Trigger warnings crop up in social media posts, TV episodes, literature and now at the movie theater. Not everyone believes these advance notices are helpful, and some claim they harm entertainment.
'Safe and inclusive for all types of audiences' Film and television are visceral, absorbing media forms. In recent years, TV shows with scenes of sexual assault, drug abuse or violence, like Netflix's "Baby Reindeer" or HBO's "Euphoria," have included trigger warnings that preceded certain episodes. The presence of these warnings at the cinema, though, is less common. Zoë Kravitz's new film, "Blink Twice," is among the first to be prefaced by a trigger warning (about sexual violence) on the big screen.
"Many suspected" this to be a "direct response" to the "missteps" of the recent Colleen Hoover book-to-screen adaptation, "It Ends with Us," said Jake Fittipaldi at Collider. Both projects feature depictions of domestic abuse and sexual violence, but "It Ends with Us" was widely criticized for its handling of the material. Trigger warnings are a "harmless yet meaningful way to ensure that the moviegoing experience remains safe and inclusive for all types of audiences," said Fittipaldi.
'It's OK to feel uncomfortable or provoked' While some consider trigger warnings to be a measure of sensitivity, others see them as evidence of censorship or unnecessary posturing. "It's OK to feel uncomfortable or provoked while looking at a painting or watching a play, but I worry everything's being dialed and dumbed down," Matt Smith, the star of HBO's "House of the Dragon," said to The Times.
Smith's worries are not isolated. "Trauma and discomfort have started to become conflated, and I think that's where people pull away from the idea of a trigger warning," Colleen Clemens, the director of women's, gender and sexuality studies at Kutztown University, said to Variety.
The jury is also out on whether trigger warnings work. "Some research suggests trigger warnings don't dissuade vulnerable people from continuing to watch, instead creating a 'forbidden fruit effect,'" Deryn Strange, a psychology professor at John Jay College, said to Variety. |