nemorathwald (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
nemorathwald) wrote2011-02-06 04:09 am
nemorathwald) wrote2011-02-06 04:09 am
The Trigger Cave
We need a new term for a particular blogging/tweeting phenomenon in which internet crowds form sides and square off for a smackdown. Opposing cultures are exposed to each other by the web, are shocked and appalled, and express more and more shock, claiming greater and greater magnitudes of hurt, used to justify worse and worse behavior, culminating eventually in threats or stalking. The most recent example is springing up around Penny Arcade Dickwolves Debacle which resulted in speakers cancelling their appearance at Penny Arcade Expo. (Of course there is an obligatory timeline to collect links to the drama.) There have been several such phenomena in recent years. Some have called them "Fails". That doesn't seem to express what it is. But it seems most likely to catch on.
Very few of us are likely to join triggered trauma victims in their emotional cave-- other than those with an automated guilt reflex. I mean, it is just not going to happen. I wish there were no victims of grievances stuck in a cold, dark, joyless mental place, with padding on the walls so that it's a safe space. But when they are, there seems to be nothing the rest of us can do about it except join them there. A "trigger"-- that event for which a "trigger warning" is issued-- is not just a case of hurt feelings. It is a brain event similar to a panic attack, which grabs the traumatized person by the hindbrain and shakes. Imagine living in an entire world made out of knives. You never know when you're going to get cut. That's what it's like.
In extreme cases we are talking about literally avoiding the entire humor genre. That is not an exaggeration, interpretation, or straw man. That is exactly what the words say in the blog post which (next to the Penny Arcade cartoon "The Sixth Slave") forms one of the twin centers of the controversy. Shaker Milli A offers me the stark choice of conforming my emotional world to the limits of her trauma cave, or look her in the eye and say "I do not care about your rape". Well, put like that, we have clearly discovered how much I care about your rape. We cannot co-exist in each others' social environment. If we accommodate each other, we will both be indescribably poorer for it. It appears we must walk away from the negotiating table.
I'm male, white, cisgendered, heterosexual, non-obese, abled, non-bullied, non-anxious, non-depressed, non-traumatized, and pretty much all-around non-oppressed. This comes with a long list of privileges. I don't really like the word "victim" associated with me. I also possess no automated guilt reflex whatsoever. The rare occasions on which I am capable of the emotion of guilt about anything, it is based on evidence, not social pressure. Then I set it right if possible. If there seems no way to do so, I don't think about it any more, so I am free of the pressure, if not the knowledge, of guilt. For me, guilt does not involve anything larger than me, such as society, the world, humanity, identity groups, demographic segments, or culture. I don't want a cookie, or a trophy: I have no interest whatsoever in whether I am deemed sufficiently liberal.
I said all that to head off any outraged surprise from activists down the road. If that's a problem for you, you might wish to unsubscribe from me on social networks. You might also wish to stop attending the cons, gaming groups, and other locations I frequent, in order to avoid me. Some of you already have, which makes those places dramatically better, because I don't want them to be a padded cave. If you want a dirge instead of a celebration, you have better options for your recreation dollars.
There are other victims who have elected to cut non-victims a lot of slack. For that I thank you, and admire you. I follow and read oppression-related links, when my friends post them, and have become gradually less ignorant. If you have a social justice grievance at a con, and a solution to suggest, and if there is a cause-and-effect relationship between your problem and your solution, bring it up. (For instance, there is certainly such a thing as a terrible rape joke, or murder joke. Pretty much any tragedy joke can go too far or be used in the wrong context.) But the cave is not an option.
Very few of us are likely to join triggered trauma victims in their emotional cave-- other than those with an automated guilt reflex. I mean, it is just not going to happen. I wish there were no victims of grievances stuck in a cold, dark, joyless mental place, with padding on the walls so that it's a safe space. But when they are, there seems to be nothing the rest of us can do about it except join them there. A "trigger"-- that event for which a "trigger warning" is issued-- is not just a case of hurt feelings. It is a brain event similar to a panic attack, which grabs the traumatized person by the hindbrain and shakes. Imagine living in an entire world made out of knives. You never know when you're going to get cut. That's what it's like.
In extreme cases we are talking about literally avoiding the entire humor genre. That is not an exaggeration, interpretation, or straw man. That is exactly what the words say in the blog post which (next to the Penny Arcade cartoon "The Sixth Slave") forms one of the twin centers of the controversy. Shaker Milli A offers me the stark choice of conforming my emotional world to the limits of her trauma cave, or look her in the eye and say "I do not care about your rape". Well, put like that, we have clearly discovered how much I care about your rape. We cannot co-exist in each others' social environment. If we accommodate each other, we will both be indescribably poorer for it. It appears we must walk away from the negotiating table.
I'm male, white, cisgendered, heterosexual, non-obese, abled, non-bullied, non-anxious, non-depressed, non-traumatized, and pretty much all-around non-oppressed. This comes with a long list of privileges. I don't really like the word "victim" associated with me. I also possess no automated guilt reflex whatsoever. The rare occasions on which I am capable of the emotion of guilt about anything, it is based on evidence, not social pressure. Then I set it right if possible. If there seems no way to do so, I don't think about it any more, so I am free of the pressure, if not the knowledge, of guilt. For me, guilt does not involve anything larger than me, such as society, the world, humanity, identity groups, demographic segments, or culture. I don't want a cookie, or a trophy: I have no interest whatsoever in whether I am deemed sufficiently liberal.
I said all that to head off any outraged surprise from activists down the road. If that's a problem for you, you might wish to unsubscribe from me on social networks. You might also wish to stop attending the cons, gaming groups, and other locations I frequent, in order to avoid me. Some of you already have, which makes those places dramatically better, because I don't want them to be a padded cave. If you want a dirge instead of a celebration, you have better options for your recreation dollars.
There are other victims who have elected to cut non-victims a lot of slack. For that I thank you, and admire you. I follow and read oppression-related links, when my friends post them, and have become gradually less ignorant. If you have a social justice grievance at a con, and a solution to suggest, and if there is a cause-and-effect relationship between your problem and your solution, bring it up. (For instance, there is certainly such a thing as a terrible rape joke, or murder joke. Pretty much any tragedy joke can go too far or be used in the wrong context.) But the cave is not an option.