Speaker 1: My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda
Speaker 1: Bungelung Calcottin woman from Gadigl Country. The Daily oz acknowledges
Speaker 1: that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the
Speaker 1: Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres
Speaker 1: Strait Island and nations. We pay our respects to the
Speaker 1: first peoples of these countries, both past and present.
Speaker 2: Here's some content advice for the podcast that's about to come.
Speaker 2: In this episode, we're going to be discussing the meaning
Speaker 2: of trigger warnings, where they come from, and whether or
Speaker 2: not they should be applied in our content. Good morning
Speaker 2: and welcome to the Daily os. It's Wednesday, the fourth
Speaker 2: of October. I'm Zara, I'm Billy. I'm the editor at
Speaker 2: the Daily os.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: Over the last few years, we've seen the rise of
Speaker 2: trigger warnings in the content that we consume everywhere. We
Speaker 2: of the Daily Ods have used it in this podcast
Speaker 2: plenty of times, and we've also used it in a
Speaker 2: lot of our written content. But at trigger warnings actually
Speaker 2: protecting people.
Speaker 3: And this is the evidence around trigger warnings. They trigger people,
Speaker 3: They make anticipatory anxiety go through the roof.
Speaker 2: In today's Deep Dive, we speak to the Global Director
Speaker 2: of Men's Health Research at November, doctor Zach Seidler, and
Speaker 2: yes he is my brother, but he also happens to
Speaker 2: be an expert in the field of mental health. Before
Speaker 2: we get to that chat, Billy, what is making headlines.
Speaker 4: The Australian Reserve Bank has kept the cash rate at
Speaker 4: four point one percent for the fourth consecutive month. The
Speaker 4: decision followed the board's first meeting under the leadership of
Speaker 4: the new RBA Governor Michelle Bullock, who said while inflation
Speaker 4: was still too high, future rises would depend on new
Speaker 4: data and risks in the economy.
Speaker 2: A new study has found Australian parents are some of
Speaker 2: the most risk averse in the world. New data from
Speaker 2: Deacon University and Coventry University in the UK found that
Speaker 2: four in five Australian parents put limits on risky activities
Speaker 2: such as play fighting or climbing trees, and that's out
Speaker 2: of fear that their child will be injured. The study
Speaker 2: puts Ozzie parents ahead of New Zealand, Canada and the
Speaker 2: UK when it comes to playtime risk aversion. It's encouraged
Speaker 2: parents to loosen the reins to support physical and mental development.
Speaker 4: Work has begun to convert Hitler's former Austrian home into
Speaker 4: a police station. It's hoped the new purpose for the home,
Speaker 4: where Hitler was born in eighteen eighty nine will deter
Speaker 4: gatherings of Neo Nazi's other site. The property has been
Speaker 4: under the control of the Austrian government for several decades.
Speaker 2: And today's good news. A one hundred and four year
Speaker 2: old woman in the US hopes to become the oldest
Speaker 2: person to ever skydive. Dorothy Hoffner performed a skydive near
Speaker 2: Chicago this week, which she hopes will be certified as
Speaker 2: a record breaking dive. Hoffner told the onlooking crowd that
Speaker 2: her age was just the number. Okay, So, Billy, the
Speaker 2: reason that we wanted to do this interview with expert
Speaker 2: Slash my brother Zach, was because you were asked to
Speaker 2: comment on how the Daily ODS does trigger warnings.
Speaker 4: Right, Yeah, So I participated in an SBS show called Insight,
Speaker 4: and it was all about whether the trigger warnings are
Speaker 4: helpful or harmful. And my perspective was that at the
Speaker 4: Daily ODS we do use trigger warnings and that has
Speaker 4: been informed by the audience. But it became clear throughout
Speaker 4: the discussion on the show that there is mounting evidence
Speaker 4: that they potentially are not helpful, and I thought it
Speaker 4: was really important that we have a discussion about that
Speaker 4: at the Daily Ods. Your brother is a clinical psychologist,
Speaker 4: and I know he feels very passionately about it, and
Speaker 4: he's spoken to me about it before, and I thought
Speaker 4: we should get him on and have a really honest discussion.
Speaker 2: And I think the best part of it is that
Speaker 2: we learn as we go and we don't pretend to
Speaker 2: be experts, and I think this discussion is the best
Speaker 2: example of that. So, without further Ado, Zach and Billy.
Speaker 4: Doctor Zach Sidler, Welcome to the Daily Ods.
Speaker 3: Great to be here.
Speaker 4: Billy. Now, you're a clinical psychologist and you've done a
Speaker 4: lot of research in this space. What is your position
Speaker 4: on trigger warnings?
