I am not a standup, but I'm confused by your contention that only an experienced comedian can do offensive topics but yet quote Mike Birbigelia (or however he spells it) say everything can be offensive... it's like that old hiring conundrum: you can't get experience without being hired, but can't be hired without experience. In any endeavor it takes time and practice to get good, and if you don't practice doing offensive material you will never learn how to walk the fine line. So if it's OK for the greats to go into offensive subjects, it's got to be OK for the rookies too. Otherwise, eventually no one will know how to do it "right", so no one will do it.
That said. Thanks for the deep dive and all the examples and counter-examples.
I really liked your suggestion that she develop some of her own material as a counter-weight to that kind of comedy. Fight jokes with jokes. May the better jokes win.
"only an experienced comedian can do offensive topics"
I don't think that's the case. I think it's more like be mindful and careful with that kinda material when you're starting out. A military vet can handle a weapon in a way that a new recruit can't, y'know? If you're picking up a weapon for the first time, do it carefully and in the right environment.
Dude, this is beautiful. One of my favorite posts from you, and something you could really turn into a book, a la Letters to a Young Poet, but for comedians, or anyone really.
i'm glad this conversation is happening! thank you for sharing it!
some favorite things of mine that you said here:
"I love how you put this..."
"It sucks you had that open mic experience."
"an audience of real people is a way better judge"
"there are female/LGBTQ+ friendly open mics. Are there any near you?"
"I hope you stick with standup and, if this happens again, that you figure out a way to take whatever you feel in that moment and use it creatively to follow that comic with a killer joke (or just words that honestly explain how you feel) that lets all the other people in the room who feel the same way know they aren’t alone, lets them laugh, and come together"
"What's right for an experienced pro may not be right for a newer comedian."
i do have one question for you:
when you say you honestly don't understand the distinction being presented between “the clinical definition of triggered” and “the overused dramatic definition,” are you sure you can't get there? what if this person had used the word "traumatized" instead of "triggered"?
PTSD is a clinical diagnosis, for example. post-traumatic stress disorder. in my own life, i used to say that, as a child, i had an experience in school that was "traumatic" because of how unpleasant it was, and later i stopped saying it was traumatic when i realized/learned that there were people out there who experienced real, clinical trauma. people who had been to war. people who had been assaulted. etc.
i do think that people use words like "traumatic" and "triggered" in multiple ways, and in this piece, it seems like the person writing to you experienced a physical, visceral reaction. this wasn't about being "offended."
i don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, but that was my experience of this person's description of their experience.
thanks again for sharing all of this matt, and thank you to the person who wrote to you and shared all that YOU did here.
Someone saying "I was clinically triggered" wouldn't make sense to me. I could "get there" if I had to, but I'd rather not because I love words too much. Similarly, I'm confused by how our society uses triggered/traumatized in general nowadays. Words start to lose meaning when we use the same term to describe having to listen to a crappy joke and seeing a buddy's head get blown off by a grenade.
Plus, I'm continually mindful of victimhood inflation. It feels like we're in an environment where whomever claims the most oppression/victimhood/trauma has the most currency and i find that to be a dangerous path (and not in alignment with Buddhist principals we've discussed before). I wrote about this previously: https://mattruby.substack.com/p/how-therapy-speak-turned-victimhood
But yeah, everyone be nice to each other and I wish people didn't feel bad and I hope sad/scared people feel happier/safe in the future blah blah nice guy stuff blah.
i love words as well AND i love aiming to understand people even if they're using different words than i might.
so, i'll continue with my gentle pushback thusly:
regarding the phrase "clinically triggered," i agree with you that it may not be the most common phrasing, and i'm not saying that "traumatized" and "triggered" are synonymous, but i am saying that they are both words that have, as your correspondent puts it, an "overused dramatic definition" as well as a more "clinical definition"
in fact, i did a brief search for the clinical definition of "triggered" in a mental health context, and found this (website linked at the bottom):
"A trigger is a stimulus that elicits a reaction. In the context of mental illness, 'trigger' is often used to mean something that brings on or worsens symptoms."
in my understanding of the person's experience, per her words ("I could feel my heart pounding and my breath getting shorter"), it's not about her "having to listen to a crappy joke." it's about her having experienced sexual assault, which is an often-traumatizing experience, and the situation she found herself in at the open mic could indeed be, as she put it, clinically triggering.
when you say "I'm continually mindful of victimhood inflation. It feels like we're in an environment where whomever claims the most oppression/victimhood/trauma has the most currency and i find that to be a dangerous path," i hear you and i also don't think that seems the most applicable here to this person's experience. this person, by her account, was a victim of assault, and isn't using that experience to claim currency.
you're right that when one word is used for two different things, it can take more work to discern what a person means when they use that word. i think the person who wrote you has provided adequate context, for me at least, to understand her description of what she experienced.
and of course, all that said, to reiterate, i think your advice to her is generally right on!
