Should Books Contain Trigger/Content Warnings?

Riddle me this, book lovers: should books contain trigger and/or content warnings?

This question has made its rounds in literary circles many times before. A few years ago, many editorials came out discussing the idea after university students began asking for trigger warnings on course material. You know, mostly to have a head's up in case a disturbing scene is just around the corner. I was amazed at the amount of anger such a consideration sparked. It was as if these students had asked for regular book burnings to take place on campus. Many of the objections boiled down to some simple themes:

1) You are ruining the Sanctity of Literature if you spoil plot points through trigger warnings.

2) These special snowflakes need to buck up and deal with it. Life doesn't come with trigger warnings.

3) Being able to "opt out" of uncomfortable situations or scenarios is unhealthy.

4) Trigger warnings will lead to banning books. 

So let's really get into this. Because I want to know what you think about all this.

For the purpose of this post, when I talk about trigger warnings, usually I'm referring to graphic depictions that could trigger someone who has a history of trauma. Things like suicide, war,
racism, rape, child murder, domestic violence, etc. When I talk about content warnings, it's usually in a broader sense and covers things that may not be triggering, but many still would like to be aware of, such as group or kink sex, swearing, drug use, etc.

Frankly, content warnings are something that should have been added to books years ago. Every other media has a rating system to let people know what kind of content they're about to walk into. From movies, to television, video games, comics-- all have their own system to let you know what kind of content it holds, from a G rating all the way through to NC-17. Even TV shows have general disclaimers to make audiences aware of swearing, nudity, and violence. These rating systems don't spoil content-- it allows us to be informed consumers.

Yet books are exempt from this? Why?

Probably because books pre-date any sort of rating system. We were dragging around dusty tomes before we decided what was offensive and what wasn't. But does that mean they should stay exempt? It's easy to excuse a novel from needing a rating system simply because you need to immerse yourself to actually get the full impact. A person strolling by a grotesque movie poster only has to glance at it to feel the triggering effects. A book, however, can look innocuous enough until you realize what those words are building towards. Of any type of media, books are most deserving of content warnings and a rating system because you often have no inkling of it coming before you're immersed in a very triggering scene. Movie trailers give you a much stronger picture than vague back covers, and yet there are still ratings and systems in place to make sure you go in informed.

Also, to add to the argument against "content warnings are spoilers" lets remember that according to the University of California, spoilers don't spoil. In fact, they often make the experience more enjoyable.

But what about real life? Nobody hands you a content warning when you walk out the door. And could it be harmful to self-censor yourself from upsetting content? Unfortunately, when we talk about people who have been "triggered" by content like this, it's not because they've lived sheltered lives. It's because that person has a mental illness that is being aggravated by this trigger. To be triggered often means panic attacks, extreme anxiety, hallucinations or flashbacks, and are absolutely debilitating. People who suffer through experiences like this, often stemming from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, cannot control their triggers and are often hit by them when they least expect it. A traumatized individual could be triggered and not even know what by, which can create a life paralyzed by fear of the next trigger. Because of that, people will often avoid things they KNOW will trigger them, as they will inevitably be triggered by something they can't control anyway. Might as well minimize the damage, right?

Imagine PTSD as an allergic reaction. Every time you come in contact with coconut you break out in hives, so the logical thing would be to avoid coconut, would it not? You would want ingredient lists on anything you eat so you can know if it has coconut. If a teacher handed you raw coconut water and said you had to drink it for a grade, would you? Or would you protest, because this could severely hurt you, if not kill you?

Do people avoid certain topics and content? Sure, because everyone has preferences. At the end of the day, why should people be forced to read something they don't want to? There is no "book everyone must read" no matter what people say. Most importantly, due to life experiences, everyone will take away something different from a story. You may have found something beautiful in a book about a soldiers' journey through war, whereas an ex-military personnel may walk away feeling disgusted and horrified. It makes me think back to how media personnel vs military personnel responded to Trump's speech which honoured a fallen Navy SEAL, William "Ryan" Owens.

Media Reaction (left) and the Veteran's Reaction (right). 

Finally, will trigger warnings lead to banning books? I suppose I can see where the thought comes from, though to me it makes about as much sense as saying that if we offer people free healthcare they'll start running into traffic. In fact, everything I've seen when trigger warnings are put in place leads me to believe the opposite. Content warnings get people more excited about what's available to read. It's used as a tool to track down what you want through an over saturated market. To me, these 'warnings' are no different than tagging a book as sci-fi, fantasy, romance-- it helps to narrow down where in the world of literature this piece fits.

