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Twitter

Twitter Truce: If You Don't Want to Watch #TheTriggering, You Don't Have To

Right-wingers and social justice warriors should just mute each other.

Robby Soave | 3.9.2016 5:34 PM

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Today, March 9, is #TheTriggering. What's that, you ask? It's a day for right-leaning social media provocateurs to post deliberately offensive things on Twitter in the purported name of free speech. 

The idea was conceived by Lauren Southern, an anti-feminist activist, and has been embraced by alt-right celebrities like Milo Yiannopoulos. The hashtag was trending on Twitter today: a profound disappointment to left-leaning (anti-harassment anti-GamerGate) figures like Randi Lee Harper, who tweeted her disgust that the company had not taken actions to thwart a hashtag "that mocks those suffering from PTSD." 

As a private company, Twitter can promote or prohibit the hashtag as it sees fit. 

But here's the key thing: Users who don't want to participate in #TheTriggering don't have to. No one is forcing them to read triggering tweets. In fact, it's fully possible to mute specific Twitter hashtags. PTSD sufferers can and should use the feature. 

Given that, perhaps cutural warriors can declare a Twitter truce?

Related: "Did Twitter's Orwellian Trust and Safety Council Get Robert Stacy McCain Banned?"

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NEXT: Department of Pre-Crime Is Becoming a Reality

Robby Soave is a senior editor at Reason.

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  1. jarflax   9 years ago

    Just knowing that someone out there doesn't Rightthink is triggering.

  2. __Warren__   9 years ago

    It's amazing easy to not see tweets. There's this one weird trick!

  3. But Enough About Me   9 years ago

    Truce? What? Act like *adults*?

    The Hell you say.

  4. AlmightyJB   9 years ago

    What's twitter?

    1. Agammamon   9 years ago

      Its like that TV you don't own.

  5. Irish Breaks Up W/ ESB   9 years ago

    Lauren Southern jokingly makes fun of leftists on twitter.

    Leftists assault Lauren Southern by hitting her in the face with bottles of urine.

    Strangely, these leftists who claim to care about people not being harassed and abused didn't much give a shit about that.

    Then leftists claim their PTSD is being triggered because of mean things on the internet. Fuck them. I hope they cry until they die of dehydration.

    1. Rich   9 years ago

      That's, um, not funny, correct?

      1. Sigivald   9 years ago

        I dunno, suggesting they cry until they die of dehydration is a little funny, if only because it's not possible, no matter what Johnny Cash says.

        Hitting people in the face with anything, let alone bottles of urine, no, not so funny.

    2. Lee G   9 years ago

      Didn't you know that words are violence?

      1. __Warren__   9 years ago

        Rapeseed.

        1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer   9 years ago

          /Homer scream.

        2. SIV   9 years ago

          Grab its motherfucking vegan mayo.

      2. Tman   9 years ago

        Jonathan: Jack, you're a grown man. You're in control of your own words.

        Jack: You're goddamn right I am. Now here come two words for you: Shut the f*** up.

      3. Ted S.   9 years ago

        They break the silence
        Come crashing in
        Into my little world

        1. Jimbo   9 years ago

          Why don't you finish it? Because it's painful to me, pierce right through me. Can't you understand?!

          1. sloopyinTEXAS   9 years ago

            Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me.

    3. jarflax   9 years ago

      Doesn't there have to be a trauma to cause a person to develop PTSD? How the hell are the pampered prima donnas of the left suffering a disorder found in combat vets and survivors of violence?

      1. Lee G   9 years ago

        If you alter the meaning of the word violence enough, we're all victims.

        Oh wait, I'm sorry. Everyone except for straight white dudes are victims.

        1. DenverJ   9 years ago

          But, but, I'm a straight white dude!

          1. Derp-o-Matic 5000   9 years ago

            Then you're guilty for all the sins of the world, past and present.

            1. Tommy_Grand   9 years ago

              no, straight white males are not guilty for *all* the sins...Christianity deserves at least some blame.