Speaker 3: So I think it won't be a surprise to you
Speaker 3: given the amount of DMS that I've sent to you
Speaker 3: and Daily Odds about my feelings.
Speaker 1: Around your our troll.
Speaker 3: I'm the troll number one troll. So the way that
Speaker 3: I see trigger warnings and the way that the research
Speaker 3: sees them is that there is no evidence that they work.
Speaker 3: There is evidence that they harm and so depending on
Speaker 3: the context, we need to be really careful about just
Speaker 3: throwing trigger warnings out the front of all of this content,
Speaker 3: especially on social media, and then throwing up our hands
Speaker 3: and kind of saying that's my responsibility done. And it's
Speaker 3: not to say that the Day the Odds has done that.
Speaker 3: But the way that this has now become a commonplace,
Speaker 3: pseudo scientific placeholder at the front of content is really
Speaker 3: surprising and strange to me and suggests that we need
Speaker 3: to have a bit of a conversation about what is
Speaker 3: going on and what we can do in future.
Speaker 4: I think the thing that I struggle with is that
Speaker 4: our approach has been in the audience who tells us
Speaker 4: that they do want trigger warnings. And I understand that
Speaker 4: the evidence is changing, but what do we do when
Speaker 4: the expectation hasn't.
Speaker 3: So my answer to that is, if your audience told
Speaker 3: you to put up more content about UFO sidings, would
Speaker 3: you suddenly listen to them? If the vast majority of
Speaker 3: them said, I swear to God, I've seen UFOs, you
Speaker 3: need to put this up. You don't follow the audiences
Speaker 3: every whim.
Speaker 4: Yeah, But I think the difference is that they're telling
Speaker 4: us that they think that we are harming them or
Speaker 4: triggering them if we don't give them that warning for sure.
Speaker 3: So there are two issues here. The first is that
Speaker 3: your audience is largely, you know, young females, and I
Speaker 3: think that what's very important to consider contextually is the
Speaker 3: fact that most of them have grown up with trigger
Speaker 3: warnings everywhere. Yeah, so it's an expectation because it's all
Speaker 3: they've had. All I'm asking for is for you and
Speaker 3: everyone else who's creating content to respect the audience enough
Speaker 3: to go, Actually, we're going to follow the evidence and
Speaker 3: ask and educate and bring you along on that journey
Speaker 3: around whether or not this is something worth doing. Secondly,
Speaker 3: and this is from a clinical perspective, avoidance is really
Speaker 3: harmful when it comes to things like PTSD for instance. Yeah,
Speaker 3: the best treatment around PTSD or something similar around trauma
Speaker 3: is exposure. Is putting yourself in a situation where you're
Speaker 3: going to be exposed to the situation again so that
Speaker 3: you learn that it's not harmful. All of that is
Speaker 3: to say, you cannot put up a trigger warning and
Speaker 3: then put up harmful content. Yeah, the trigger warning doesn't
Speaker 3: suddenly get rid of the responsibility for you to put
Speaker 3: up safe, respectful content. In fact, what is happening, I
Speaker 3: think is the trigger warnings are providing a blanket. Okay,
Speaker 3: we've done our job now for much of the media. Instead,
Speaker 3: if we get rid of trigger warnings and spend the
Speaker 3: amount of time that is needed to actually ensure that
Speaker 3: the content is safe. When we're talking about suicide, rape,
Speaker 3: domestic violence, we use the right language and then we
Speaker 3: pump information at the end, we make really clear to
Speaker 3: provide a lot of information that is going to support
Speaker 3: those young people to get the help that they need.
Speaker 3: But the fact that they're coming out and saying this
Speaker 3: content is harmful, well, there are two things there. A
Speaker 3: trigger warning is not making it less harmful, So we
Speaker 3: need to consider what is harmful about the content and
Speaker 3: how to go about eradicating.
Speaker 4: But it's giving them the choice.
Speaker 3: But it's not giving them the choice. The trigger warning
Speaker 3: doesn't give them the choice. What it does is it says,
Speaker 3: and this is the evidence around trigger warnings. They trigger people.
Speaker 3: They make anticipatory anxiety go through the roof. It makes
Speaker 3: people go oh, and it gives you mental imagery. It
Speaker 3: makes you start to go, what's coming, what's it going
Speaker 3: to look? Like, how's it going to work? And it
Speaker 3: increases anxiety. Rather than doing this thing, which I think
Speaker 3: society needs to do, which is not over fragilized society,
Speaker 3: not you know, suggest this over therapization of everybody. Rather
Speaker 3: we need to go you are resilient, you are able
Speaker 3: to cope with this. We are putting in safe content,
Speaker 3: and we're going to make sure that you get the
Speaker 3: support that you need at the end. But it's it's
Speaker 3: not right for the media to decide. I don't believe
Speaker 3: what is triggering and what is not.