I'm not saying I don't understand this person's p.o.v. However, I'm pushing back at our society's desire to conflate personal feelings with clinical diagnoses.
For example: Let's say I fell out of a tree once and became scared of heights. And now I'm on a plane and the pilot takes off. I feel traumatized. My heart is pounding. My breath is getting shorter. Can I say I've been clinically triggered by the pilot? After all, I fell out of a tree once! What if I want the plane to land and have the pilot punished? Should my feelings take priority over the feelings of others who want the flight to continue?
I hear you, and I think conflating falling out of a tree with a sexual assault is misguided.
And this person isn’t saying that no one should tell offensive jokes. The person is considering whether she should be avoiding spaces where she is made to feel the way she doesn’t want to feel, to care for herself, which I think is a reasonable question to ask, having experienced what she experienced (which I also don’t think you or I can understand from a few sentences on a screen).
I am certainly in no position to diagnose this person or anyone, and neither are you. If she were sharing her thoughts with me, I might ask more questions to learn more, as opposed to zooming out from this individual’s experience to pathologize our society in a macro way.
and I do think that there’s a time and a place for macro pathologizing, for sure! I just don’t know if it’s in the response to someone sharing about their assault, you know?
There are a few issues here! And I think we can often run the risk of conflating them.
And my response to you, with whom I often engage in more macro/philosophical discussions, is my response to you.
So let's not conflate THOSE things lol.
And to be clear, I am not comparing falling out of a tree with a sexual assault. I am merely stating that if we elevate "but I feel this way" to the level of clinical diagnosis which trumps the feelings of others, it can render the severity of the original incident(s) meaningless in a way that does a disservice to people who have genuinely suffered from traumatic incidents.
Psychotherapist Seerut Chawla expresses views on this subject that I align with if you're curious: "There is always a balance to be struck between prioritising yourself & being considerate of other people. Never forget that."
i absolutely understand that your response to me and your response to her are different.
AND your response to her (per your post) included this:
"I don’t understand the difference between what you describe as 'the clinical definition of triggered' and 'the overused dramatic definition.'"
which is what prompted part of my response to you.
and i would say here, in my response to you, that when you say "if we elevate 'but I feel this way' to the level of clinical diagnosis," that WE are not doing that. in fact, the letter writer specifically dichotomizes “the clinical definition" and “the overused dramatic definition,” so it seems to me that she, the one with the experience, has more knowledge about her own experience than either of us, and i am accepting her assessment as valid, because i have no reason not to, and i have plenty of reasons YES to.
i also don't want there to be any "disservice to people who have genuinely suffered from traumatic incidents." and my understanding of what the letter writer wrote to you is that her assault was very likely a traumatic incident. because assaults often are, AND because of the way she describes things.
i agree with this:
"There is always a balance to be struck between prioritising yourself & being considerate of other people. Never forget that."
and my question to you: are you saying that there is someone that this should apply to here in this situation?
to me, the letter writer is being very considerate.
and i also think that you and i are both doing our best to be considerate.
i don't know if we can get much further without knowing more about the individual's experience, and we don't! we know what we know, and the rest is speculation and probably projecting things through our own filters. or, i'll speak for myself. i don't know anything more than is written, and what i have deduced or induced from it.
i think we understand one another, i love you, i thank you, and i'm happy to know you and to be able to engage with you like this!
I am not a standup, but I'm confused by your contention that only an experienced comedian can do offensive topics but yet quote Mike Birbigelia (or however he spells it) say everything can be offensive... it's like that old hiring conundrum: you can't get experience without being hired, but can't be hired without experience. In any endeavor it takes time and practice to get good, and if you don't practice doing offensive material you will never learn how to walk the fine line. So if it's OK for the greats to go into offensive subjects, it's got to be OK for the rookies too. Otherwise, eventually no one will know how to do it "right", so no one will do it.
