people do for each other. An enslavement to society, if you will.

Okay, maybe I read it wrong.

I put warnings up because I want to.  I don't want a standard imposed.

If that wasn't the suggestion, then everyone disregard my response.

Naw, I think that what Pixie meant (correct me if I'm wrong, Pixie) was that, now that we've had this conversation and people are aware, it would be immature not to learn from it and be conscious of it. And she seemed to me to be applying that principle to herself, in awareness that she posted a thread without much by way of descriptors, with a link in it that led directly to content that triggered flashbacks for Murmur. Sort of an "Oops, I'm definitely not going to do that again" moment. And Faust's objection to it turned out to be positive because of the ensuing conversation about PTSD and triggers. The way I read it, she was just saying "Let's not just forget about this; let's try to be more conscious, including me".

As far as I can tell, this board is all about consciousness, so this shouldn't be a problem.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

[The Good Reverend Roger]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

You forgot:

Anal bleeding, sudden acceleration to dangerous speeds, terminal butthurt, exposure to Welsh people (coyote, et al), Angry Black Woman attacks (Nigel, me), and occasional TMI.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

You forgot:

Anal bleeding, sudden acceleration to dangerous speeds, terminal butthurt, exposure to Welsh people (coyote, et al), Angry Black Woman attacks (Nigel, me), and occasional TMI.

THESE are just a FEW of the known side effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL. To find out if this medication is right for you, please consult your local Holy Man™. When taking this medication never deviate from the prescribed instructions. Do not operate heavy machinery or suspend disbelief while under the effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

You forgot:

Anal bleeding, sudden acceleration to dangerous speeds, terminal butthurt, exposure to Welsh people (coyote, et al), Angry Black Woman attacks (Nigel, me), and occasional TMI.

THESE are just a FEW of the known side effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL. To find out if this medication is right for you, please consult your local Holy Man™. When taking this medication never deviate from the prescribed instructions. Do not operate heavy machinery or suspend disbelief while under the effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL.

If you are pregnant or think you might be pregnant, take way too much PDCOMUNOXIDIL.  If your genital warts start talking to you, stop taking PDCOMUNOXIDIL at once, and enter a monastery or convent.  If you cease breathing, you're dead and that's really not our problem.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

You forgot:

Anal bleeding, sudden acceleration to dangerous speeds, terminal butthurt, exposure to Welsh people (coyote, et al), Angry Black Woman attacks (Nigel, me), and occasional TMI.

THESE are just a FEW of the known side effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL. To find out if this medication is right for you, please consult your local Holy Man™. When taking this medication never deviate from the prescribed instructions. Do not operate heavy machinery or suspend disbelief while under the effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL.

If you are pregnant or think you might be pregnant, take way too much PDCOMUNOXIDIL.  If your genital warts start talking to you, stop taking PDCOMUNOXIDIL at once, and enter a monastery or convent.  If you cease breathing, you're dead and that's really not our problem.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

We should just post a generalized trigger warning on the front page.

WARNING: The content in this site has been shown to cause cancer, schizophrenia, panic attacks, flashbacks, and other dangerous medical and psychiatric conditions in lab animals. PTSD patients, victims of violent crime, children, and the Moral Majority are at especially high risk from these effects. Use PDCOM at your own risk

You forgot:

Anal bleeding, sudden acceleration to dangerous speeds, terminal butthurt, exposure to Welsh people (coyote, et al), Angry Black Woman attacks (Nigel, me), and occasional TMI.

THESE are just a FEW of the known side effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL. To find out if this medication is right for you, please consult your local Holy Man™. When taking this medication never deviate from the prescribed instructions. Do not operate heavy machinery or suspend disbelief while under the effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL.

If you are pregnant or think you might be pregnant, take way too much PDCOMUNOXIDIL.  If your genital warts start talking to you, stop taking PDCOMUNOXIDIL at once, and enter a monastery or convent.  If you cease breathing, you're dead and that's really not our problem.