              1. CZmacure   9 years ago

                I hear the Mongols were super nice to women, like all "People of Color" are.

                Also they could dance wicked good.

      2. Raven Nation   9 years ago

        If you want to search thru Reason there's a video of the woman who got one of the first trigger requirements put into college syllabi (Occidental maybe?). Her argument was that she did for those students at her university who were suffering from genuine PTSD such as military service, rape, etc.

        1. HazelMeade   9 years ago

          And them some PC idiot took it and ran with it.... and ran , and ran, and ran and ran ...

      3. Zeb   9 years ago

        They aren't. The assholes who feel like they need trigger warnings for everything are assholes making light of a serious psychological problem that some people have so they can feel important and powerful. Fuck them.

      4. HazelMeade   9 years ago

        WHO ARE YOU TO DEFINE WHAT PTSD MEANS, YOU WHITE RACIST SHITLORD?

      5. Migrant Log Chipper   9 years ago

        If you actually have PTSD I doubt twitter is your social media of choice.

        I'm pulling for the market to put this venue for preening nitwits to death (yeah Reason people), it's too stupid and I'd guess it's on life support. People that think they are important hang around there...most of us not so much.

        Can you say Myspace..

    4. MJGreen - Docile Citizen   9 years ago

      She claims it was urine.

    5. Cytotoxic   9 years ago

      She's great. Too bad she's employed at The Rebel. Exposure to another one of Ezra's failed projects will be worse for her than urine.

    6. SIV   9 years ago

      "The right does it too"

      /reason

      1. Zeb   9 years ago

        That's some nice trolling.

        1. HeteroPatriarch   9 years ago

          Single Issue Voter's single issue? Trolling. He's for it.

          1. Trigger Warning   9 years ago

            I thought it was cockfighting.

          2. CZmacure   9 years ago

            Single Issue Voter? I thought his nick was Simian Immunodeficiency Virus!

    7. HeteroPatriarch   9 years ago

      Never heard of her, but she kind of makes me wish I wasn't married.

    8. MarkLastname   9 years ago

      No, see, that wasn't violence. When wrong-thinking people use speech, it's violence, and they must be suppressed. When right-thinking people use violence, it's speech, and it must be encourage.

  6. Rich   9 years ago

    tweeted her disgust that the company had not taken actions to thwart a hashtag "that mocks those suffering from PTSD."

    Would someone *kindly* tweet my disgust that the company has not taken actions to thwart the term "hashtag", which mocks those suffering from PTSD?

  7. Pan Zagloba   9 years ago

    (anti-harassment anti-GamerGate) figures like Randi Lee Harper

    She's one of those things. Not both. Fucking hell, Robby, can you not give vile fuckers like her a benefit of the doubt?

    Or at least call Lauren Southern "pro-liberty" or someshit? You know she was a Libertarian Party candidate up here? Which granted, led to its own shit show...

    1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer   9 years ago

      Canadians are functionally retarded when it comes to grasping basic libertarian principles.

      1. Pan Zagloba   9 years ago

        Canadian Libertarian Party is functionally retarded etc.

        Seriously, they de-selected her because SJWs - people who think Libertarian is an insult - complained. Then begrudgingly re-instated her when their own party members complained. And still were shitty about it!

        1. Irish Breaks Up W/ ESB   9 years ago

          Can't find it now, but when she was temporarily booted from the Canadian LP, a girlfriend of one of the high ranking guys in the LP mockingly said 'a bunch of dudebros just lost their masturbation fodder.'

          I love Lauren Southern. Anyone who makes leftists go that batshit while actually being pretty inoffensive is a classy human being.

          1. Lee G   9 years ago

            Anybody who uses the term dudebros in a serious manner deserves to be mocked

            1. Chipwooder   9 years ago

              I was going to say "deserves to be punched in the face", but tomato, tomahto and all that

            2. Trigger Warning   9 years ago

              I use "dudebro" as a derogatory term, as in Call of Dudebro.