Before I came into the publishing world, I wrote fanfiction and participated in a lot of communities. Content and trigger warnings were STANDARD. It was EXPECTED. Often there were warnings on a chapter by chapter basis for longer pieces, so you knew exactly when the troubling content was coming. And how did people feel about it? Great! In fact, those content and trigger warnings became like lifeblood. Often, instead of turning people away from a story, it would engage them to click on and read. Back in those days, when I wanted to read a sweet romantic story featuring two gay men, I knew to look for tags such as "fluff" and usually the coded tag for that relationship (dating myself here, but in Saiyuki fandom, numbers were used to represent characters 3, 5, 8, and 9, so looking for a certain relationship meant looking for those numbers 3/9, 5/8, etc.) It worked amazingly. Going back to spoilers don't spoil piece, if people knew a story was especially dark, or contained graphic sex, or torture, tagging it as such let allowed people who were looking for those stories to find them easier.

When I transitioned out of the fanfiction world and started reading YA, I was thrown off by how little you are able to find out about a book. I wanted to find gay characters, especially as a teenager, and while in fanfiction such things would be easily tagged as such, in the book buying world I was flying blind. Unless the whole book focused around an Issue, you had to read the thing to find out if it had the content you were looking for. And then, Issue Books are often so formulaic and focuses so much on the problem that it can be hard to just enjoy the stories. Not to mention (especially for marginalized people) it's unfair that the only representation offered painted those people as People with Problems and forgot that they're just human.

Even today, when you look at how readers refer books to one another, you can see readers are concerned about content, not just when it comes to picking what not to read, but what to read as well. So many people on Twitter shoot out questions like, "Any recs for books with lesbian MCs/Disability rep/losing virginity/etc?" Yet if books had a content warning or rating page, it might be easier for people (especially teens) to track down the content they actually want to read about.

Content warnings don't have to be scary.

A content/trigger warning page doesn't have to be the end of the world. It can work like in the picture above, or a page like the acknowledgements listing out any troubling material, which can be easily skipped if you're not concerned and prefer to fly in blind. And if fanfiction is any indication, content warnings could serve to drum up excitement about books and reading. Would trigger warnings lead to censorship? Doubt it. If so, then we wouldn't have television, movies, video games... Besides, trying to slip in potentially distressing scenes in the name of Literary Sanctity, or to "teach readers" some moral or another, or because you know it won't be received well (slipping gay characters into Christian fiction, for ex)-- just comes across as, what we call in bird culture, a Dick Move.

I'm not asking for censorship. I just want the chance to be informed.

A Culture of Labels: Mental Health and Violence

Growing up in Canada, any kid in the ‘90s or early 00s could tell you about the commercials put out by Concerned Children’s Advertisers, a non-profit organization that puts out public service announcements aimed at kids to teach about bullying, drug use, self-esteem, etc. Even today when I turn on the kid’s channels, I may catch a newer version of one of these commercials. But the ones I watched when I was younger still ring in my head, sticking with me for reasons I never quite understood as a kid.

One in particular featured a young teenage girl on a track field, ready to leap into a sprint. And as she did, tiny labels were ripped off of her by the wind, words like whore, emo, lazy, stupid, all fell away, until it was just her, no labels holding her back.

I remember being confused by the message at the end: “Don’t Label Yourself.” What did that even mean? Surely labelling oneself had its benefits. How else did you know where you belonged? How else did you know who you were? In my young mind, things were better labelled and categorized, people were better labelled and categorized, so you knew what to expect when interacting with them.

(One of the CCA's commcericls. Their stuff is really good if you want to check it out.)

And it seems that other young people have thought this way as well. I saw the culture of labelling emerging as I was a young person not long ago, but it seems to have exploded in the years since then. Especially when it comes to mental health.

Just saying those words, mental health, people think Schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression, anxiety, etc. They think of the diagnoses, the illnesses in which people are classified as. And it seems these days that everyone wants to be labelled. Kids that come into our mental health treatment facility don’t want treatment, they want a diagnosis. They want a name to slap onto the crazy they feel, a name that comes with a list of dos and don’ts, or as it’s seen, list of what they can or can’t do. They’ve spent so long with all this buzzing energy within them and they want someone else to acknowledge, Yes, what you feel is legitimate. Here’s what we call it.

So, naturally, when people talk about mental health in connection to extreme acts of violence such as a school shooting, a lot of people, including those who work with mental health, are quick to say: But this isn’t a proper reflection of people with mental illness! Not everyone with a mental illness will become violent! Stop comparing mentally ill people to murderers!!

Ugh, hold up here. Are you people serious?

