Read the passage below and check your comprehension by answering the following questions. Then “submit” your work.
Persuasive speeches can often involve controversial topics. For your persuasive speech, you have selected the topic of preventing rape on college campuses because you think it is an important issue in today’s culture. Your instructor has approved your topic, you have conducted your library research, and you are scheduled to give your speech one week from today. You have just heard a rumor, however, that someone in your class has been victim of sexual assault on your campus, and you are anxious about how this classmate may react to your speech.
You bring your concern to your professor, who tells you that you have the option to provide a trigger warning to the class prior to your speech. Trigger warnings are statements before a lecture, reading or other activity that inform the audience of potentially sensitive material, such as depictions of violence (Barnes, 2016). Professors are expected to issue trigger warnings if something in a course might cause a strong emotional response. For example, psychology instructors regularly warn students to avoid four behaviors: stigmatizing mental illness, diagnosing oneself, diagnosing others, and sharing too much personal information (Boysen, Wells, & Dawson, 2016).
According to a recent study, most students support trigger warnings: 61 percent of students surveyed said universities should provide them, and 55 percent said students who “don’t maintain a safe space” should be disciplined (Barnes, 2016). Students have increasingly demanded trigger warnings in regard to course topics they believe will elicit strong, negative emotions (Wilson, 2015). They have expressed a desire for their campuses to be free from words, ideas, and subjects that might offend them or cause emotional discomfort. Trigger warnings can protect students from psychological harm.
At this point, issuing a trigger warning seems like the right thing to do, but then your professor goes on to tell you that faculty on campus have strong opinions about trigger warnings. Many faculty argue that trigger warnings go too far in accommodating students: they reduce academic freedom and have a chilling effect on the content that can and should be discussed in classrooms (American Association of University Professors, 2014). According to one study, most instructors had neutral or negative opinions about trigger warnings (Boysen et al., 2016). Rather than trying to protect students from words and ideas that they will inevitably encounter in life, campuses should prepare students to thrive in a world full of words and ideas that they cannot control (Lukiandff & Haidt, 2015).
After your instructor tells about you the faculty’s perspective, you remember how much you wanted to speak about rape prevention because you felt it was critical for your peers to hear. You believe you have the right to speak about what you want. And yet, you are still sensitive to your classmate’s potential reaction.