<p>I’d love to see warning labels like these:
Pride and Prejudice: WARNING: Classist (income bias), Ableist (lots of walking to Meryton) Content may REINFORCE the gender binary (m/f romance).
Romeo and Juliet: WARNING: violent swordplay, underage sex, and a “what, ho!”
Language textbooks: WARNING: mention of conjugation. Also contains rules, which some may find unnecessarily restrictive
Mathematics textbooks: WARNING: contains absolute truths, which may be offensive to some users.</p>
<p>"Sometimes I wonder whether I am simply lacking in sensibility, but when I see articles in student newspapers–just as an example–clearly addressing sexual assault prefaced by “trigger warnings” I wonder exactly how dumb people have to be.</p>
<p>I consider myself to be a staunch feminist, but sometimes I despair at the stuff that emerges from contemporary gender studies. Perhaps I am simply a dinosaur."</p>
<p>I agree with you. There’s a sense of victimhood - don’t show me anything that doesn’t already fit with my preconceived notions. As an aside, I think it’s terrible that Smith College wound up having Christine Lagarde (head of the IMF) pull out from being commencement speaker, and same thing with Rutgers and Condoleeezza Rice. </p>
<p>Oh you have to be kidding! These are college students! How about when the 9th grade ELA class reads Huck Finn aloud with a lone AA student in the classroom? The slavery unit in 5th grade US History? </p>
<p>And frankly as a parent I don’t even want to know exactly what they are discussing in “health” class, but safe to say there is some level of discomfort in a coed class, and it is a graduation requirement, not an elective.</p>
<p>Not to mention Ayaan Hirsi Ali. The back-pedaling by the president of Brandeis was pathetic.</p>
<p>In 1990, some students at Wellesley publicly expressed dissatisfaction with the idea of then-First Lady Barbara Bush as graduation speaker. The person who initially raised the question said that Bush had led a life centered around her family and had done admirable volunteer work. So has my mother, said the student. My mother is as admirable as Barbara Bush. Why are we inviting her, instead of one of the myriad of women with the same accomplishments? Because she is married to a famous man. Is this what we are about here? Personally, I think she had a very valid point.</p>
<p>The Bush White House and the College handled the situation well. BB brought Raisa Gorbachov with her to the graduation, and the speech she gave acknowledged the difference in women’s lives and choices since the days when she dropped out of Smith to get married. (As it happens, a Wellesley classmate of mine had just started a new job as a speechwriter for GHWB. She said her only input to the speech that was written for the First Lady was supplying the correct pronunciation of “Waban.” 
)</p>
<p>Regarding graduation speakers, almost anyone famous will have some “baggage” that someone will consider offensive.</p>
<p>The Barbara Bush graduation speech at Wellesley was awesome – BB handled the controversy absolutely superbly with her closing line, which went as such: (The hoop race is a Wellesley tradition, and the commend about the mermaids references an earlier part of the speech.)</p>
<hr>
<p>For over 50 years, it was said that the winner of Wellesley’s annual hoop race would be the first to get married. Now they say the winner will be the first to become a C.E.O. Both of those stereotypes show too little tolerance for those who want to know where the mermaids stand. So I want to offer you today a new legend: The winner of the hoop race will be the first to realize her dream … not society’s dreams … her own personal dream. </p>
<p>And who knows? Somewhere out in this audience may even be someone who will one day follow in my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the President’s spouse. (pause)</p>
<p>I wish him well!</p>
<hr>
<p>It was well done and brought the house down, and even those who had disagreed with her choice as speaker had to smile. Very elegantly done.</p>
<p>Wellesley is so uptight these days, though, that no one would even smile at a line like that, and there would be protests that it wasn’t inclusive of same-sex couples. Like Consolation, I’m pretty liberal, but what I hear from my D at Wellesley makes me roll my eyes half the time. You can spend so much time being “offended” that you forget to actually learn. </p>
<p>I’m really quite sick of trigger warnings. I’m one of the target populations that it’s supposed to “help” (ie I’m a rape survivor). It makes me feel like society still sees me as fragile and broken- needing to be “warned” ahead of time.
Yes, sometimes I read things and get flashbacks but you know what? That’s life. You deal with it and move on. </p>
<p>I will not speak for all survivors. I can only speak for myself. I also clearly can’t speak for other groups that trigger warnings target (I know those with or who formerly had eating disorders is another big one), but if you’re really so sensitive that you can’t read literature that’s a bit graphic then I question whether you should be taking x or y class at all. </p>
<p>We’re too darn offended as a society- I agree with above. People LOOK for reasons to be offended and it’s just tiring. </p>
<p>I keep thinking of “A Few Good Men” quote–“You can’t handle the truth!”
Maybe the problem is lack of objectivity. The truth gets distorted on a regular basis in textbooks, teacher views, home views. Whole 'nother can of worms.
I think the purpose of college is to provide information ,teach how to seek truth, disparate views, debate, teach critical thinking (not indoctrination). That’s a tough agenda.