That said. Thanks for the deep dive and all the examples and counter-examples.
I really liked your suggestion that she develop some of her own material as a counter-weight to that kind of comedy. Fight jokes with jokes. May the better jokes win.
"only an experienced comedian can do offensive topics"
I don't think that's the case. I think it's more like be mindful and careful with that kinda material when you're starting out. A military vet can handle a weapon in a way that a new recruit can't, y'know? If you're picking up a weapon for the first time, do it carefully and in the right environment.
Dude, this is beautiful. One of my favorite posts from you, and something you could really turn into a book, a la Letters to a Young Poet, but for comedians, or anyone really.
Thanks so much, Ryan. I truly appreciate that.
dear matt,
i'm glad this conversation is happening! thank you for sharing it!
some favorite things of mine that you said here:
"I love how you put this..."
"It sucks you had that open mic experience."
"an audience of real people is a way better judge"
"there are female/LGBTQ+ friendly open mics. Are there any near you?"
"I hope you stick with standup and, if this happens again, that you figure out a way to take whatever you feel in that moment and use it creatively to follow that comic with a killer joke (or just words that honestly explain how you feel) that lets all the other people in the room who feel the same way know they aren’t alone, lets them laugh, and come together"
"What's right for an experienced pro may not be right for a newer comedian."
i do have one question for you:
when you say you honestly don't understand the distinction being presented between “the clinical definition of triggered” and “the overused dramatic definition,” are you sure you can't get there? what if this person had used the word "traumatized" instead of "triggered"?
PTSD is a clinical diagnosis, for example. post-traumatic stress disorder. in my own life, i used to say that, as a child, i had an experience in school that was "traumatic" because of how unpleasant it was, and later i stopped saying it was traumatic when i realized/learned that there were people out there who experienced real, clinical trauma. people who had been to war. people who had been assaulted. etc.
i do think that people use words like "traumatic" and "triggered" in multiple ways, and in this piece, it seems like the person writing to you experienced a physical, visceral reaction. this wasn't about being "offended."
i don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, but that was my experience of this person's description of their experience.
thanks again for sharing all of this matt, and thank you to the person who wrote to you and shared all that YOU did here.
much love,
myq
Thanks for the thoughtful feedback, Myq.
We're getting into semantics here but...
Someone saying "I was clinically triggered" wouldn't make sense to me. I could "get there" if I had to, but I'd rather not because I love words too much. Similarly, I'm confused by how our society uses triggered/traumatized in general nowadays. Words start to lose meaning when we use the same term to describe having to listen to a crappy joke and seeing a buddy's head get blown off by a grenade.
Plus, I'm continually mindful of victimhood inflation. It feels like we're in an environment where whomever claims the most oppression/victimhood/trauma has the most currency and i find that to be a dangerous path (and not in alignment with Buddhist principals we've discussed before). I wrote about this previously: https://mattruby.substack.com/p/how-therapy-speak-turned-victimhood
But yeah, everyone be nice to each other and I wish people didn't feel bad and I hope sad/scared people feel happier/safe in the future blah blah nice guy stuff blah.
thanks as always for engaging thoughtfully.
we ARE getting into semantics here!
i love words as well AND i love aiming to understand people even if they're using different words than i might.
so, i'll continue with my gentle pushback thusly:
regarding the phrase "clinically triggered," i agree with you that it may not be the most common phrasing, and i'm not saying that "traumatized" and "triggered" are synonymous, but i am saying that they are both words that have, as your correspondent puts it, an "overused dramatic definition" as well as a more "clinical definition"
in fact, i did a brief search for the clinical definition of "triggered" in a mental health context, and found this (website linked at the bottom):
"A trigger is a stimulus that elicits a reaction. In the context of mental illness, 'trigger' is often used to mean something that brings on or worsens symptoms."
in my understanding of the person's experience, per her words ("I could feel my heart pounding and my breath getting shorter"), it's not about her "having to listen to a crappy joke." it's about her having experienced sexual assault, which is an often-traumatizing experience, and the situation she found herself in at the open mic could indeed be, as she put it, clinically triggering.
when you say "I'm continually mindful of victimhood inflation. It feels like we're in an environment where whomever claims the most oppression/victimhood/trauma has the most currency and i find that to be a dangerous path," i hear you and i also don't think that seems the most applicable here to this person's experience. this person, by her account, was a victim of assault, and isn't using that experience to claim currency.
you're right that when one word is used for two different things, it can take more work to discern what a person means when they use that word. i think the person who wrote you has provided adequate context, for me at least, to understand her description of what she experienced.
and of course, all that said, to reiterate, i think your advice to her is generally right on!
thank you again for engaging, my friend!
