Did you learn nothing the last time you were comment banned?
Looks like trolls don't understand how rules work. Perhaps you can use this time to scrutinize our rules and raise your IQ level during your one month comment ban.
@Teasday
Yea, we're talking way past each other and I still don't think we've ever been on the same page.
My original comment, that you responded to and said was irrelevant, wasn't a response to the general conversation, but the original post and the sentiments it echoed. You said that my pointing out his suggestion's goal is based a concept proven to be "bad" is off topic or not necessary to this discussion. I said it wasn't off topic. And from there I've been trying to clarify that and why I think that's relevant, but it seems we've drifted further apart on what we're talking to each other about. It basically boils down to me saying I disagree with his suggestion, and explaining why and you thinking the "why" is not relevant.
A user asked for a like/dislike system, you and several commentors shot it down because it encourages popularity hunting comments, it leads to the formation of cliques, and you specifically mentioned that you'd argue it is unhealthy.
This guy is asking for Trigger Warnings, I said it's a bad idea because trigger warnings are proven to be unhealthy and are bad system for dealing with or avoiding trauma, which is the goal of this suggestion - they have either no effect or negative effect and that's why I said it was a bad idea.
I think this is a 1 to 1 comparison, both ideas were shot down because they're unhealthy, and ineffective. Like/Dislike systems are rejected because they're bad at encouraging conversations, and have negative effects such as cliques, and unhealthy effects on individuals. Trigger Warnings are bad because they don't reduce trauma or anxiety, and are ineffective at helping people avoid things that trigger them, and have negative long term affects on health, just like like/dislike systems.
If what I have said, my original comment as a response to the OP, is off topic or irrelevant, so is your comment in that thread.
I wasn't petitioning you to reject the idea, or do anything, I was just responding to OP's post. If you're angry, I'm sorry, but I'm just trying to get us on the same page. As far as I can tell, we're either talking about two separate things, or disagree on what constitutes relevance, or both. II'll give up at this point unless you care about us getting on the same page, because I really think we are not even close to communicating.
@Yautja Well now that I read your essay I gotta admit that I agree with you. The thing that I'm supporting here are more tags so that I can expect how dark a series is going to get, not the trigger warnings themselves.
Well except for this
And Baka Updates is right there, every single time, with a more comprehensive list of content than MD could reasonably reach. It's a pointless reinvention of the wheel and or ineffective and or a semantic error.
We're not here to copy Baka Updates tags, we're making MangaDex tags. The point of tags is to see them here in MD not BU. A casual reader does not need to do extensive research reading multiple reviews from multiple sites, only one and that's if they care to do so.
I actually like this. It's stands out less compared to "physical violence" or "psychological abuse" since those tags are wordy. Not sure about the humiliation one but "abuse" is more compact than "physical violence" and "torture" would help me not read the manga in public so those two get a +1 from me.
While this study and discussion is interesting I fear we're veering off-topic a bit so I'll leave it alone after this post.
a) all the studies mentioned by Jones et. al. have used more or less the same methodology (e.g. requiring subjects to read passages) mostly in order to test the effect of trigger warnings in educational environments, which do not really apply here.
b) in regards to avoiding trauma being harmful the key part seems to be when subjects view their trauma as "a core part of their identity". The only source cited that suggests a direct link between trigger warnings and trauma becoming core to one's identity (McNally 2016) is a New York Times editorial that is no longer accessible so I can't really speak to it.
c) this study puts many asterisks with any results that would suggest explicit harm caused by trigger warnings as "the size of the effects were small and have not yet been rigorously tested across multiple studies." Additionally, the trigger warning they use in their research is significantly more invasive than the current Content Warning system.
d) it does not take into effect that, when blacklisted on this site, such content will not even appear, including their tags, and so will significantly reduce any friction. You just set it and forget it, as they say.
e) happy to discuss this or other studies further but it'd probably be better to move it to a different thread.
Much more importantly though is that
...avoiding "triggering content" is not the same thing as avoiding things you dislike. One is unhealthy, the other is preference.
These are both achieved through the same means though, and the latter will end up to be the vast majority of use-cases.
