You're eyewateringly wrong on like four different levels and I'm debating whether it's worth my time to explain it to you https://twitter.com/nickinsussex/status/1275252397774901248

aight, you asked, but if this turns into a sealioning situation i'm going to be Annoyed. Thread to follow:

First: You have fundamentally misunderstood the purpose of trigger warnings. Trigger warnings are not "I am going to intentionally spoil the book for you", they are a way of showing care and empathy for the members of your audience who might like a head's up.

Supposing you have a friend who is really scared of certain breeds of dog. The kind, caring, thoughtful thing to do when your friend comes over is to lock your dog in an isolated room. Before your friend comes in, you say "I have a dog, but I've put her in my bedroom."

You might then say "Are you scared of big dogs or little dogs? She's a pomeranian and she's super sweet, if you feel like meeting her. If not, that's ok too."

Congrats, you've just trigger warned your friend! They can relax and enjoy the visit comfortably.

Providing trigger warnings is being considerate and hospitable towards members of my audience, just as I would be considerate and hospitable to a guest in my home. If they don't want to read my book, THAT'S OK. I don't want them to read something that will upset them! OBVIOUSLY??

Secondly: We actually do informal trigger warnings all the time. When people went to see The Shining in theaters, they were able to see it was rated R. They KNEW it was a horror movie. They'd probably seen a trailer!

When reading the book, they'd almost certainly read the back cover. They knew it was a horror book. They probably knew what kind of horror Stephen King writes, too, so they probably had a rough guess of what to expect.

People who liked the book/movie probably read/watched it a second time. The tension was still there, even though they knew EXACTLY what was going to happen, because Being Good At Tension is Stephen King's entire job as a writer.

Which proves my next point: Only a TRULY SHITTY WRITER *requires* the element of (perfectly ignorant, uninformed) surprise in order to build and maintain tension.

In BOTH my published books, you know a hint of the end on the FIRST PAGE: Chant survives to tell his tale. Ylfing does too, and so does the mysterious person annotating
his notes.

Tension doesn't come from "WHAT", it comes from "HOW"

In other words: not "what's lurking in the woods?" (which we can quickly guess: Some kind of monster or Bad Thing) but "How does our hero survive?" (which will keep us going until the very last page)

Additionally, the argument that "if you know what's happening, it ruins the tension" is actually implying "if you know what's happening, you can't enjoy it" which is just... definitively not true?? people reread books and rewatch movies all the time.

Think of your favorite song. Was it your favorite song the first time you heard it? probably not.

But when that shit comes on the radio, you go "OMG!!" and crank it UPPPPP and sing every word, right? Even though you've heard it a hundred times?

People like songs they know. People like stories more when they know a little of what's going to happen. Fanfic tags are a shorthand way of saying "Hey, you don't know THIS song yet, but it rhymes with that other song you love."

Also also: Nobody is shoving trigger warnings down your throat. On my website, mine are in a popup window. You have to click the button "tags and trigger warnings" to view them. You have to CONSENT.

People who seek out trigger warnings are the people who HAVE SOMETHING THEY'D LIKE TO BE WARNED ABOUT. If you aren't scared of dogs, you don't need to ask whether your host has a dog before you go inside. But if you are scared of them, that's necessary information.

If you really, really hate even a hint of a spoiler, you don't have to read the trigger warnings. But you have to understand that their existence is an accessibility issue for other people who ABSOLUTELY need them.

it's about consent. It's giving the reader agency to say either "No, not today" or "I'm usually scared of dogs but I'm feeling secure enough to meet your sweet Pomeranian."

Because really, even if trigger warnings did ruin the story, the feelings and well-being of a real-life person are WAY more important than my ~*~artistic vision~*~. Give me ten chances to pick one over the other, and I'll pick the real-life person every. single. time.

In severe cases of trauma, being unexpectedly confronted with a trigger can fuck you up for DAYS, sometimes weeks. Imagine reliving the worst day of your life -- would you intentionally force another person to go that pain, if you had the chance to spare them?

Fuck artistic vision. Fuck tension. It's not more important than people.

and whoops, the "okay you asked" tweet at the top was supposed to be quote-tweeting this guy https://twitter.com/nickinsussex/status/1275253930608427009

What I would actually love to see, and what I will probably pitch to the editor of any future books I write, is to have a Trigger Warnings page at the back of the book with the Acknowledgements, and a note at the front saying "Trigger warnings at the back" https://twitter.com/AliciLee/status/1275265716359516162

This way, people who want the TWs can find them, and people who want to avoid them can do that too. CONSENT!!!!!!!

Also, if anyone wants to check out how I did the tags and warnings for my books (ooorr... if you want to check out my books themselves??), they're all here: http://www.alexandrarowland.net/books