          2. DenverJ   9 years ago

            Time for another name change, Irish? Irish ? LS, maybe?

        2. Sigivald   9 years ago

          Hmm.

          Is it possible to have a Libertarian Party that isn't a joke?

          I mean, the Canadian one seems to be.

          The American one is, if in a different way.

          Is it just "small minority party" factors, or is there something about the sort of people who are both libertarian and want to do party politics that selects for being a clownshow?

          1. cavalier973   9 years ago

            Not as long as libertarians support abortion and same-sex marriage. They totally fail the "Non-aggression Principle test" on those two issues. Also, they are too brain-addled from smoking marijuana to make any cogent arguments. Godless, brain-damaged libertines lying in opium dens is no basis for a system of government.

            #TheTriggering

      2. Cytotoxic   9 years ago

        So we are just like the Americans!

    2. Irish Breaks Up W/ ESB   9 years ago

      Some wonderful evidence of Randi Harper's anti-harassment bonafides

      More kind words from Randi Harper

      I don't give a shit because people are always going to talk shit on the internet. The issue is that these authoritarian scumbags use their supposed opposition to 'harassment' to silence political opponents while engaging in the very rhetoric they pretend is 'toxic.'

      1. SIV   9 years ago

        It's a shame Popehat booted Clarkhat so they could make room for Randi Lee Harper. Although Harper does take up a lot of room.

      2. Sigivald   9 years ago

        Nothing says sensitivity to others like "go set yourself on fire, Indian man" as a response. Or "dick for brains", yeah.

        I mean, I get "yes, you're oppressed too, but don't speak for my identity, 'cause it ain't yours", even as someone who can't stand identity politics.

        But you lose a lot of sympathy when your response to the Oppressed other is "commit suicide [in a culturally biased way, no less]!!" whenever someone disagrees.

        (TRWTF is self-identifying as a FreeBSD user in this day and age.

        At least if it was OpenBSD it'd be comprehensible, but FreeBSD, FFS?)

        1. MarkLastname   9 years ago

          Wtf is BSD?

          1. UnCivilServant   9 years ago

            The current Mac OS without the pretty frontend.

  8. MJGreen - Docile Citizen   9 years ago

    Christ, are people still talking about fucking Gamergate?

    1. Crusty Juggler   9 years ago

      THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE OF OUR TIME

    2. Zeb   9 years ago

      I still have no idea why or what it is.

      1. jarflax   9 years ago

        Whiny guy got cheated on by obnoxious girl. Whiny guy whined online. Girl slept with game reviewer who gave her very bad game a good review. Gamers got mad half at girls half at dishonest reviewers. Many lies were told about threats. Many threats were made about lies. Butthurt was.

        1. jarflax   9 years ago

          ^Gamergate

        2. Acosmist   9 years ago

          Not...at all, but ok.

          First they came for the gamers...

          1. jarflax   9 years ago

            If I read you correctly you may have missed what I meant by

            "Many lies were told about threats." the SJWs were clearly far and away in the wrong in the discussions. But I stick by my claim that the triggering issue was 2 awful people being awful to each other. And dishonest game reviewers getting payola, or should I say layola, is not terribly important

            1. Bubba Jones   9 years ago

              Sounds like the problem is that gamers don't have actual friends they can ask about games?

        3. JeremyR   9 years ago

          It's more than that. These days it's also about censoring games and/or simply not bringing them over from Japan because they are "problematic" according to SJWs.

        4. CZmacure   9 years ago

          You forgot a huge does of reddit censorship/Striesand effect.

  9. Rich   9 years ago

    Penguin swims 5,000 MILES every year to visit man who nursed it back to life

    Wow.

    1. The Last American Hero   9 years ago

      Score one more for the patriarchy! You don't see penguins swimming that far to hang out with some woman.

    2. Irish Breaks Up W/ ESB   9 years ago

      That is the cutest thing I've ever seen.