For a comprehensive list of all possible side effects of PDCOMUNOXIDIL, consult this link.

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

I'm kind of disappointed that Faust bowed out of the conversation about the whole trigger warning issue.  They may be annoying for some people, but for other people they are a tool to help them decide if they can cope with the subject matter

Rat, as for your assertion here

ETA: Oh and I have a simple opinion on 'trigger warnings'. If people want to post them they should, if they don't then they shouldn't.

This, to me, is overly simplistic. Personally I think that here, on PeeDee, knowing that THIS discussion has triggered one member's PTSD, that we should put some kind of trigger warning (hell, you could just have a "this link contains [insert possibly triggering subject here] so be aware", rather than the specific phrase "trigger warning" on this type of thread.

While I defend the idea of putting "trigger warnings" on threads, I will not be forced to do it myself.

If there is NSFW material, I will say so.  If it is merely an upsetting subject, then the nature of the subject (example:  AZ rape statistics, etc) will reveal the subject matter in advance.  I am most emphatically not going to put warning labels on my threads unless the thread could get someone in trouble at work (NSFW, etc).

Nobody here, as far as I can tell, wants to force anyone to do anything.

And you DO put trigger warnings on your threads, you just don't call them that. You, as many people do, tend to label potentially gut-wrenching threads in such a way that the content is clearly identifiable. You even label/hide images that might trigger my epilepsy, and anything involving graphic images of people being hurt or killed. I don't use the words "trigger warning", but I, as you do,  try to be descriptive so that nobody clicks a link or is faced with content that could land them in therapy, or cause them to have a panic attack, or get fired, or even to load content that their kids probably shouldn't see. All of these things are day to day courtesies that thoughtful people do for each other. An enslavement to society, if you will.

Okay, maybe I read it wrong.

I put warnings up because I want to.  I don't want a standard imposed.

If that wasn't the suggestion, then everyone disregard my response.

Naw, I think that what Pixie meant (correct me if I'm wrong, Pixie) was that, now that we've had this conversation and people are aware, it would be immature not to learn from it and be conscious of it. And she seemed to me to be applying that principle to herself, in awareness that she posted a thread without much by way of descriptors, with a link in it that led directly to content that triggered flashbacks for Murmur. Sort of an "Oops, I'm definitely not going to do that again" moment. And Faust's objection to it turned out to be positive because of the ensuing conversation about PTSD and triggers. The way I read it, she was just saying "Let's not just forget about this; let's try to be more conscious, including me".

As far as I can tell, this board is all about consciousness, so this shouldn't be a problem.

Yea, that's what I was getting at.  I wasn't suggesting that we slap gurt big trigger warnings over anything that might possibly squick or freak out people in general in a visceral and nasty way, just, yanno, look after our own when we KNOW there is an issue, in whatever manner that may take. I'll use possibly a trigger warning or content note and then a big jump in the page because that's a habit I picked up in the feminist and queer spaces on teh intarwebs (and yes some people may think that is infantilising or coddling or whatever, but thats, like, your opinion, man), but how the rest of peedee choose to consider others doesn't matter as long as they consider others once a situation has been shown that it needs consideration for someone of the community, be it epilepsy warnings for Nigel, OMG SPIDER for Suu, or consideration for Murmur's PTSD.

Can we get back to rape myths and the victim blaming bullshit surrounding sexual assault now?

I think we have chewed out the squeak in the chew toy labelled "trigger warnings and stuff".

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Can we get back to rape myths and the victim blaming bullshit surrounding sexual assault now?

I think we have chewed out the squeak in the chew toy labelled "trigger warnings and stuff".

I did.  Everyone ignored it. 

A post on the internet isn't the same thing as spousal rape, of course, but people who are dealing with PTSD can have it triggered by related topics, especially if they delve too graphically into the brutal reality, and that's what those kinds of warnings are for. Not everyone needs them, thank god, but it's not wrong to have consideration for those who do, especially if we want them to feel like a part of our community and not like pariahs who must stay away because they are unclean.