When someone becomes a danger to themselves or others, they are considered ‘mentally unwell.’ A person can become suicidal without needing to be diagnosed with depression. A person can go out of their way to hurt someone without qualifying for a diagnosis of ‘psychotic’ or ‘delusional.’ Just because these people aren’t diagnosed with something, DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE MENTALLY WELL.

Mental health =/= mental illness.

Everyone has a state of mental wellness that they uphold. Some people have their wellness disrupted by mental illnesses that develop, i.e., someone finds it harder and harder to function in day-to-day life as they develop depression, exhibit symptoms, and that is the main reason they are unable to function. The reason we even have a diagnosis of “depression” is simply to say “When these symptoms line up, here are the steps to treatment we’ve found that works.” All the diagnosis of “depression” means then, is the cue to use a certain vein of treatment for that individual.

But what happens when something starts affecting a person’s ability to function, but they still don’t qualify for a mental illness? I had a psychiatrist, who has been working with youth with mental health issues for a long time now, come into my office and let out a deep sigh once. When I asked him what was wrong, he said that he couldn’t get a doctor to diagnose his client with bipolar disorder because she didn’t fit the guidelines of it, and he couldn’t access much help (like medication) for her unless he had that diagnosis. He said to me, “The thing is, she doesn’t meet enough of the qualifications to be diagnosed with bipolar disorder, but those mood swings are still there. They’re having a huge effect on her.” Because she didn’t fit the label, professionals all around her were pretending that the symptoms she had didn’t matter. When really, her symptoms and behaviours were severe enough to land her in an agency with Children’s Services.

So then what happens when we as a society decide, mental health discussions shouldn’t take place anywhere near discussions of violence or school shootings? What happens when we conveniently ignore the symptoms and behaviours of violent people because it doesn’t fit into our idea of what a mental illness should look like? I can tell you exactly what happens, because sadly I see it often in my line of work: the person and their issues are pushed to the back burner until they explode and do something that can no longer be ignored.

Do all violent people have mental illnesses? Of course not. But their mental state is jeopardized, where they don’t see the logic of how hurting others and themselves is extremely detrimental to their well-being. Many get wound up in these ideologies of “glory” and “fame” through violence, but where does that need for glory and violence come from? It stems from many places, but often builds up from feelings of hopelessness, feeling alone and isolated, projecting their anger onto other people and convincing themselves they are the cause of their problems. All are behaviours that anyone could exhibit. After all, haven’t we all wanted to blame someone else when we were angry, too emotional to see our own errors in judgement? But when those small things are left to fester within us, grow to a place where suddenly all we think are those negative thoughts, where our day-to-day functioning is impacted, then we are no longer in a state of mental wellness. We wouldn’t qualify for a diagnosis, but the condition of your thoughts doesn’t allow you to reach your full potential. You are mentally unwell and, in a lot of cases, are in need of help.

Mental health or gun control? What will keep our children safe? There’s no easy answer, but it definitely isn’t in turning a blind eye to mental health. Because we ALL have a mental health, we all contribute to it every day—weighing yourself down with stresses and taking the load off with exercise and time to reflect. It’s never a bad thing to seek help when things get out of control—or even when things are just tough, to keep things from getting out of control. After all, most people who fall into toxic thinking don’t even realize or acknowledge that they’re unhappy. They use that anger and bitterness to convince themselves they are happy, or that they’re above or smarter than the rest of the population for the way they see things.


Don’t underestimate the power of a walk outside on your mental well-being. Never underestimate how truly damaging stress can be. We deal with our mental health every day and so often we don’t even think about it, often letting our worldview fall into a “normal” and “crazy” spectrum, where we’re either one or the other. When really it’s a compounded interest of everything we think, do, and experience. It can seem far-fetched that something as simple as “toxic thoughts” could lead someone to walking into a school and killing as many innocent people as they could before taking their own life. After all, everyone has toxic thoughts from time to time. But the fact of the matter is those people who commit these horrific acts are often not mentally ill (since a lot of mentally ill people, the illnesses people think of as “the crazies,” wouldn’t even function well enough to follow through with a scheme of that scale). They are normal people whose toxic thinking led them to a place where they are very mentally unwell, often to a point they don’t realize it.

And I think that’s what frightens people the most. That’s why they use words like “crazy,” and “mentally ill,” and “psychotic,” when we refer to these people. Because we don’t want to think for even a second that those monsters could be anything like us.

Labeling Characters

Not long ago I was on Twitter, and the topic of conversation during a #GayYA chat was on labels. Are they good, are they bad, and whether you or your characters chose to use them. And it got me thinking. Labels affect more than just gay teens, so I wanted to open this up to discussion.