I read books and views of people I totally disagree with on a regular basis and encourage my kids to also. It’s a form of learning. Just don’t make a grade dependent on anything less than the presentation of a good argument.
I DO think that class descriptions should be more upfront in their descriptions sometimes. Liberal vs Conservative views of professor on a scale of 1-5 (and will grade you accordingly). Big books only–gotta read fast, Writing counts, …</p>
<p>So–a DLSV designation for syllabus works if needed at all. I would hope that all the “victims” (since a lot are “survivors”) can take care of themselves and choose their own classes without outside help.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the age.
I certainly believe that college students should be reading works that cause them to have a new perspective.
However, the syllabus ( books required) should be available at the college bookstore before registration so the student can determine for themselves if that is this class/ section that is appropriate for them.</p>
<p>I found viewing the material beforehand gave me a better idea of the course content which helped with course selection.</p>
<p>Teachers also choose triggering material in middle school in my experience, but don’t always give parents a heads up. It seems like nearly every book aimed at young teens addresses rape, suicide, the death of a parent or sibling, drug abuse, sexual abuse, physical & mental abuse.</p>
<p>If they made it through middle school, they can probably handle similar works in college.</p>
<p>I read an anti-Semitic book in the sixth grade. Read works like Huckleberry Finn in the seventh grade. It only got “worse” from then on. I enjoyed the book selections that I have been able to be exposed to. Hats off to my Honors teacher from last semester. Glorious job creating a safe environment where we could discuss things that others would shy away from. </p>
<p>“So such warnings will just be added to the syllabus template that faculty of humanities and social studies courses start their syllabi with. Just like the admonitions against cheating, such warnings will end up everywhere, and routinely ignored.”</p>
<p>This reminds me of allergen warnings on foods that have the allergen in the name. You know, peanut butter that says, Warning: Contains peanuts!</p>
<p>Is this for real? </p>
<p>Dear peers…grow up. </p>
<p>That said I do think professors should give warning before, say, watching extremely graphic violent or sexual content. I know I sure did not enjoy having to watch artist Pollock hump countless women like some dog during an art appreciation class. It was just gross and vulgar and encouraged no intellectual growth. However, college is supposed to be where you have your views challenged, get outside your bubble, and grow and learn as a student and person. This is going to mean you will be offended and unconfortable, multiple times. If a history book about slavery is going to bring down your world and cause you to consider suicide; maybe you’re just not ready for college. Or the real world. There is only so much ridiculousness this world can take.</p>
<p>Did you ever read the instructions on a packet of toothpicks? If so, you’d already know that we’re living inside the Asylum. This is just one more symptom.</p>
<p>Maybe my opinion would change if I had a professor who thought Pollock humping women was “educational”. I think I would be entitled to a warning —and a refund.</p>
<p>As I’ve read more about this, my views have moderated a bit, and I guess I do agree that students shouldn’t be surprised by material that a significant number would find objectionable. I don’t think this happens all that often, because usually there is a syllabus, and the syllabus is usually followed. But I recall that when I was in high school, the school showed us a film on the Holocaust with very graphic images of dead bodies and more–our families were notified in advance, and we had to get permission. We also were shown extremely gruesome films in drivers’ ed class. I don’t think those films should be sprung on anybody without warning, and there may be similar things in college. But it should be sufficient to require that the syllabus identify the materials that will be used, including those that will be shown in class. College students can be given the responsibility to determine for themselves if they are likely to have issues with any of the materials.</p>
<p>Some pretty gruesome photos appear on the front pages of newspapers. </p>
<p>College students are adults and history with all its horrors should be shown with no sugar coating. </p>
<p>There are hidden triggers and hidden signals everywhere. How many people know, for example, that Waddy Piper, writing “The Little Engine That Could,” was an ardent feminist propagandist challenging the manliness of everybody who couldn’t? It’s true, I swear. Re-read your child’s book. All the bad trains are MALES, and all the good trains are FEMALES helping to carry good things for children over the mountain.</p>
<p>As a college prof in the social sciences I always regarded my purpose as one of provoking thought about serious issues. This often required us to look at “inconvenient facts” about our own motivations, social conventions, and political beliefs. It required taking the received canon and the writings of serious scholars apart, piece by piece. There was no way to excise the bad or threatening parts from the text.</p>
<p>To add to my previous comment about dangerous propaganda in children’s books (if we only knew!), who knew that “Ferdinand the Bull” was a pacifist and leftist tract teaching our children not to be fierce and aggressive but instead to enjoy the smell of flowers in the ladies’ bonnets? (It’s true, btw, that Munro Leaf was censored by the fascist regime because his book was seen as anti-war and effectively anti-fascist.)</p>
<p>I don’t think any readings in a college course should have to pass a board of censors.</p>
<p>
Can you expound on that? I can think of some potential readings that I would not want to find in a course without warning…</p>