Lately I’ve been seeing a rise in the use of the word triggered on social media and around campus. While triggered has traditionally been used to give individuals a warning for potentially harmful content that could elicit a bad experience or memory, the word is now used as a way to ridicule individuals who have an emotional response to certain phrases or actions.

*See examples below for reference*

While individuals continue to devalue the purpose of this word, it is important to understand what they are actually making fun of and just how harmful that could be.

So, why do we use a trigger/content warning in certain spaces?

The word trigger became popular from early psychologists working with war veterans in helping them get through their post-traumatic stress disorders. Psychologists observe and jotted down what made these veterans react and identified certain words or images as triggers. Most recently, many people have identified that there are many triggers in relation to sexual violence and police brutality and noted that words or phrases can stir up negative responses.

The reason we use trigger/content warnings in society is the same reason we do not talk about death in front of someone who just lost a significant other, it’s the same reason we hold off on loud noises around someone who just came back from war, So why is it that we can be so careful around these situations yet as soon as someone is triggered by the word rape or the sight of police in riot gear, we undermine their reactions?

We need to stop making a mockery out of the lived experiences of certain individuals and groups of people.

We need to stop invalidating an argument purely because it is based on emotion rather than logic because the way we feel is equally as important as the way we think.

We need to stop labeling millennials as too sensitive simply because we do not have the fucking decency to help everyone feel safe by watching our language.

And lastly, we need to stop trivializing the word triggered and using it as a joke because the experiences that trigger these individuals is not something that should be taken so lightly.