What are labels in fiction? Labels in fiction reflect labels in real life. Things that may not necessarily be negative, but define you in a very specific way. There is a difference between descriptors and labels. A descriptor is a very general way of describing someone. A label has a little different connotation. It usually comes with background stigmas or expectations from society.

To explain it a little better, a descriptor could be referring to another as a "redhead." This is general, and there's not much hidden meaning beneath the surface. But change that for a label such as "ginger" and you've got a different story. Calling someone a ginger is not necessarily a negative thing, but in the last 5-10 years there has been a growing stigma for people with red hair and freckles. Calling someone a ginger could have negative connotations depending on context. Though most uses of the word "ginger" to teens are used in jest, there's still a shift in the meaning of that word. Being called a redhead is not necessarily the same as being called a ginger.

All descriptors can be labels, but labels have a bit more specificity and background connotations to them, so we’ll focus on those for now.

What does it mean for an author or character to use labels? When an author uses labels in fiction, we see it used in narration, as opposed to if a character used it in dialogue. Both have subtle differences, but both do one thing: they set the reader's expectations. Not necessarily a bad thing, right? After all, sometimes it’s better not to beat around the book (Heh, keeping that typo.) about a character's ethnicity or gender identity or sexuality. Sometimes it's better to come out and say, "I'm Kenyan" or "He's Asian" or she's "Gayer than a fruitcake." It's a quick and easy way to establish a part of your character in the reader's mind.

Besides, sometimes there's no point to ignoring labels. Sometimes instead of saying "She had mocha skin and black hair" try "She's black." After all, how many ways can you describe a person's skin color before it gets dull? No, really, let's find out...

Using labels is often a good way of reclaiming them too. Instead of ignoring a label that most people may not understand, use it. Show them what it really means. For example, when you have a transgender character, it can work well to use labels. Show who your character is, show them that this is a transgendered person, and there's no reason they shouldn't understand this person.

When we have characters using labels in dialogue, we tend to get a lot of reclaiming. I remember one flamingly gay character who often called himself "Queer" or a "fairy" ect, ect. He used derogatory labels to reclaim them, because that was the kind of character he was. How characters use the labels, why they use the labels, even their avoidance to some labels really gives an insight into how the character views himself and those around him.

There's nothing wrong with using labels in dialogue and narrative. Sometimes, by using a label other people avoid, you can make a bold statement with only one word. But this is not always the case. Labels are not always sunshine and joy. To be honest, I don't use labels unless absolutely necessary. In Shell, I only openly mentioned that one of my characters was gay once, and it was only to gauge the reaction of another character to that word. (This was actually edited out during agent revisions.) I find labels very limiting. On the one hand, yes, great, you have an instant picture in the reader's mind. Unfortunately, people's definitions and ideas of labels are always different. I'm going to bet that many who read my point of redhead vs gingers didn't know that ginger could be a negative label. This is partly due to the evolution of language in different areas, slang, and of course, different age/wealth demographics.

In real life and in fiction, sometimes people have a hard time seeing past the label. Introducing a character who is schizophrenic, for example, could change a reader's entire perception on them. For many, schizophrenic is synonymous with crazy. Yes, in one way we can change or "reclaim" the meaning of that word in the reader's mind. But sometimes, I find that authors stray from simply reclaiming a word to making a point about people with schizophrenia or mental health in general. And trying to have a point or moral to the story will definitely turn readers off.

Is labeling necessary? After all, as writers, aren't we taught to show, rather than tell? Isn't telling readers that a character is gay or African or bipolar less effective than showing them? If you can easily show your readers who your character is rather than telling them, that will make for a more enjoyable read.

Can't figure out how to do it? Well, if you have a gay character, show the relationship. Show them with a member of the same sex. Show your readers an ethnic background. Perhaps your MC is Mexican and his mother is traditional? Mental illnesses, I'm half-and-half on. Is it necessary that your MC know that he has this illness? If not, keep the behavior, but drop the label. See if your readers catch that something's amiss. It could lead to interesting discussions of your character's psyche, instead of having readers write off the issues since it’s been “established.”

Whether you're for labels or against them, write how you want to. No editor or agent is going to tell you to add or take out labels unless it's absolutely necessary. Whether you choose to use them or not is dependent on your writing style and the type of story you're telling.

Of course, these are just my thoughts on labels used in everyday life. But what about not-so-nice terms? How would your character facing a derogatory label change your story? How about if your character used the derogatory label?

Leave me your thoughts to devour. Tasty, tasty thoughts.

Peace,

-Katie