      1. grrizzly   9 years ago

        I read about it probably a year ago. So the penguin returned once again.

    3. Lee G   9 years ago

      The penguin probably just likes shitting on his lawn

      1. Rich   9 years ago

        😎

      2. R C Dean   9 years ago

        Whoa. Sandy is a penguin?

    4. Sevens   9 years ago

      Love that.

    5. HeteroPatriarch   9 years ago

      Now, Dindim spends eight months of the year with Mr de Souza and spends the rest of his time breeding off the coast of Argentina and Chile.

      Win-win.

    6. lap83   9 years ago

      How do they know it's the same penguin each time? Pretty good scam they've got going

      But seriously, cute story

  10. Fist of Etiquette   9 years ago

    Users who don't want to participate in #TheTriggering don't have to.

    I don't know what you mean by this.

  11. Lee G   9 years ago

    #gamergatematters

  12. Cytotoxic   9 years ago

    OT: I have been busy lately and less able to post here. Sorry. Jesus Christ the Hit&Runpublicans; have lost any shred of dignity or rationality. Holy fuck this is embarassing. These are the most thin-skinned, whiny assholes on the planet. "Wah why don't you criticize Hillary like Twump? LEAVE TWUMP ALOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEE!!"

    1. MetalBard   9 years ago

      Trump! Trump! Trump! Trump! Trump!

  13. MJGreen - Docile Citizen   9 years ago

    Ha-ha: Mizzou Protests Lead to Plunge In Freshmen, Massive Budget Deficits

    Dear university community,

    I am writing to you today to confirm that we project a very significant budget shortfall due to an unexpected sharp decline in first-year enrollments and student retention this coming fall. I wish I had better news.

    The anticipated declines? - which total about 1,500 fewer students than current enrollment at MU -?? in addition to a small number of necessary investments are expected to leave us with an approximate $32 million budget gap for next year. A smaller entering freshman class will have continuing impact on finances as they progress toward their degrees at MU...

    1. Lee G   9 years ago

      Sometimes the market works.

      However I expect them to learn nothing from this.

    2. SusanM   9 years ago

      I'm not sure that there's a firm enough connection to make that assertion. Or, even if there is a connection, whose side of the issue is not now attending Mizzou.

      1. Illocust   9 years ago

        Doesn't matter which side isn't attending. There was nothing the college could do to appease the protesters, so the only option available to them is to make sure such a protest doesn't occur again. No protest, no national media coverage, both sides continue not to think about your college in negative terms.

    3. Scarecrow & WoodChipper Repair   9 years ago

      Almost like they just might one day begin to comprehend consequences.

    4. Suthenboy   9 years ago

      I am wondering if the useful idiots there will protest and denigrate the people not enrolling and thus cause enrollment to drop even further.

    5. HeteroPatriarch   9 years ago

      Oh, no! They might have to shut down the lazy river!

  14. GILMORE?   9 years ago

    ""an anti-feminist activist""

    I thought it was "Free-Speech Supporter"

    1. Pan Zagloba   9 years ago

      You can't be both!

  15. Heroic Mulatto   9 years ago

    But dogs don't use Twitter.

  16. Crusty Juggler   9 years ago

    Finally, my outrage has been satiated.

    1. Lee G   9 years ago

      I didn't know Roseanne Barry finally won a beauty contest.

  17. Tak Kak   9 years ago

    "Given that, perhaps cutural warriors can declare a Twitter truce?"

    Don't "right wingers" have a bigger issue with the Twitter administration?

  18. The Immaculate Trouser   9 years ago

    PTSD sufferers can and should use the feature

    Give me a fucking break.

    I will pay if anyone can find any non-lunatic, non-leftist people who are genuinely "triggered" by anything that #TheTriggering provokes.

    Jesus, Robby. If people want to tune out of political debates I don't blame them, but it's a complete fucking farce to suggest that any of these people are suffering from actual PTSD rather than an overinflated case of Special Snowflake Syndrome.

