Trigger warnings - what are they really for?

[mahagonny]

I'm not in a position to comment about how careful anyone here needs to be about upsetting students. YMMV. I don't teach political science, history or such. So far, usually the only things I do that occasionally upsets students are asking them to work harder and awarding grades. Nevertheless, a recent communication from the provost included this:

"Academic leadership is going to take a systematic look at the curriculum through a social justice lens and recommend changes where appropriate."

The potential for strict administrative control of our teaching could easily be on the horizon. And it might get interesting; whereas, people with guaranteed academic freedom will have used it to create infringements on their academic freedom.

ETA:

We are in different times now. It's easier than ever to lose your job, and for crazier reasons than ever before.

If this were a student paper, I'd write on it. "Evidence? This is a big assertion." I probably would not be particularly impressed with the student's reasoning skills if the evidence they provided was 20 news stories from the last 2 years about weird different incidents, many with complicating factors or missing information.

This doesn't mean more people are getting fired for crazy reasons today than before, though that would support the claim. It means the reasons you can get you fired are getting crazier, so people are having to be extra careful not to be fired for things you shouldn't be fired for, because they are getting crazy.
Aside: a friend of mine just quit an administrative job held for many years because of the stupid, anti-white racist 'training' she would have had to take to continue in Fall 2021. So had she reported for training in the fall, she would have been fired for sounding off (unavoidable, since she is well educated, caring and has a strong aversion to propaganda and lies) instead of sitting there and taking the indoctrination like a good loyal subject.

At any rate, my post followed a prediction made by caracal upthread:

I don't know what society you people are living in, but the one I'm in isn't much like that. It is true that I've seen some people talk about microagressions and the like, but I've seen no sign that that stuff is taken seriously by deans or chairs.

It seems to me that both sides of the debate are guilty of some oversensitivity and hyperbole.

That's usually how this stuff goes. Some weird thing happens at Wesleyan and people pretend its some massive national issue where nobody can teach anything anymore. Nobody at my institution, student, faculty or admin has ever even uttered the words "trigger warnings," and I continue to teach about various upsetting things without the slightest complaint.

:

...and as a prediction, I would definitely stand by it, unless something as done. Hopefully there is enough furor, for example organized objection to public school CRT-that's-not-really-CRT-because-you're-too-dumb-to-understand-what-CRT-is from parents that the radical left will get it through its skull that there's growing opposition.