This is also why looking at Manga-Updates is not really a solution here, as you cannot blacklist something on M-U so that it won't show up on MD. They are two different sites where the tagging system has differing functions.
Lastly, I was not referring to the cat- or dog-death tags and more in line of differentiating between "Physical violence"/"Gore". Seeing as there is already precedent with the Ecchi and Smut tags, it's not a bad idea to differentiate between different degrees of the same concept/type of content.
After four months I think I already have a pretty good idea about what the local 'community' is (and if I didnt, I can always treat this thread as something of a biomarker), but I was referring specifically to statements made by staff.
Leaving all the matter of the whole should-we-warn-from-triggers debate (see my edit for that) - this is for me now about which tags to add, for whatever reason, be it because I do not wish to read it because there's a trigger or because I just don't want to read it. Is that okay? Can we all just do that? I'm a bit sick of the trigger wars. They sort of triggered emotions. And bans.
New tags suggested were: (And please tag me if I missed something, I'll add it, I've just been skimming this site for now I fear)
Extreme Humiliation, Extreme Abuse tag or Torture tags
--> Psychological Abuse can be way more subtile, as the manga Colorful Recipe shows. It would just at some times count as extreme Humiliation, although the whole "relationship" is brutally manipulative. It would count as Mindbreak more than Extreme Humiliation, but Psychological Abuse would fit best.
Torture I give a +1, that one is a great idea, it would be a totally valid tag for some stuff I read about here, would include the genital kicking bit (still making me gringe!)
So I'd suggest the tags "Psychological Abuse" (Mindbreak as an alternative could be misleading, so while wordy, psychological abuse may be better), "Torture", "Child Abuse" or something equivalent to it, because as I said before, you almost never see children abused graphically, but it's always implied in nasty ways. Not everyone wants to read that. Especially if it's kids.
I still vote for "drug abuse" for completeness sake, to complete the whole bundle, even if it might not be used all that often.
These tags would cover mental stuff, violence without the blood, child stuff and possibly drugs. Any additions or comments to these tags?
Edit: @Yautja
Why does everyone comment on dead pets? I never mentioned them. If you are triggered by such things, you really should go to therapy.
Also, I really like that statement:
Whether or not we should add more tags or more specific tags gets into a clutter argument, something which I'm not interested in as of yet because of how fucking long this comment is and since we're not on the same page as of yet. And I want to make it clear, avoiding "triggering content" is not the same thing as avoiding things you dislike. One is unhealthy, the other is preference.
As for disregarding your study, you are right, I shouldn't have simply done that. But I'm used to studys having flaws, and I'm sceptical unless I've seen a couple that have a solid ground. There was a study that promoted (MILK) chocolate as healthy, for goodness' sake, and it was absolutely fake and people still quoted it everywhere! EVEN a couple of serious news sites.
There are also so many studys quoted out of context or that are themselves very flawed. If you take the thesis for example, that video games make people violent (and cause people to kill people), there's about half that say, yes they do, and half that say that's bullshit.
So yes, I'll likely question a single study for a field that's as complex as the human mind. Multiple studys however? Those I'll take a very interested closer look at.
At this point, I want to really thank you for discussing this properly. You are trying to make a point and to convince others, using proper facts and arguments. if more people would comment like you, this community would be way more awesome!
And now please excuse me, I need to read up on those studys...
My original comment, that you responded to and said was irrelevant, wasn't a response to the general conversation, but the original post and the sentiments it echoed.
Yes, and at this point responding to the general sentiment is irrelevant and off-topic, because we're in the suggestions forum discussing what tags should be added, not debating the merits of trigger warnings.
A user asked for a like/dislike system, you and several commentors shot it down because it encourages popularity hunting comments, it leads to the formation of cliques, and you specifically mentioned that you'd argue it is unhealthy.
This guy is asking for Trigger Warnings, I said it's a bad idea because trigger warnings are proven to be unhealthy and are bad system for dealing with or avoiding trauma, which is the goal of this suggestion - they have either no effect or negative effect and that's why I said it was a bad idea.