Speaker 4: But I think as the editor, if someone has gone
Speaker 4: through trauma, who am I to tell them? Well, I
Speaker 4: actually know what's best for you, and it's for you
Speaker 4: to be exposed to this content. I feel so uncomfortable
Speaker 4: taking that approach, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: One percent? And I think that that's really to be
Speaker 3: respected and valued. That question and you questioning yourself around
Speaker 3: what is safe and not safe content is the pertinent
Speaker 3: question here. But you deciding what is safe and not
Speaker 3: safe for them around trigger warnings, you're making that call.
Speaker 3: You're making that call about what is safe and what
Speaker 3: is not safe. You're deciding what deserves the trigger warning.
Speaker 3: And what doesn't I understand when it comes to mental
Speaker 3: health and wellbeing that you feel like you have a
Speaker 3: responsibility to look after them. And my response to that
Speaker 3: is you do, and the best way to look after
Speaker 3: them is to make safe content and to get rid
Speaker 3: of trigger warnings.
Speaker 4: Is there nuanced to it, like, are there ever scenarios
Speaker 4: where you think that they could be helpful?
Speaker 3: I think when it comes to aberge and on Torrest Islanders,
Speaker 3: when there has been depictions of somebody who has died,
Speaker 3: it's very clear there are cultural regulations and suggestions about
Speaker 3: how to go about that. When it comes to warnings
Speaker 3: more broadly around rape, domestic violence, assault, that type of thing,
Speaker 3: I think what we need to do is not have
Speaker 3: blanket rules for yes on everything. Rather we need more research,
Speaker 3: which is a very reliable answer for any psychologist to say,
Speaker 3: to go in what contexts for which people are these useful? Instead,
Speaker 3: at the moment we're just going scattergun everywhere. Every piece
Speaker 3: of content deserves this, And I think that you might
Speaker 3: be safeguarding one person. I'm not suggesting that you're not,
Speaker 3: but you may well not be looking after another thousand
Speaker 3: or ten thousand people. And I think that we need
Speaker 3: to realize that that one person should be getting supports
Speaker 3: that they need. But the trigger warning actually does and
Speaker 3: tell them what to do. It doesn't provide them with
Speaker 3: any support.
Speaker 4: But it does at the end of the piece, because
Speaker 4: whenever there's a trigger warning, you also provide the help line.
Speaker 3: Perfect, and that's exactly what is required. Let's have more
Speaker 3: of that, let's build in safety. But the trigger warning
Speaker 3: doesn't do anything for them in that interim period, whether
Speaker 3: or not they watch it or not. It doesn't offer
Speaker 3: any choice around the way that the content is going
Speaker 3: to be offered to them. Does that make sense? You
Speaker 3: put in a trigger warning, you say we're going to
Speaker 3: talk about rape, and then you do whatever you want
Speaker 3: in the middle, and then you offer supports at the end.
Speaker 4: But no, because I don't think it's fair to say
Speaker 4: that just because we use trigger warnings means that then
Speaker 4: in the whole post we just do irresponsible reporting, like
Speaker 4: we would never report on anything irresponsible. But it just
Speaker 4: means that the audience has a choice.
Speaker 3: But what I'm suggesting is that the choice they don't
Speaker 3: have a choice about what you report already.
Speaker 4: And it feels like it sounds maybe like I'm not
Speaker 4: listening to you. I know that's fair, but it's more
Speaker 4: just like, this is what it's been so low, and
Speaker 4: I think it's a really important conversation about how we
Speaker 4: change it. But I'm obviously just stuck on the choice.
Speaker 3: But it's a choice. It's the choice around what type
Speaker 3: of content they're choosing to watch. It's the choice around
Speaker 3: what type of content you decide to put a trigger
Speaker 3: warning on. There are so many arbitrary, subjective decisions that
Speaker 3: are being made here, and that's what I think should
Speaker 3: be eradicated. Rather, there should be a really clear, evidence
Speaker 3: based protocol around this. Stuff is very clearly going to
Speaker 3: trigger this population who we know is watching this, so
Speaker 3: we're going to build it in. Otherwise, you're just building
Speaker 3: up anticipatory anxiety for people who were never going to
Speaker 3: have it before, and for other people who might actually
Speaker 3: benefit from watching this content, they're going to avoid it
Speaker 3: because they're avoiding anxiety, which is understandable. And I think,
Speaker 3: and this is hard for any psychologist to say a
Speaker 3: bit of anxiety is useful. It's useful for them to
Speaker 3: watch the content if it is safely reported, for them
Speaker 3: to embrace and their own resilience and realize that they
Speaker 3: can get through it.
