Before Mississippi University for Women professor Mallory Malkin shows students in her psychology classes videos on sensitive topics like substance abuse or sexual assault, she tells them they’re free to leave if the topic upsets them.
“I always put a disclaimer,” she said. “I always say they’re able to leave without penalty.”
That disclaimer is what’s known as a trigger warning, and it’s becoming more common at universities that increasingly incorporate a culture of keeping students emotionally safe — whether by having safe spaces where students can discuss touchy topics or by warning against microaggressions, small often unintentional biases that come out in speech and reveal the speaker’s biases toward a marginalized group.
“The environment that we have in general today is one of creating a safe space,” Malkin said.
The movement has its critics. Media from The Wall Street Journal to The New York Times have suggested the safe space trend creates environments that stifle open discussion on controversial topics. In September 2015, The Atlantic ran the headline “The coddling of the American mind,” arguing microaggressions and trigger warnings, far from keeping students safe, actively prevent them from dealing with trauma or other negative feelings.
Malkin argued trigger warnings aren’t meant to help students heal from trauma as much as keep students from suffering academically. Still, she said the system risks coddling the students, keeping them from taking risks and experiencing failure.
And, of course, students must actually learn the topics they’re in school to study.
“I would say it’s a mix of creating that safe space but also walking the fine line of making sure you’re not reducing the autonomy and integrity of the course,” she said.
Hitting close to home
The movement has crept into the Golden Triangle.
Last April, a group of students at Mississippi State University called Lucky 7 staged a protest and issued a series of demands of the university. These included a safe space for minority students away from “the daily stresses of navigating white spaces” and institutionalized sensitivity training for incoming freshman so black students wouldn’t experience microaggression on campus.
The university did not meet these demands. While some — such as the hiring of a more diverse faculty — the university agreed with, the safe space for minority students was where MSU leadership drew the line, Vice President for Student Affairs Regina Hyatt said.
“We would not consider any exclusionary policies in any context,” she said.
And while area students know of the protest, they don’t necessarily know the vocabulary. Ask random students at MSU or MUW about microaggression, and many respond with blank looks. When asked about safe zones, some students think of emergency preparedness drills — though not all.
“A safe zone [is a place] where LGTBQ or people in general … can confide, be able to share your feelings or emotions without being judged or worry about being threatened or anything like that,” said Devin DiMizio, a sophomore poultry science major at MSU.
Trigger warning isn’t a widespread buzz term yet at area college campuses, but the spirit of what it means — what should and shouldn’t be openly discussed in an academic setting — remains a subject of some debate.
“We do talk about topics like racism and different cultures,” said freshman Hannah Marshall, an MSU international business major taking a course in cultural anthropology. “The first day a teacher told us that we’re going to be covering touchy topics … and she just wanted us to know before we engage in those conversations so that everyone is prewarned.”
If controversial topics coming up in class are going to upset a student, she added, she thinks it should be that student’s responsibility to take another class.
Some students, however, think some subjects should be off-limits.
“I don’t feel like race should be talked about,” said MUW freshman nursing student Kerronique Newell.
Not just because it’s offensive, she said, but because it creates conflict between people.
She said she mostly doesn’t talk about controversial subjects in class or on campus.
Freshman business administration major at MSU Justice Jones feels that offensive speech is a problem in classrooms. She once had an English teacher tell her that Martin Luther King Jr.’s concept was “crazy.”
But she also feels open discussion is beneficial.
“I think open discussion is good for the students,” Jones said. “I think the teachers should just give the facts. … Give us the opportunity to talk to one another. Don’t make me feel bad because you have your master’s (degree) and you say ‘This is what it is.'”
Striking a balance
These safe space trends shouldn’t be so extreme they inhibit people from discussing uncomfortable topics, Malkin said.
Hyatt agreed.
“We want to help our students consider the whole campus to be a space where they can express their views, have productive exchanges on topics that are of personal or national interest and feel like they can do that in a place where that exchange of ideas is received and responded to in appropriate ways,” Hyatt said. “And that’s been our real emphasis in the work that we’re doing.”
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