The difference here is that we have already implemented the system for these "trigger warnings" and that there are reasons to have them that have absolutely nothing to do with dealing with and avoiding trauma. That's what I've been trying to say with the comparisons to Yaoi and Isekai. The effectiveness of the tags in dealing with triggers is not relevant to the consideration of whether or not to add them, because simple personal preference is already a reason good enough with the types of tags we're discussing. There are reasons to avoid them, there are reasons to seek them out.
Incidentally, when @crazybars said "it's not our place to police people and tell them what's "SAFE" and what's "NOT SAFE" for them" he's completely right, although the sentiment is ironically the opposite of the intended one. Even if we were to decide right here and now that leaving certain content warning tags out is 100% safe for people who would rather not see that certain content, it's not our place to force that decision on them. That does open a can of worms about "well what tags shouldn't we keep in then" but at the same time we're trying to have a usable website here.
I wasn't petitioning you to reject the idea, or do anything, I was just responding to OP's post. If you're angry, I'm sorry, but I'm just trying to get us on the same page. As far as I can tell, we're either talking about two separate things, or disagree on what constitutes relevance, or both. II'll give up at this point unless you care about us getting on the same page, because I really think we are not even close to communicating.
I may be getting a bit frustrated but you're not going to make me angry unless you're specifically trying, don't worry about it. I have a long fuse.
If you want to keep arguing this point then let me know why, for example, I who have no triggers I can think of should not be allowed to filter out a tag called Substance Abuse or Physical Abuse just because I'm not necessarily a big fan of hentai where girls get drugged against their will or beaten up. Based on what you've posted so far, it would seem like your argument would be "because trigger warnings are unhealthy", which seems like a non-sequitur to me. I don't expect you to actually make this specific argument, but it's why I've been telling you it's irrelevant.
@AbyssalMonkey
there's a ton of revenge/betrayal/softcore porn that's deserving of these tags, too, not just hentai. But I agree with some of your concerns over the tags you mentioned (extreme abuse is too general, f.e.), but frankly, while torture is specific, I can think of a couple mangas that deserve that tag...
Which makes me wonder: The examples I can think of which would count as physical abuse are usually that because it's long, brutal violence, intending to hurt/break a person. Which qualifies it as torture, in a way. Though, let's take a domestic violence situation as an example: Isn't that a lesser form of torture, too? But it's not the torture people would think of when they hear the word.
I might be overthinking this, however.
This thread has turned into a nightmare. Holy shit.
I disagree. Ecchi and smut both means "sexually appealing" but ecchi is softcore compared to smut. As someone said, I forgot who I think it was Teasday maybe, "we need different intensities to be different tags" or something to that effect.
Here are the tags I propose: Physical violence Torture Psychological abuse Child abuse Substance abuse (this way we can include alcohol)
(Extreme humiliation still feels way too niche for me. Plus a character probably need to be emotionally manipulated first to be extremely humiliated anyway so that could count as psychological abuse.)
Btw what do you guys think of "bullying"? I just thought about A Silent Voice. Is it too light and specific?
It's a single click, and if we're going beyond what @crazybars suggested tag wise, that single click makes far more sense than implementing a myriad of tags. But that's something I'd actually agree belongs on another thread because that isn't about trigger warnings, but comprehensive tagging. Ironically, I'd say that people taking this thread to mean more tags are the ones off topic considering the actual nature of what a trigger warning is.
There isn't a great deal of methodologies to study trigger warnings considering the incredibly fine domain of them. You can either check if they prevent or ease anxiety by doing as the studies did, or check of they help avoid "triggering" content, something a few of the studies tried and more of the articles address.
Considering I didn't link a NYT article, I'm not really sure what you're talking about. And that's not at only the only way avoidance is harmful, certainly not the only way in the articles I've listed.
It's almost like a trigger warning is not the same thing as a content / genre tag. And "this" study is now three studies, so you'll have to be more specific.
That falls into the avoidance point, and is not unlike social bubbles on Twitter. The 50 wild hogs meme comes to mind.
But the effects are massively different. That's why I'm rejecting trigger warnings and not adverse to more tags even though I think they're unnecessary, and specified the difference. I understand how little difference you may feel there is, and how people could use them achieve the same thing, but it's a semantic line I do not want to give up.
