Freedom To Insult

Many years ago, US Supreme Court said speech can still be protected if it is angry or profane. And that prohibiting fighting words must be very narrowly tailored.

But recently racial and political groups have been exploiting “Sensitivity Rights” for victimization, and to claim being psychologically hurt.

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Scott Barry Kaufman

“Psychology Today,” August 30, 2023

Do People Signal High Sensitivity to Get What They Want?

Signaling high sensitivity is different than being highly sensitive

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Sensory processing sensitivity is a real trait. Some people genuinely score higher on scales measuring a heightened depth of stimulus processing, higher awareness of subtleties in the environment, and ease of overstimulation.

Elaine Aron has spent most of her career studying the “highly sensitive person” and has done a beautiful and important job highlighting the gifts as well as challenges that can come with scoring high on this trait.

High-sensitivity signaling, however, is a whole other thing. I have noticed in recent years a significant increase on social media and even in my university classroom the declaration of high sensitivity as a strategy for obtaining special privileges and getting out of having to do difficult things.

A beautiful and complex trait has become co-opted by some people as a victim-signaling strategy — “a public and intentional expression of one’s disadvantages, suffering, oppression, or personal limitations.”

Indeed, recent research suggests that victim signaling is becoming increasingly prevalent in our society and can be viewed as an expression of a “culture of victimhood” in which claiming to be a victim is not in the service of receiving help and assistance for a genuine disadvantage but instead becomes something desirable and fashionable in itself.

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