I have never understood the "blame the victim" culture, which is far more widespread (through religion, etc) than the more commonsense "blame the perpetrator" mindset.

I don't find a robbery victim to be unclean.  I don't find a battered person to be unclean, or a murder victim, or any other victim of violence.  Instead, there is something unclean about people who would DO these things.

I doubt I'm the only person on PD who feels this way.  In fact, I'm willing to bet that nobody on PD considers a rape victim to be unclean or "ruined".

I realize that doesn't help much, because it's easy to SAY that we don't feel uncomfortable or that the person isn't unclean, and much harder for the victim to accept that...Or even to not feel that way while talking to people even if they DO accept it.

Some crimes are at least partially abetted by the victim; Bernie Madoff's victims come to mind.  Their unrestrained greed allowed the situation to occur, and they didn't really care how he made things happen (no way does anyone think you can get consistent 20% returns on an investment without some kind of funny business).  They were accomplices turned victim.

Some crimes, on the other hand, are solely the responsibility of the criminal who commits them, no matter if that person is a spouse, or if the victim "dressed for it", etc.  Holding the victim responsible means taking the side of the criminal.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Can we get back to rape myths and the victim blaming bullshit surrounding sexual assault now?

I think we have chewed out the squeak in the chew toy labelled "trigger warnings and stuff".

I did.  Everyone ignored it. 

I didn't. I think your point was dead on. (I modified it a bit so we don't get threadjacked on my poor use of words earlier):

I agree completely. I think a lot of the 'blame the victim' thinking, especially when it comes to the rape of women ties directly into the male dominated culture we're still struggling to extricate ourselves from and the Judeo-Christian belief system that informed that culture. The bible clearly places some of the responsibility for rape on the woman and people who still believe that stone age trash tend to think there's at least some truth in it.

I personally find the idea abhorrent. No one is responsible for someone else taking the freedom of choice away from them. I don't care if they're wearing a mini skirt that barely covers their butt cheeks, clothing is not a goddamned invitation.

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

Here are some rape myths as posted on a UK parenting website. http://www.mumsnet.com/campaigns/we-believe-you-campaign-rape-myths-busted

there are a plenty of other ones out there, such as this one http://www.d.umn.edu/cla/faculty/jhamlin/3925/myths.html, and this one contains some pretty racist as well as other types of ignorant bullshit.. It's not a great list, as it doesn't account for some cases of "misreading signals" rather than a power trip, IHMO.  The "misread signals" aspect of rape IS something that can be tackled with education, as well as campaigns to outline what consent actually is, I'll let you all go over the rape myths links before I get onto that bit.

Can we get back to rape myths and the victim blaming bullshit surrounding sexual assault now?

I think we have chewed out the squeak in the chew toy labelled "trigger warnings and stuff".

I did.  Everyone ignored it. 

I didn't. I think your point was dead on. (I modified it a bit so we don't get threadjacked on my poor use of words earlier):

I agree completely. I think a lot of the 'blame the victim' thinking, especially when it comes to the rape of women ties directly into the male dominated culture we're still struggling to extricate ourselves from and the Judeo-Christian belief system that informed that culture. The bible clearly places some of the responsibility for rape on the woman and people who still believe that stone age trash tend to think there's at least some truth in it.

I personally find the idea abhorrent. No one is responsible for someone else taking the freedom of choice away from them. I don't care if they're wearing a mini skirt that barely covers their butt cheeks, clothing is not a goddamned invitation.

In addition to Rat and Roger's excellent observations, I'd like to add this... (which due to PeeDee going down I had to copy and paste into Word to avoid losing over 750 words and has been saved as "Pixie's Massive Rape Culture Essay," It took over 2 hours to write this. It may just be the biggest post I have ever posted here. Maybe it's so big that I crashed PeeDee!)