PS the link:
https://care.unc.edu/understanding-mental-health-triggers/#:~:text=In%20the%20context%20of%20mental,%2C%20and%2For%20eating%20disorders.
I'm not saying I don't understand this person's p.o.v. However, I'm pushing back at our society's desire to conflate personal feelings with clinical diagnoses.
For example: Let's say I fell out of a tree once and became scared of heights. And now I'm on a plane and the pilot takes off. I feel traumatized. My heart is pounding. My breath is getting shorter. Can I say I've been clinically triggered by the pilot? After all, I fell out of a tree once! What if I want the plane to land and have the pilot punished? Should my feelings take priority over the feelings of others who want the flight to continue?
I hear you, and I think conflating falling out of a tree with a sexual assault is misguided.
And this person isn’t saying that no one should tell offensive jokes. The person is considering whether she should be avoiding spaces where she is made to feel the way she doesn’t want to feel, to care for herself, which I think is a reasonable question to ask, having experienced what she experienced (which I also don’t think you or I can understand from a few sentences on a screen).
I am certainly in no position to diagnose this person or anyone, and neither are you. If she were sharing her thoughts with me, I might ask more questions to learn more, as opposed to zooming out from this individual’s experience to pathologize our society in a macro way.
and I do think that there’s a time and a place for macro pathologizing, for sure! I just don’t know if it’s in the response to someone sharing about their assault, you know?
There are a few issues here! And I think we can often run the risk of conflating them.
Thanks again for sharing! I love you!
My response to her was my response to her.
And my response to you, with whom I often engage in more macro/philosophical discussions, is my response to you.
So let's not conflate THOSE things lol.
And to be clear, I am not comparing falling out of a tree with a sexual assault. I am merely stating that if we elevate "but I feel this way" to the level of clinical diagnosis which trumps the feelings of others, it can render the severity of the original incident(s) meaningless in a way that does a disservice to people who have genuinely suffered from traumatic incidents.
Psychotherapist Seerut Chawla expresses views on this subject that I align with if you're curious: "There is always a balance to be struck between prioritising yourself & being considerate of other people. Never forget that."
More from her:
1) https://www.instagram.com/p/CtcSuHrM-pp/
2) https://www.instagram.com/p/CsRfuafsBO4/
3) https://www.instagram.com/p/CsjmbEisPbA/
i appreciate you!
i absolutely understand that your response to me and your response to her are different.
AND your response to her (per your post) included this:
"I don’t understand the difference between what you describe as 'the clinical definition of triggered' and 'the overused dramatic definition.'"
which is what prompted part of my response to you.
and i would say here, in my response to you, that when you say "if we elevate 'but I feel this way' to the level of clinical diagnosis," that WE are not doing that. in fact, the letter writer specifically dichotomizes “the clinical definition" and “the overused dramatic definition,” so it seems to me that she, the one with the experience, has more knowledge about her own experience than either of us, and i am accepting her assessment as valid, because i have no reason not to, and i have plenty of reasons YES to.
i also don't want there to be any "disservice to people who have genuinely suffered from traumatic incidents." and my understanding of what the letter writer wrote to you is that her assault was very likely a traumatic incident. because assaults often are, AND because of the way she describes things.
i agree with this:
"There is always a balance to be struck between prioritising yourself & being considerate of other people. Never forget that."
and my question to you: are you saying that there is someone that this should apply to here in this situation?
to me, the letter writer is being very considerate.
and i also think that you and i are both doing our best to be considerate.
i don't know if we can get much further without knowing more about the individual's experience, and we don't! we know what we know, and the rest is speculation and probably projecting things through our own filters. or, i'll speak for myself. i don't know anything more than is written, and what i have deduced or induced from it.
i think we understand one another, i love you, i thank you, and i'm happy to know you and to be able to engage with you like this!
love,
myq