This is not to say that Halberstam’s piece is entirely wrong. Trigger warnings are overused in a way that condescends to the traumatised, creating an activist tic that serves primarily to signify fealty to a norm rather than do real community work around the issue of trauma. It is also true that we have indeed built an activist culture whose practices are individualist in their perspective, and thus a neat fit with neoliberalism—I myself have written about this. Halberstam’s argument about the way current activist emphasis on individual trauma is commodified and consumed, then, has ample merit. But the flaws in his argument are legion, and potentially destructive. Halberstam’s overall thesis finds its foundation in scapegoating the young, recapitulating antediluvian clichés about “free speech” and “censorship,” and antagonising trans women, all while failing to grasp how his own favoured theories have led us into the very mess he decries.
Posted on: Tue, 08 Jul 2014 15:12:25 +0000
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