I feel content. Warnings are beneficial.

I grew up in the 90’s. The wild West of the Internet. I’ve accidentally seen things so beyond fucked up. I had a friend back then that I’ve lost contact with and she used to email me fucked up images that just opening the email, there it was. But she’d also send high quality jokes or nudes of herself so it was kinda all or nothing. I think at that time my email was @rammstein.com lol. But were talking fatal crash pictures, one was a woman fucking a cactus, stuff seared into my memory that I wish I could get rid of. So yeah, if you think trigger warnings are excessive, you are probably too young to have experienced the 90’s and early 00’s. Even going to picture sites like imgur today, back then nothing was categorized so you’d get everything. Nsfw sites back then included EVERYTHING nsfw, from people smoking pot to stills of decapitations.

The traumatizing shit I saw on the Internet in those days, I’d compare to my experience in Iraq. That’s not to say that visual imagery is as bad as IRL, with the sights, sounds… And smells, but when you’re not expecting that sort of thing, it can be a big deal. Honestly those things probably jaded me to a point where I could more adequately handle war, but in ANY other scenario I’d say those days of no rules Internet were very harmful to a lot of people.

I appreciate them. You are what you eat. That goes for what you put in your eyes and ears as much as your mouth

eh, shit i’ve read and seen on a screen, while it may have bothered me at the time, isn’t actual trauma, which does not fucking ask permission.

And yeah, there’s media that triggers that-but it’s media. I close it. I leave. I can. it’s not actually happening to me, right now.

I think it’s a decent notion, to annotate. It’s for sure people trying to be good for one another, and that’s laudable.

But. As I said, the worst of the world does not ask permission, and I think enforcement of content tags or what have you would likely lead directly to even more oppression and censorship in the storm of that which we are currently in.

I will say ao3’s pretty on point about it, from what i’ve seen-it’s voluntary, and it’s actually voluntary. How you keep that across the ages is anyone’s guess

Depends. I’m fine with most stuff, but I certainly want warnings if a video is titled “revolving door fail” but the content warning is “NSFL” (dude got his fingers caught and visibly cut off)

Not having a NSFL tag would be a major disservice to the viewer.

I think it’s content dependent. I lean towards not having them, but I can think of a couple episodes of the magicians where I would have appreciated the warning instead of the after the fact help line screen. It’s also true that adding a warning lessens the impact of the scene being warned about which I think is also counterproductive.

I think we need more granular ratings than we currently have. Kickass and I Spit on Your Grave having the same R rating is essentially meaningless.

Just to head this off at the pass, because someone is bound to bring up exposure therapy: hi, hello, I am someone who has been through exposure therapy (technically Exposure/Response Prevention, or ERP). Yes, it is broadly speaking true that avoiding triggers increases anxiety in the long run. However, one thing that was stressed to me over and over in ERP is that exposures have to be VOLUNTARY to be beneficial. Meaning, just hucking a tarantula at someone with arachnophobia is going to do far more harm than good. Likewise showing them a bunch of pictures of spiders with no warning. However, putting a content warning puts the decision to engage back into the hands of the person with the phobia (or trauma, eating disorder, etc), which effectively turns it into a voluntary exposure should they choose to engage.

All content is upsetting to someone.

Many commenters would self-censor, at best, toward a “common man” kind of shock tolerance. This doesn’t help those people who need trigger warnings for way more.

I can’t see how to resolve that vast gulf.

It depends on the implementation. Some good implementations are: Tags on AO3, Content Warnings at the beginning Movies/TV, using tags on the fediverse There is one implementation that really bothers me and it’s the Content Warning on the fediverse, the fact that it hides the whole post by default means that most of the time I end up expanding the content and seeing it anyways. I would prefer if the fediverse would just move to spoiler tags where you can hide only the content that the warning is for:

I think of them like food content warnings for non-lethal allergies, like lactose intolerance. It’s a kindness to have a warning that helps people avoid shitting their pants. However, we all need to recognize that it is just that, a kindness. There is an inherent risk when someone says ‘hey, taste this.’ If you have a high sensitivity, you have a responsibility for self-care through self-denial. If you were uncertain if a food contained something to which you had an extreme sensitivity, you’d say ‘no, thank you.’ Same holds true for the whole world of media. You can hope for kindness, and put in the effort give it to others where you will, but don’t trust that it will always be given to you because it is an extra effort.

Depends on what are they warning me about. If it is about gore of something similar I can appreciate it, if it about foul language they can shove that warning up their asses.

I absolutely appreciate them. They give me the chance to decide for myself whether to engage with a topic, depending on where I’m at. Suicide is often hard for me to deal with, due to my own family circumstances, so sometimes I want to get in and help people who are struggling, but other times, I just need to avoid the discussion for my own wellbeing. Content warnings give me the opportunity to make that choice

I hate graphic depictions of sexual violence. Moves like “A Clockwork Orange”, “The Accused”, and “Requiem for a Dream” all have scenes that I wish I didn’t remember.

Content warnings are information that allow media watchers to make informed decisions. People who are annoyed by them are just contrarian assholes with the teenage mentality that gore and cusswords are cool.

I saw a post once that had a content warning for music. Just. Music.

Depends on the magnitude of what is being warned of.

“Warning, graphic gore”? Absolutely appreciated. “Contains scenes of actual combat, those with PTSD may wish to leave the room”? Yeah totally reasonable. “This book contains vivid descriptions of sexual abuse”? I can see why people would be squicked out by that.

But then we get into the absurd side of it. A film about the Holocaust, needing to warn its viewers that some contents may be distressing? Wow. You don’t say. A memoir about a tragic death, needing to put a warning that… someone dies? “This politics discussion may discuss slavery, racism, and oppression”? Oh no, we have to think about upsetting things that happened!

And before someone suggests those are unrealistic hyperbole, those are all things I’ve seen. I don’t feel those are helpful.