Comedian Bill Maher torched the long-standing trend to produce so-called “trigger warnings” in one of his most recent monologues. He blasted people who like the idea of “wearing a mask” for their minds and took aim at those who have to begin every sentence from an identity or victim standpoint.
“You know what makes me uncomfortable? This bullsh*t: People who start every conversation with ‘As a person who,’ ‘As a survivor of.’ I’m triggered every time I see a trigger warning because I’m reminded of how weak my country has become. It’s like wearing a mask on your mind.”
People wonder why the younger generations have so much anxiety, it’s this stuff. Lots of stuff makes us uncomfortable,” he said.
The entire six minutes is peak Maher; it provides both incredible insight and analysis and a brand of comedy that made him a household name decades ago. Look, Maher might still identify as a liberal, but when you’re right, you’re right.
Take a look at this fantastic monologue:
I’m triggered every time I see a "Trigger Warning" because I’m reminded of how weak my country has become. pic.twitter.com/EAxurVGymU
— Bill Maher (@billmaher) March 4, 2023
Maher begins by citing a study that looked at how trigger warnings have the opposite effect of what they’re supposed to accomplish. He said:
“A new study from Flinders University analyzed a dozen other studies on trigger warnings and they all came to the same conclusion. They don’t work. Not only don’t they protect your feelings, but if you actually have been traumatized by something they’re warning you about. A trigger warning makes it worse. It’s like if seatbelts were made out of broken glass.”
Most of us didn’t need a study to show this, and the crowd that supposedly follows the science suffers too much cognitive dissonance for it to matter, but there’s a nice reassurance that the rest of us aren’t going crazy and see the dangerous outcomes of promoting such nonsense.
Maher nails it in this sketch. Trigger warnings enable people to never confront discomfort, leading to a weak and insufferable population.
“Students started demanding them so they could get ready in case something in a book, or a piece of art, or a history lesson reminded them that life included bad things and not just good and sometimes people were mean,” he said.
“A trigger warning is a kind of ‘Close your eyes, here comes an ouchie that like so many bad ideas in recent years got started on college campuses,” he later commented.
After citing various examples from both the film and stage industries, Maher pointed out that audiences now get warnings in England for one of the most iconic stories ever told in the history of literature.
“London’s Globe Theatre felt the need to tell the audience that its production of Romeo and Juliet includes suicide. Okay, but Romeo and Juliet has been in your Netflix queue since 1596.
You’ve had 400 years to prepare, and also it just kind of gives away the ending,” Maher joked.
He went on to say:
“And again, all the research shows that these trigger warnings don’t even work what they do is reinforce the idea that trauma is central to your identity, and that you should let it define you instead of dealing with it dispatching it, and moving beyond it. People wonder why the younger generations have so much anxiety it’s this stuff. What’s this stuff makes us uncomfortable? You know what makes me uncomfortable? This bullsh*t,” he raged. “I start every conversation with as a person who, as a survivor of, I’m triggered every time I see a trigger warning.”
“Bruce Wayne, you’re familiar, was afraid of bats. So what did he do? He became Batman.
That’s the way to go,” he offered as an alternative. In other words, toughen up.
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