"Physical Violence", an incredibly vague term if I've ever seen one. At least the other guy mentioned "extreme". What qualifies? Attack on Titan? BnHA? How bout Nagatoro? All have violence of some sort. This is why a lot of people are against such generic "trigger warning-esque" descriptors. Someone even complained about gore being misused. And in the context of "trigger warnings" almost anything could be classified as that.
@Vofuro
Anyone who needs trigger warnings should be in therapy.
Well good for you, I've listed two more and half dozen articles. Or maybe people misrepresented or misunderstood an article / study. And comparing psychology studies to food articles, or using examples of shit studies to dismiss all studies is horribly fallacious. What your dismissal boils down to is some people lying and you using that as an excuse to ignore everything you don't like and to be beyond lazily skeptical. Somehow I doubt you'd be dismissing these studies if they supported you, as almost all people do. Especially since you took some random commentor at his word who, IMO, likely hadn't even read the study and just threw out half-assed criticisms of methods not practiced.
@Teasday
Then we simply disagree. I do not see how responding to the initial post is off topic. Especially not when the crux, "trigger warnings", was still being echoed. Semantics are extremely important, and asking for trigger warnings vs more tags is a very, very different thing, and that's why I think squashing that is extremely relevant, because even up until this point, people are asking for or using the word "trigger warning". Only one person so far seems to have understood the difference.
Oh, no you haven't. What you guys have is content tags. A trigger warning is far different, and OP and I specified that. He asked for a flag of sorts indicating that something is triggering.I understand that is rejected. Like something literally saying "trigger warning". I think this part boils down to you and I having very different definitions of what constitutes a trigger warning. A trigger warning is a far more sensitive version of the classic "view discretion is advised" sort of thing that is played before a cartoon. It'd be a flag next a manga or chapter indicating something is potentially triggering. I said not to bother with them because they'd not only be ineffective for those who seek to avoid being triggered, but anyone who would use them.
And I agree, and that's one reason why I said OP's idea is bad. I mentioned what's triggering to be highly subjective. But again, this boils down to an incredibly important semantic issue, giving people more tags so that they may use them to avoid things they dislike is very much different than giving them trigger warnings. As for forcing people, I think that's a stretch. That's like saying a billboard is forcing people to buy the product. As echoed previously, that'd be a fault on the user for being lazy and not reading a description, comment, review or all of the tags. But I don't want to focus on this part specifically because I think it'll lead to a whole new issue, and I think we haven't even squashed the semantic misunderstand I think we have.
And that's the misunderstanding. You don't know what a trigger warning is. I made that exact specification in my last post. "And I want to make it clear, avoiding "triggering content" is not the same thing as avoiding things you dislike. One is unhealthy, the other is preference." Now bear with me.
I don't care if people use tags to avoid things they dislike, petition to have more tags, etc. Asking for trigger warnings to avoid things that trigger them is asking the website to add highly subjective flags, which are independent from tags. A trigger warning would be a literal flag next to a chapter or manga. Trigger warnings are to manga as moderated comments are to regular comments.
The big difference between them is the moderated comments are enforced by reasonable moderators and a set of fairly clear rules. Trigger warnings would be entirely based on individual users.
For example, you want tags to avoid those things. And we could have an argument about what constitutes substance abuse or physical abuse, let's leave the minimum at the example you explained. Such tags are clearly defined.
Trigger warnings would be a flag either mentioning "trigger warning" or "sexual violence / rape trigger warning" on "Soredemo Sekai Wa Ustukushi" because some chapters, less than 1%, have aggressive sexual undertones indicating potential rape, or fucking "Takagi-san" having a "bullying trigger warning" flag because bullying or teasing of the sort maybe triggering. I'm not against what you listed, I am against what I listed because of how subjective it is, how ineffective it is and because it is unhealthy.
And I understand how small a difference there may seem to be in that specification, but it is an incredibly important semantic. Tags can be used the same way trigger warnings are used, but to a lesser extent, trigger warnings cannot be used the same way as tags are in any capacity. Tags are objective, trigger warnings are subjective. Tags are fairly clear, trigger warnings are extremely unclear.