    1. Heroic Mulatto   9 years ago

      I will pay if anyone can find any non-lunatic, non-leftist people who are genuinely "triggered" by anything that #TheTriggering provokes.

      Is that an offer of employment?

      1. Lee G   9 years ago

        If it is, he better obey all the EEOC rules.

      2. The Immaculate Trouser   9 years ago

        It's a job that can earn you up to the tens in Zimbabwean dollars, good sir.

        I hope I didn't trigger any victims of inflation just now.

        1. Heroic Mulatto   9 years ago

          Hmm...considering I'd do it for free...SOLD!

          1. Lee G   9 years ago

            The sound you just heard was HM being added to the BOLS's fully employed metric

    2. 0x90   9 years ago

      There's a name for when you diminish the legitimate experience of others, by claiming for yourself, labels which previously applied only to them. If I could only think what it was, and who generally tends to use it...

      1. sloopyinTEXAS   9 years ago

        Faggotry?

      2. Bubba Jones   9 years ago

        Stolen valor?

    3. Sigivald   9 years ago

      I think he was suggesting that anyone who actually has PTSD related to any related topic should use the ignore feature.

      Not that all of these fainting-salts types are actually suffering from PTSD.

  19. SusanM   9 years ago

    OT: RedPillers everywhere weep softly:

    http://variety.com/2016/film/n.....201725853/

    The second Wachowski sibling of "The Matrix" trilogy has come out as a transgender woman, with Andy Wachowski, now going by the name Lilly, making an announcement on Tuesday.

    Lilly's sister and directing partner, Lana, came out as transgender years ago. In a statement to Windy City News, Lilly said she was at risk of being outed by the media.

    1. Lee G   9 years ago

      Wake me when they make a decent movie other than the original Matrix

      1. lap83   9 years ago

        seriously...what an overrated piece of crap

      2. HazelMeade   9 years ago

        Agreed.

    2. HazelMeade   9 years ago

      Does that mean they can start calling themselves the "Wachowski Sisters" now?

  20. Social Contractor   9 years ago

    One side is engaging in censorship and the other speech. They should just call a truce and move on because those are the pretty much the same.

  21. Dv   9 years ago

    Short but to the point. Good article. Both sides of this are so ridiculously stupid.

  22. DenverJ   9 years ago

    Damnit! It's 541 and I still haven't had a drink!

    1. Zeb   9 years ago

      How do you think I feel? It's 7:48 and I just opened my first beer.

  23. GILMORE?   9 years ago

    " a profound disappointment to left-leaning (anti-harassment anti-GamerGate) figures like Randi Lee Harper"

    her actual claim to fame is the perpetuation of auto-blocklists that have included people like your own co-writers

    1. Pan Zagloba   9 years ago

      Hey, it was just Cathy Young. She was pro-Gamergate from the start, which I think makes her views abhorrent or something. And ENB? She can't write a non-triggering post. Just look at the comments...

  24. jarflax   9 years ago

    Maybe they could try actually engaging ideas they dislike and, I dunno call me crazy, debating?

  25. buybuydandavis   9 years ago

    It's a day for right-leaning social media provocateurs to post deliberately offensive things on Twitter in the purported name of free speech.

    The SJW is strong with this one.

    Not deliberately offensive, deliberately triggering to totalitarian scum who would silence the truth.

  26. HazelMeade   9 years ago

    What, no long thread of funny triggering things that have been said on Twitter?

  27. HazelMeade   9 years ago

    Here's a good one:

    I call this piece "gay Muhammed kissing Thor in front of a confederate flag" #TheTriggering pic.twitter.com/bYWSxx9XHP

    ? Lauren Southern (@Lauren_Southern) March 9, 2016

    [removed][removed]

  28. HazelMeade   9 years ago

    Ok, now my real comment....

    In order for there to be a "truce" someone has to fight back hard enough to make the SJWs stop their advance.

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