This topic is mostly because of a review I read for the book was Stolen Ink, but I don't recall if the review was on Amazon or Goodreads. My understanding of a trigger warning is that you would normally put it in place if there is something traumatic that happens in a story, like rape, incest, domestic violence, abuse of some sort (drug, alcohol, or any of the physical that would fall under domestic violence), so that people sensitive to those issues know to avoid or are at least prepared when they read the work. I have also seen authors specifically mention if something features intimate MM situations.
At the risk of sounding totally insensitive, and sometimes I am a bit blind to things, I am wondering if I am wrong with regards to what should be listed by an author as a trigger. The review I am speaking of complains that the author of a MM urban fantasy/paranormal romance did not list as potential triggers the use of the phrase "spirit animal" and that two characters met in a bar and then went home together and had sex. Neither of which seem to me to be something that would merit "trigger warnings" in my opinion because neither seem inherently likely to be traumatic. The review mentions that the latter is just something she/he doesn't like, and she finds the former (the use of the phrase "spirit animal") to be offensive to native americans/first peoples, and that even though they are not used in reference to those people (it is used in reference to an elf's tattoo "companion"), she doesn't like the phrase, since it is appropriated from First Peoples' culture (and the writer gives no indication of being from that culture). Is the reviewer just being sloppy in her terminology, am I being too literal? I may have taken it too seriously, but I also think this is how something useful becomes something onerous. I appreciate a warning that drug abuse or rape or something similarly unpleasant is in the storyline, but if such warnings are expected to cover everything potentially offensive to someone (rather than traumatic), then the blurb will be bloated to incomprehensibility, and the warnings will mean almost nothing. Everyone has different dislikes, and perhaps a rephrasing of the review would be simplest, but I am just curious if I have totally misinterpreted what Trigger Warnings are actually for. I mean if you are reading a book that is considered MM romance, and you don't like guys meeting and hooking up immediately after meeting at a bar, then it is probably the wrong genre to read anyway, at least in my experience.
Let me know if I am being insensitive, if the reviewer just chose the wrong phrase, if I have the proper concept of Trigger Warnings (or not).
[Cultural appropriation is a different matter altogether, but I think when artists and authors do it respectfully and it is something that fuels their growth or is an important part of a book, then it should be accepted. Monet was inspired by Japanese woodcuts and Picasso by African tribal masks, and neither hid that inspiration.]
After all those words, my biggest issue is that I don't want something as potentially useful as those warnings to become just a list of what people have taken issue with because I think there is a chance it will limit an author's ability to be creative. For the elf in question, his spirit animal was mentioned as a link to his people, so I don't see why the author should need to make up some new term for it, if such an understanding is already inherent in one available (and if the author had chosen "totem" as an alternative choice meaning much the same thing, but in my opinion a much more loaded word, then the reviewer would still have had an issue). It is not a perfect correlation, but then it is urban fantasy, so that shouldn't be expected. I guess I think authors, like artists (which authors are), deserve a great amount of freedom, and that readers should couch their expectations based on genre. Many blurbs do mention common triggers, whether it be a reminder that it is an explicit MM tale or something a bit more serious like drug abuse or domestic violence, and I like that status quo, and I hope that my concept of what triggers are isn't totally fouled up.
Stopping now, before I write another several hundred words circling the same subject without making it any clearer.
At the risk of sounding totally insensitive, and sometimes I am a bit blind to things, I am wondering if I am wrong with regards to what should be listed by an author as a trigger. The review I am speaking of complains that the author of a MM urban fantasy/paranormal romance did not list as potential triggers the use of the phrase "spirit animal" and that two characters met in a bar and then went home together and had sex. Neither of which seem to me to be something that would merit "trigger warnings" in my opinion because neither seem inherently likely to be traumatic. The review mentions that the latter is just something she/he doesn't like, and she finds the former (the use of the phrase "spirit animal") to be offensive to native americans/first peoples, and that even though they are not used in reference to those people (it is used in reference to an elf's tattoo "companion"), she doesn't like the phrase, since it is appropriated from First Peoples' culture (and the writer gives no indication of being from that culture). Is the reviewer just being sloppy in her terminology, am I being too literal? I may have taken it too seriously, but I also think this is how something useful becomes something onerous. I appreciate a warning that drug abuse or rape or something similarly unpleasant is in the storyline, but if such warnings are expected to cover everything potentially offensive to someone (rather than traumatic), then the blurb will be bloated to incomprehensibility, and the warnings will mean almost nothing. Everyone has different dislikes, and perhaps a rephrasing of the review would be simplest, but I am just curious if I have totally misinterpreted what Trigger Warnings are actually for. I mean if you are reading a book that is considered MM romance, and you don't like guys meeting and hooking up immediately after meeting at a bar, then it is probably the wrong genre to read anyway, at least in my experience.
Let me know if I am being insensitive, if the reviewer just chose the wrong phrase, if I have the proper concept of Trigger Warnings (or not).
[Cultural appropriation is a different matter altogether, but I think when artists and authors do it respectfully and it is something that fuels their growth or is an important part of a book, then it should be accepted. Monet was inspired by Japanese woodcuts and Picasso by African tribal masks, and neither hid that inspiration.]
After all those words, my biggest issue is that I don't want something as potentially useful as those warnings to become just a list of what people have taken issue with because I think there is a chance it will limit an author's ability to be creative. For the elf in question, his spirit animal was mentioned as a link to his people, so I don't see why the author should need to make up some new term for it, if such an understanding is already inherent in one available (and if the author had chosen "totem" as an alternative choice meaning much the same thing, but in my opinion a much more loaded word, then the reviewer would still have had an issue). It is not a perfect correlation, but then it is urban fantasy, so that shouldn't be expected. I guess I think authors, like artists (which authors are), deserve a great amount of freedom, and that readers should couch their expectations based on genre. Many blurbs do mention common triggers, whether it be a reminder that it is an explicit MM tale or something a bit more serious like drug abuse or domestic violence, and I like that status quo, and I hope that my concept of what triggers are isn't totally fouled up.
Stopping now, before I write another several hundred words circling the same subject without making it any clearer.
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