Speaker 4: I have a question about a Star Born. I remember
Speaker 4: when that came out. In the movie there is a
Speaker 4: scene about suicide. There was a discussion about whether that
Speaker 4: movie should have come with a trigger warning because it
Speaker 4: is quite confronting and they do go into some details.
Speaker 4: And obviously they're not a media organization, so they don't
Speaker 4: have the necessity to have responsible reporting. What do you
Speaker 4: think about that movie, like, should something like that have
Speaker 4: a trigger warning?
Speaker 3: So my response to that is the media has really
Speaker 3: clear regulations and there are the mind frame guidelines which
Speaker 3: everyone should follow around how to talk about suicide. Film
Speaker 3: and television has very similar guidelines. The fact that they
Speaker 3: don't feel the responsibility to live up to them is
Speaker 3: a totally different ballgame. When it comes to showing depictions
Speaker 3: of suicide in plays, in film, in television, they should
Speaker 3: be in consultation with clinicians, with researchers about how to
Speaker 3: go about doing that. There are plenty of shows that
Speaker 3: I've worked on with in Australia who have asked for consultation,
Speaker 3: who've gotten lived experience to make sure that this stuff
Speaker 3: is safe. That depiction which shows method and location is
Speaker 3: not safe.
Speaker 4: Do you remember that movie very clearly and did it
Speaker 4: follow responsible Guiden? Not at all?
Speaker 3: And so no trigger warning was going to be safe there.
Speaker 3: What it was going to do was going to amp
Speaker 3: me up for the next hour and a half and
Speaker 3: then I was going to see it and I was
Speaker 3: still going to feel shitty. So that's a perfect example
Speaker 3: of if you actually build in safe content and you
Speaker 3: make sure and this is across media, television, anything, you
Speaker 3: make sure that you are doing what is right by
Speaker 3: the guidelines and the evidence, you shouldn't need a trigger
Speaker 3: warning because the trigger warning would not have safeguarded that
Speaker 3: piece at all.
Speaker 4: So we've just had a whole conversation about trigger warnings.
Speaker 4: We've talked about suicide for example. What do you think
Speaker 4: that we should do at the start of this podcast.
Speaker 3: I feel like I should record this is not a
Speaker 3: trigger warning, enjoy the podcast. But I think that at
Speaker 3: the top of this podcast, I think that you should
Speaker 3: say we're going to be discussing the meaning of trigger warnings,
Speaker 3: where they come from, and whether or not they should
Speaker 3: be applied in all of our content. So suggesting that
Speaker 3: this is going to be an education all situation rather
Speaker 3: than a triggering one.
Speaker 4: But isn't that still even if it's not using the
Speaker 4: term trigger warning, it's still a trigger warning.
Speaker 3: It is so Yeah, I think that there is a
Speaker 3: way of talking about it that goes we're going to
Speaker 3: It's so it's so interesting because even the second you
Speaker 3: start to go in this podcast, we're going to discuss
Speaker 3: immediately takes you two. We're going to have a trigger
Speaker 3: warning here. Yeah, I got to think about I don't
Speaker 3: know what you would.
Speaker 4: Maybe we use the term content advice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, well yeah, here is some content advice for
Speaker 3: the podcast it's about to come.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Lastly, we haven't even discussed the fact that your
Speaker 4: Zara's brother. I imagine that you two have had lots of
Speaker 4: discussions about this. Why hasn't the Daily Os not been
Speaker 4: using trigger warnings from the start?
Speaker 3: It's a great question. She doesn't listen to me very clearly.
Speaker 3: We've got older brothers in chrome, which is terrifying. But
Speaker 3: I think that I'm really excited to be here today
Speaker 3: and to be able to discuss this. It's something that's
Speaker 3: evolving and I think that's the most important thing. And
Speaker 3: you never want to, you know, jump it preemptively and
Speaker 3: make sure that you do something unsafe, but let's just
Speaker 3: have the conversation, because that's the way to really respect
Speaker 3: the intelligence and the experience of your audience.
Speaker 4: Doctor Zach Saidler, thank you so much for joining the
Speaker 4: Daily Ours.
Speaker 3: I'll see you soon.
Speaker 1: Cheers.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us on the Daily Ours. If you
Speaker 2: need someone to talk to, you can give Lifeline a
Speaker 2: call on thirteen eleven fourteen. We'll be back again tomorrow morning,
Speaker 2: but until then, have a brilliant day.