University of Chicago to freshmen: We do not support ‘trigger warnings,’ ‘safe spaces

[treee]

I think a large part of living in the world is learning to be uncomfortable. Ideally someday in the distant future the world we be a utopia where nothing goes wrong, but until then you have to roll with the punches. I had really super bad anxiety for a couple years after I consumed a bunch of mind altering substances just after high school but I eventually pushed myself and once I got back out there I remembered that you gotta have thick skin sometimes.

However, I do have a couple of things to say here in defense of the underlying concepts of "being triggered" and "safe spaces"

1) It is natural and okay to do your best to avoid situations that you feel unsafe in or that will result in you feeling some negative emotion.

2) It is okay to expect other people, to some subjective extent, to try to coexist with you as harmoniously as possible.

Where I draw the line is when one thinks it is okay to condescend or even accost others for not following some obscure (by societal standards) code of conduct. Most of us are doing our best to be accommodating and pleasant people. If one politely asks me to modify my behavior in some reasonable fashion, then I will happily acquiesce. But there are some things one can't just expect society in general to know or understand, and one should keep that in mind when feeling affronted.

Edit: In retrospect my post has nothing to do with trigger warnings or safe spaces, but more an observation on the attempt to over-sterilize public interactions to point of harming cultural and societal growth.

[treee]

As for trigger warnings specifically, I see nothing wrong with it. Complaining about trigger warnings seems to be unwarranted if you look at it with the right context: it is giving one information about the nature of experiences one might encounter with media or situations.

Edit: They've been around for decades.