hso_mods: (Default)
hso_mods ([personal profile] hso_mods) wrote in [community profile] hs_olympics2012-05-20 12:16 am
Entry tags:

Announcement

Here is what the list of requested trigger warnings is:
A guide to assist you in not hurting your fellow participants in the HSO.
That post is not a list of rules, it is information.

It is not in any way appropriate for you to decide what other people can or cannot be triggered by. You do not get to decide that, and we will brook no argument on that topic. Furthermore, there is no hard and fast rule for triggers, because they do not follow a logical structure. There is no line we can point to, saying 'ten years is a significant age difference, but nine years is not.' Asking us for those numbers does not constitute asking us for clarification.

Practically speaking, a good rule of thumb is to consider whether the potential trigger is a significant theme in the work. When in doubt, warn and specify.
And finally, nobody is getting points taken away if they forget to add trigger warnings. Nobody is getting disqualified, nobody is getting punished in any way. We have spent the past week reworking the schedule so that we have enough time to read through the entries and add trigger warnings where necessary before posting them to the main HSO comm. We know you are going to miss stuff. We are going to miss stuff ourselves.
Nevertheless, we are committed to providing trigger warnings for all of the main round entries, and we have no intention of giving up on that commitment.
If you do not feel that you can agree with this mission in word and in spirit, the HSO may not be the right event for you.

Because of the reactions to the trigger warnings post, we are postponing the bonus round 0 for 24 hours (until May 20 11:59PM EDT) so that we can be sure everyone here is on the same page before we open the main comm to content creation that might potentially endanger HSO participants.

Edit: comments have now been unscreened.
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scampers: (Default)

[personal profile] scampers 2012-05-20 04:04 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm going to very neutrally state that you should have participants label these as "content warnings" and not "trigger warnings". It's essentially the same thing, but it really does take the sting off when you see "content warning: couch cushions" rather than "trigger warning: couch cushions".

Content warning is a neutral term that, by in large, most of the things on that list should probably have anyway. Trigger warning is not.

Either way you are warning people about things that could make them uncomfortable and also not appropriating the use of a word that once had a severe meaning but is rapidly devolving into a buzz word for things that make people uncomfortable. I'm not saying that the above list is in any way, shape, or form, but it's becoming more and more widespread and that is not okay. Words evolve but this is taking a massive step backward.

[personal profile] mimicre 2012-05-20 07:13 pm (UTC)(link)
Admin here, responding in a personal capacity: you are absolutely right, and we will be putting up a post in a little while announcing our change to a 'tag'-based language (in part because it is more familiar to people than 'content notes' etc).