There is a fine line here, and I think we're standing on other sides. I'm really trying hard to keep trigger warnings separate from tags, you are not. I think I'm at the ends of my ability to articulate the difference, but I'll stress it one more time. Trigger warnings are not the same thing as tags in both function and concept. You seem to be conflating them to a significant degree.
@AbyssalMonkey
This an argument I've had literally 3 different times, and you don't quite seem to have a grasp on what I've said. I'll try this one time, but if you've already read every comment, especially the long one, I've said and still do not understand what I've been trying to say, I'm not going to bother after this because A) I'm tired of explaining this and B) I don't think I'll be able to explain it to you. Anyways.
That's not the only premise, this is. Trigger warnings are a nebulous, subjective and unhelpful term. They do not achieve any of the goals they set out to achieve, have no or negative effects and are highly subjective. Me saying "do not implement them" is not saying "go out of your way treat your users" but don't add a system that is not effective for anyone and has negative affects on those who would use it for it's intended ideological or psychological purpose.
I've touched on several different things and at one point focused on health because I thought that is was where a misunderstanding laid. Other specifics included the subjectivity of the term. Trigger warnings are not the same thing as regular tags, and what constitutes whether or not something is triggering is highly subjective. A trigger warning flag, literal flag next to a chapter or manga, would be entirely useless because it's a subjective classification that would lead to almost everything being flagged with it and either people avoiding every manga with them, or completely disregarding the flag and nullifying its' value. As indicated in some of the articles and studies listed.
Drug abuse for example, what constitutes it? Needles and heroine? What about weed and a bong? Cigarettes? Alcohol? I've seen all of these listed by large groups of people as triggering, and thus a user defined trigger warning system would be absolutely useless.
Another specific includes that it does not achieve its' goal. Trigger warnings are meant to brace people for content that may cause panic attacks, something they unequivocally fail at doing. Trigger warnings do not reduce anxiety or panic attacks. Trigger warnings are also not proven to help people avoid such content, only things which such a flag.
I think almost every misunderstanding or disagreement here boils down to semantics. OP suggested "trigger warnings" and "flags" for chapters or manga to go along with them. Flags that could be set or indicated by users. Something I rejected because of the aforementioned reasons.
I'm not commenting on anything that's concerning triggers any longer. Regardless of what I say or how I say it, I get a semi-internet war. No thank you, I hate those, they NEVER lead anywhere. Also please assume I'll not read past your first sentence if it's concerning that topic.
@DANDAN_THE_DANDAN
thank you for the adorable picture! It reminds me of my brother's cat, so cute
About the bullying tag: I'm not sure. We do have a tag for "vampire" on this site, but "bullying" is really hard to differentiate. There's manga with serious bullying, and those where it's simply a plot device. I think it would be hard to properly implement it, and the manga where the bullying is serious, you can usually tell right away.
Oh wow I caught a new @ within 3 secs that's a new record for me.
@Vofuro I mean, MD has some super niche tags already so the line between "much enough" and "too little" is blurry. Now that I think of it, do we really need to be warned of serious bullying before reading? Cause personally I'm fine with reading those in public. We probably don't need a bullying tag.
What about "depression/bipolar" or something to that effect? Maybe "self harm"? I wouldn't want to read a new manga in public where the character regularly hurts themselves. Some mangas make it obvious from title/cover/synopsis but how about those that don't?
Oh, no you haven't. What you guys have is content tags. A trigger warning is far different, and OP and I specified that. He asked for a flag of sorts indicating that something is triggering.I understand that is rejected. Like something literally saying "trigger warning". I think this part boils down to you and I having very different definitions of what constitutes a trigger warning. A trigger warning is a far more sensitive version of the classic "view discretion is advised" sort of thing that is played before a cartoon. It'd be a flag next a manga or chapter indicating something is potentially triggering. I said not to bother with them because they'd not only be ineffective for those who seek to avoid being triggered, but anyone who would use them.
Asking for trigger warnings to avoid things that trigger them is asking the website to add highly subjective flags, which are independent from tags. A trigger warning would be a literal flag next to a chapter or manga. Trigger warnings are to manga as moderated comments are to regular comments.
