A trigger warning is a world away from an outright ban of “offensive material” – but it is still a step down that road, writes Scott Begbie.
True confession time… I’ve never read Peter Pan, and now it looks as if I never will.
JM Barrie’s classic has been slapped with a trigger warning by Aberdeen University, so I had better steer clear.
I would be shocked – shocked, I tell you – if I were to find a book written by a middle-class Edwardian had “odd perspectives on gender”. And goodness knows what I would make of all those stereotypes of “Red Indians”, and that overarching sense of Empire and entitlement that might – or might not, since I haven’t read it – leap off the page at me.
Nope, I’ll just stick to the Disney film version of Peter Pan, with its portrayal of… Oh, wait a minute.
Maybe I should leave Neverland to its own nefarious devices and retreat back into those safer books I devoured as a kid.
Ah, Enid Blyton, my eternal refuge of innocent childhood, where there isn’t an ounce of racist xenophobia to be found. Well, apart from…
Whoops. OK. Biggles. Can we do Biggles the pilot, and his tales of derring-do against the dastardly… Oh, and there’s another word I won’t be using. Oops. Sorry.
Treasure Island, then? Surely Robert Louis Stevenson’s swashbuckling pirate yarn is a safe haven? Ah, it’s on the trigger warning list from Aberdeen University, right there with The Railway Children and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
Sheesh, I think I’m just going to have to stay on safer ground. After all, it’s been a while since I read American Psycho.
Shifting views over time brought us to where we are now
Joking aside, the proliferation of books, films and even TV shows being smacked down for “distressing themes” is a modern phenomenon that should carry its own trigger warning.
Of course, classic – and not-so-classic – tomes will contain the views and attitudes that prevailed at the time they were written. And, of course, much of the world view of bygone eras will be an absolute anathema to the way we think today, chock-full of what we see as misogynistic, racist and outright vile.
We can’t just wave a hand and dismiss our collective cultural memory because it might be upsetting
But, they will also contain the elements that made them classics in the first place. That sense of magic and adventure that sparked young imaginations. The feeling of wonder that gave generations the idea of making the world a better place, and striving towards that.
And more than a fair few of the stories from yesteryear were challenging the concepts of the times, leading to the shift in attitudes that have brought us to where we are.
Books are part of our history – good and bad
We can’t just wave a hand and dismiss our collective cultural memory because it might be upsetting.
To be fair, a trigger warning is a world away from an outright ban of “offensive material”. But it is still a step down that road, and should be taken with extreme caution.
This material is part of our history, a record of how people thought – good or bad – and a benchmark of how far we have come.
And it stands as a warning not to let the offensive and downright dangerous creep into society again. Denying it ever existed leaves the door open for evil to slink back, unnoticed.
Scott Begbie is entertainment editor for The Press & Journal and Evening Express
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