I've always censored my writing. Starting with
Antioch, I began refusing to write sex scenes because I wanted to prove that,
contrary to popular opinion, a book could be written without dicks plunging
into holes every five seconds. I had moderate success with this idea, and it
encouraged me. Eventually, though, suggestions of sex leaked into my stories.
It only happened if it moved the story along, and I always felt the need to
warn people. I have straight male readers, and somehow, in my mind I always
pictured them coming across some mention of gay sex and turning into this
immature, disgusted asshole and making a huge deal out of how disgusted they
were. After all, that's what society expects. Or rather, it did during the Bush
era, I suppose. The gay rights movement really moved back about ten years from
2000 to 2008, didn't it? We're almost back to the level of acceptance we were
at in 1999. That's another story, though. I'll get to that in another blog at
another time.
It occurred to me that when I come across a straight sex
scene, I survive anyway. I have no reaction to it, in fact. Why should anyone
have a visceral, violent reaction to a written scene unless they are so
uncomfortable with their own sexuality that they simply cannot stand how much a
scene like that functions as a mirror. In which case, sad day. However, I
suddenly have no fucks to give. If there's a sex scene that moves the story
forward, it'll happen. You'll not be warned.
Also, trigger warnings are officially gone from my writing. I was informed a long time ago by a
friend of mine who simultaneously rallies for equality and talks about
"damn Mexicans" that I ought to warn people when a particularly
upsetting scene is in a story. Rape, for instance. You know what putting a rape
trigger warning on Spin the Bottle did? It made it my most popular story.
People see words like rape and death and sex and molestation and suicide and
they immediately want to see it. It is not my problem that triggers exist for
people. I am no longer going to do trigger warnings. You'll read my work as it
is written without warning and you'll either freak out and kill yourself
because you just can’t deal with reality, or you'll see the purpose behind the
scene and examine your own life. It is neither my fault nor my problem that my
writing a story with a rape scene causes you to have rape flashbacks. Maybe
that's what I'm going for. I'm a fucking artist, and I create worlds with the
purpose of disturbing, causing emotion, causing a reaction. I personally have
triggers as well. It doesn't stop me from reading if the book is triggering.
Quite the opposite.
Trigger warnings are a bullshit invention of millennial
hippies, telling you that you can indeed write a scene of incest, but you have
to make sure everyone knows beforehand that it's there. As though life itself
needed warning labels. As though every aisle in every grocery store needed a
warning label saying TRIGGER WARNING: PEOPLE for those of us with social
anxiety. Trigger warnings are cruise control for people who lack the ability to
control themselves when exposed to triggering stimuli, and I don't write
specifically for people who cannot keep their emotions in check. If someone
cannot find within them the maturity and sense to be able to read one of my
stories without having some kind of strong reaction that is so bad they can't
stand it, they ought not read my stories. They're about to get worse. I'm releasing
one of the darkest things I've ever written on Halloween, and I am through
holding everyone's damn hand through their personal set of triggers. If it's a
trigger for you, don't pull it and you won't get blown away. It doesn't pull
itself. That's not how it works. Learn how to control yourself or get
medicated. We all have to do it at some point. I am not here to hold your hand
and make the world less scary by warning you of what's going to happen next.
That defeats the purpose of writing. We call those things "spoilers"
and they're generally frowned upon. In Spin the Bottle, the rape scene was the
part of the story known as Rising action and climax. It was pretty much the
end. By putting a “trigger warning” at the beginning, I let everyone know how
the story ended. I am bitter, bitter, BITTER about being told that I need to use
trigger warnings, because in the end, I censored myself even harder.
I realize that sounds hostile. I didn't intend for it to
sound that way, but I have started to resent the idea of having to hold your
hand through the experience of reading my work. I understand issues. I get
them. Writing is supposed to reflect them like a mirror. Art itself is supposed
to cause a reaction, sometimes unpleasant, to the world around you. In my
opinion, my generation is so busy trying to avoid triggering events that we
forget how to be truly moved by anything. My advice is to take some pills, calm
the hell down, and enjoy the ride. The things that you consider triggers shan’t
be going away, and you can’t always prepare for them. If life is really so
upsetting that you need to be warned that it’s still happening around you,
maybe you should retire from the internet. And reading. And movies. And social
interaction. And life. I am no longer censoring myself, putting up trigger
warnings, or in any way indicating to my reader what’s going to happen at the
end just because it might cause some particularly unstable person to freak out.
I refuse. This is art, not therapy. I am an artist. I am not here to smooth the
world over for you.
Expect changes. You can accept them, or you can leave. I'm
not doing this anymore. I may continue my spiral in person, but writing is my
one safe place, and you will not make me put up warning signs because something
makes you uncomfortable. These are my stories, and you've invited yourself into
them. You wouldn't go into someone's house and insist on warnings that some of
the carpets are green, and you'll not be doing something similar in the only
safe place I have left to express myself. Fuck your triggers. Grow a spine or
stop reading altogether, because there's a whole world of literature out there
with triggering scenes. Art is what it is, and I'd rather create art that stays
true to life than make sure your stupid fucking life stays free of irritants.
Veto. Absolutely not.
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