No, I recognize all that and I understand that what was asked originally is not exactly the same as what we're prepared to implement and are talking about now. I put "trigger warnings" in quotes for a reason. It's just that since I said multiple times that new features are not happening and that if we're implementing anything it'd be simply new Content tags, I don't see the point in continuing to argue against a separate new trigger warning flag feature, especially since the OP seems more or less fine with the proposed solution. Clearly you already know all this, so I'm at a loss as to what your goal here is...
And I understand how small a difference there may seem to be in that specification, but it is an incredibly important semantic.
I'm really trying hard to keep trigger warnings separate from tags, you are not. I think I'm at the ends of my ability to articulate the difference, but I'll stress it one more time. Trigger warnings are not the same thing as tags in both function and concept. You seem to be conflating them to a significant degree.
...Unless it's simply to convince me that trigger warnings and tags are not in fact the same thing, which I'll condece without contest. I agree. The problem is I don't understand why you're bothering with talking about their differences when it has nothing to do with what this thread is about anymore (if it ever was). I'm not conflating trigger warnings and tags functionally or conceptually in principle (or I'm certainly not advocating or arguing for anything of the sort). I'm conflating them in this discussion because that's going to be the practical outcome of this thread for the purposes of this particular website, if there is to be any outcome at all. We're here to talk about technical solutions, not semantics.
If I'm wrong, please just state clearly what exact point you're trying to argue to me that you think I disagree with. If it's "trigger warnings are harmful" I'll concede for the sake of the argument at least, but I don't think it's enough of a reason to not implement some new Content tags which is what we're talking about here. It's a reason not to implement the kind of trigger warning flags you're describing, but that was never on the table to begin with.
It's usually quite obvious when there's going to be the serious side of bullying. You can usually tell via a mix of genre, cover and summary, because the whole manga tends to focus on it. But yeah, some of the tags are blurry - like that loli tag. Sometimes it means it's sexual, other times it's just that one of the main characters is a cute girl, it's a bit confusing. (Is it supposed to be like that?)
The tag self harm would be spoiler-territory for me and a bit too specific. But a tag like "mental illnesses" might cover a lot, too, without giving too much away. Because there's more than just depression, some mangas cover really specific mental issues, too.
I don't think a reader site like mangadex should have tags for absolutely everything, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist, mangaupdates has a tag for EVERYTHING, if you really have severe trigger warnings maybe you should pop there and check whatever work you want to check.
@Vofuro I thought about that but autism counts as a mental illness, doesn't it? And autism doesn't really have the same "I can't read this in public" vibe than depression. Or maybe this tag goes too deep in spoiler territory and shouldn't exist?
@DANDAN_THE_DANDAN
well, one could argue the psychological tag would cover mental illnesses. And probably autism as well, just like tragedy deals with suicide and the like.
I also think that depending on the manga, autism can be quite the spoiler, and the point of the themes is not to unnecessarily spoil the contents.
@negavamas
jup. we moved on, it's not about the triggers exactly anymore, more like expanding the themes a bit so people can more easily say which stuff they want to read New tags would be stuff like "psychological abuse" or "torture", but there's a list a site back or two.
@Vofuro Well now that you put it that way, I guess you're right.
What about we separate "bleeding" from "gore"? Basically just a lighter category. Obviously we don't include one-off events like a character accidentally stepping on a nail or the cliche where someone gets a nosebleed from getting hard.
This would take care of the self-harm thing I pointed out while being vague enough to both avoid spoilers and be an umbrella term. It can also be used for shounen series that does show blood but no gore. Some people don't like to see blood at all. I think? Idk anyone like that tho.
@DANDAN_THE_DANDAN
I think it would be very, very hard to find mangas with absolutely no blood due to nosebleed, a papercut or something like that xD I mean, licking blood from the finger is a shojo cliche, even. A tag called "bleeding" would be too generic, I fear.
What do you want from the tag exactly? If it's self harm, an umbrella term like "mental illnesses" would cover it. That would be more specific than the psychological genre and wouldn't unnecessarily spoiler something, because that area can include schizophrenia, multiple person disorder, and so on. Now that I think of it, I can recall quite some mangas you can tag with that, too.