I think the myths about rape and victim blaming that constitute what feminism terms as being rape culture go hand in hand, because what the media and society see as "really real rape for realness" is only a fraction of rapes committed. The scary man in the bushes rapist or the sleazy spike your drink at the bar guy is the common perception of it, and anything outside of that perception falls prey to what some feminist blogs has called the "Not My Nigel!" response ,(which, in the context of peedee and peedee only, I find the phrase hilarious. the concept, not so much.) where people cannot see their friends, colleagues, partners, siblings or children as the perp for something that sits outside of what they know about rape. 

When you are deep in "Not My Nigel!" country, victim blaming happens, because no one wants to believe that their loved ones and pillars of their lives and communities is capable of something so heinous and taboo in our culture. Ergo "the bitch must be LYING" responses and all the other myriad rape myth bollocks , where those who report rape break the comfortable little bubble of the lives of the perp and their friends and loved ones, and it turns into a kneejerking hairless ape shitflinging contest.  This is why rape and sexual assault is such an under-reported crime, because those who are assaulted KNOW that they will not be believed, that the defence will turn up with a massive bag of rape myths to fling around with abandon if it even gets to court in the first place.   

It is such a heated concept that in mainstream society with it's fucked up attitudes toward sex in general, the gender binaries of what we expect from women (passivity, people pleasing, non-aggression and worth based on appearance, not wanting sex and a whole heap of bullshit that could make it's own thread), and what we expect of men (competitiveness, aggression, ambition, being a slave to their penises and sexual urges, not showing emotion or empathy and fear of being :O likened to anything feminine and some other heap of bullshit that could make up it's own thread.) which reminds me of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PsHlSZ_3jo which may be slightly relevant, but I'm a weird person, and its a great fucking song, and if you've been following this whole thread, you deserve a wee break. (but NO COOKIES, OKAY! /feminist in-joke.)

Anyway the end of that paragraph turned into somewhat a ramble... the point is the tropes about sexuality, gender and the transgressions or outliers impede our understanding of rape and sexual assault and lead to the traditional "don't get raped" anti rape campaigns such as this one, which in my opinion is a pretty bad example-http://www.westmercia.police.uk/news/campaigns-and-initiatives/rape-short-word-long-sentence.html are mostly aimed at policing women's behaviour for fear of offending men(!).

Campaigns like this one cause a massive shitstorm which is a shame, because I find this and the video from Rape Crisis Scotland to be actually quite funny, albeit very darkly funny.

Whereas this website-http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/KnowTheDifference/DoYouKnowTheDifference.htm

is actually pretty good, even if the home part of it exploits the "real man" anxiety and tropes, but you got to target your message somehow, and this one seems to have managed to do it without provoking a massive backlash, although it was only launched last week and I stay off the somewhat odious Men's Rights Activist sinkholes of the internet. It challenges behaviours of men and educates them on what constitutes consent, soon to be all up in London buses and such, and to me and other feminists, is what we'd like to see more of.

To me, if we remove all the historical patriarchal baggage about purity, sexuality and so on, rape is a crime of egregious disrespect of boundaries, although in some cases people don't even fucking know where the goalposts are, which is why abstinence only sex ed, and the "don't get knocked up or catch an STI" schools of thought are woefully fucking inadequate, because society doesn't teach us about healthy and positive expressions of sexuality and what is a healthy relationship, and it is sorely needed if we are going to end victim blaming and rape culture.

Anyway, I fear I may be repeating myself on the last paragraph, and it's a long assed post to digest, so for now I'm going to leave it there.

Any questions?

[Juana]

^^^^^ bless this post

[Freeky]

That post was awesome, and I'm going to put that info graph URVERWAIR!

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

That post was awesome, and I'm going to put that info graph URVERWAIR!

Awesome! Well I have a deadline for my community project volunteering that I need to sort out, and tomorrow is my off duty feminist day (I gotta look at kittens and puppies and not stuff like this for one day a week, or else I'll turn into some kind of all froth and rage cliché about second wave feminism and be all made of straw or something whilst gleefully getting all stabbity stab-stab on my housemates /sarcasm), so I will see you spags..... Later.

I am sure Nigel and Garbo can clarify any points of interest about the post.

[EK WAFFLR]

That post was great, Pixie!