trauma and trigger warnings

Warning: The whole world is a big fuck you to victims of all violence, assault and traumatic stress.

This article has been floating around the interwebs for the past couple of days. In most cases those who are posting it have attached words like "brave", "powerful", "awesome" and "interesting read" but most importantly "TRIGGER WARNING".

The title of the article is "How Violent Sex Helped Ease My PTSD". Bascially, the trigger is right there in the title, so if you've read that far, too late.

The idea of a "trigger warning" is to warn victims of violence and specifically sexual assault that the subject of rape or violence might be in an article. It's a great idea and I'm glad that it's universally used to let readers use their own discretion as to whether or not they're ready to handle a specific subject. But in reality, triggers come in many forms and may be something incredibly simple and have nothing to do with sexual assault. For an individual, a trigger might be something ordinary like an object or a place, or a common phrase. And part of the healing process in the aftermath of an assult is learning to deal with those triggers and function in a way that those become part of normal life again instead of panic attack-inducing instances. Unlike the internet, in real life there are no warnings.

I read the article once, and it really bothered me. I can't call it brave, but I guess I could call it powerful. I don't mean that in a positive way. I respect that it's her personal story, but I can't seem to justify someone using the exact same scenerio that unfairly turns a normal person into a person who deals with triggers as a way to become a person with less triggers. I know she is in no way trivializing rape and violent sexual assault, but I can't help but read it that way. And I am the kind of person who actively seeks to expose myself to fears in order to overcome them. I get it. But I don't get this.

The difference between rape and BDSM is consent. When a consenting adult engages in submissive sexual behavior, regardless of how little control they have over the actions of their partner(s), they've made the decision to engage in that activity. That is a huge difference to the point of making the two incomparable. Sexual assault is not only devoid of consent, but it is generally devoid of sexual meaning or pleasure in either party. The author specifically points out that she was engaging in this activity not for pleasure but for healing, and I can respect that, but I'm still having a hard time with the blurred line she has drawn between assault and consensual violent sex.

I appreciate the trigger warning, but sometimes just saying "trigger warning" is a trigger in itself. It says "Hey you, can you handle this? Let's put your healing process to the test. Prove to everyone that you're normal by reading this. I dare you." It doesn't help that nearly a dozen of my friends put it all over their facebook and twitter feeds and then all the feminist blogs on my feed featured how awesome this article was. The trigger was already set in motion. I'm not suggesting that people not write about PTSD or sexual assault or any of the common "trigger warning" themes. There is no cut and dry method for healing from sexual assault. But I am suggesting that people re-read the article and really try to figure out what makes this just so awesome.