to wonder why people invest in threads titled 'sad. Sorry - long, or triggering'

[ElizabethHoover]

WHY would you want to post on a thread advertised already as SAD?
CHrist alive

SOMEONE does though.

A kind person

Lighthearted
+
Trigger
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No paragraphs
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No full stops
+
Textspeak

I win the internet

No caps, Biwi?

Huh! You've got them in your name!

Often I detect a distinct vein of voyeurism and the savoring of others misfortunes
Waiting gleefully to see what will happen next
Pleas for the OP to update ?

i think 'triggering' is twee and patronising always have,...

Oh yes! Forgot the caps.

Also, usually misspelling things, like 'rediculous'

... and councilling

I don't know really what the point is of putting triggering with no clue as to what it might be. Everything's triggering to someone.

Exactly! There are all sort of things that you could argue are 'triggering' for one person or another (personally I detest the phrase and I really hate the way it pervades MN now) but in order to know whether it might trigger you or not you have to open it and read it, which is a bit fucking stupid really. Putting the subject matter (rape, miscarriage, whatever) in the post title is perfectly sufficient that anyone who isn't feeling emotionally robust enough to read about someone else's experience can just choose to give the thread a wide berth without the need to resort to any psychobabbly catchphrases.

And halt the time these supposedly 'triggering' threads aren't even especially graphic or harrowing in their actual content - they just make reference to a subject matter that is already widely acknowledged as being very upsetting. It's all a bit patronising to be told in advance that you might be 'triggered' if you've already experienced that specific brand of trauma.

half the time, not halt!

Yes, it's when the voyeurism is thinly veiled as concern.

Theres a lot of really great supportive posters on the site, but sometimes it's blatantly obvious people are only checking in for the next update in someone's personal catastrophe.

I don't mind long so long as it's interesting, relevant, lucid and properly punctuated.

Can't be arsed with some drunken bint's 3am rambling stream of consciousness that make no sense whatsoever and hurt my brain.

But surely, the "Sad" entitled threads just let you know which not to open?

It's doing us a service!

Ah, now see you've gone too far, taking the piss out of the emetophobes.

Goodbye.

I also intensely dislike hand holding, although I myself have held someone's hand quite supportively tonight in fact, so i'm not all about the cat's bum face, clearly.

I hate the open letters too. Aaargghhh can't stand 'em. There is one long running one somewhere from some terrible budding writer who is going through er…something (don't want to be accused of identifying her too obviously) and she writes each post/update like it's a great long diary entry but always addressed to 'him' and talking about 'him' and telling 'him' what he did/said on a specific day in enormous detail when he already bloody knows, because he was there.

It's like 'You walked into the room on that fateful Tuesday afternoon and you were wearing that blue shirt your mother bought you for Christmas, the one I always hated…etc' and it just makes me want to gouge my eyes out with embarrassment on her behalf.

oh cringey

I know that the 'correct' response to this thread is to roll about larfing but I don't feel like that today. I feel like saying fuck off OP tbh and that's because yes occasionally there are emotional vampires and yes occasionally there are wind up merchants and outright fantasists. But mostly there are people having a shit time and somebody giving them a few kind words can make a lot of difference.

There are threads on the board atm which have the sort of phrases which this thread is rubbishing and the end result of this is likely to be some perfectly decent people feeling got at. That doesn't float my boat.

its just the way some posters express themselves. Some are genuinely looking to reach out for a bit of advice and compassion.

are you trying to tell us that this thread is triggering for you Northernlurker?

What I really dislike is when someone posts something and then puts "non?" after their sentence.

yeah but, c'est la vie!
non?

Thank you Mintyy. I'm one of those there emetophobes and it's pretty crappy. I am proud however to report that I've been on a post natal thread daily for two years and barely a day passes without vom being mentioned in one way or another and I cope. Sick mentions on threads I deal with. Being told I'm a waste of space less so Goodbye also.

No I'm telling you that this thread is potentially hurtful for people who don't need more hurt. Sorry not very amusing I know.

I had never heard of emetophobia until I started on MN, a bazillion years ago.

It's an education, I tell ya.

Anyway - triggering and lighthearted are overused on here, these days.

Although I'd quite like a 'Triggering - lamentable grammar herein' on some threads.

I appreciate a warning if a thread is long. I sometimes open a thread with a sad title and then have to click away because I don't have the time or headspace to take it all in at that moment. But at other times I feel like I do have time and headspace to spare so I will purposefully click on a thread.

Sometimes people think a thread is long when it isn't, though, so it's confusing.

Again it's nice to be warned if the subject matter is heavy because I think reading something upsetting or emotional can be a bit of a mental shock or jolt and can put you in a weird mood for the rest of the day. Very occasionally threads I've read on here have stayed with me for a long, long time.

General trigger warnings should be used for sexual abuse content only. Otherwise if you want to put a trigger warning, say what it's for.