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Political correctness was not even the original term it was called Alternate **** insert target here.
It's purpose was the recognition of prejudices that had become so normalised that they had become unnoticeable.
It called for an end to social oppression on the grounds of race, gender, creed, class or other accidents of birth.
Problem was it worked, it worked quickly, was a success and was widely embraced.
In the UK by the year 1980 we had the sex discrimination act, race relations act, homosexuality was decriminalized for anyone over twenty one and a few year later the age of consent was brought in to line with everyone else, religious prejudiced was outlawed.
It was so successful that by the 90's "Political correctness" as it was dubbed by the media was done, established and ready to settle in to social normality for generations to come.
Then two things happened.

  1. The activists realised they were victims of their own success and had effectively put themselves out of a job. So they began challenging normality as not being PC enough quick enough.
    Everything was now a target, from the language, to clothing, literature, media, jobs and names. Everything was "Bigoted" had to be changed, suddenly there were a whole new slew of negative -ists, to oppose.
  2. A whole new generation of people brought up with far less oppression were still being taught they were still oppressed and saw the normal trial of life suffered by everyone as bigotry against them personally and demanded special privilege.
    Those who were the decedents of the oppressors of time past where made to feel they must carry the guilt of their antecedents and of course did not like this and in most cases did not understand why they should.

The result was a spiral of decent in to resentment and hatred, division and mistrust.
As in the days of the French revolution...
What began as a cry for equality, freedom and friendship, became a reign of terror

LenHazell53 9 Oct 13
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2

Do you really believe that racism and misogyny and bigotry and homo-“phobia” simply disappeared after a few years of people saying that it is not nice to use derogatory terms for them?

Yes, you start a movement by addressing the most egregious harms. Then when people begin to accept that even those who are different from you deserve to be treated as human beings, then you begin to educate people about the ways that smaller acts can hurt others.

Surely even if you believed that most racism was in the past, the events of the last 2 years would’ve disabused you of that notion.

No and I did not say that, see my comments further down the thread.

2

Maybe things in your county are different than mine. Political correctness is a way of being polite and changing language. When a person changes their language, they change how they think about a person or group. I do not think your "thinking" is based in fact. Please engage in civil discourse only if you want to dispute me and use genuine research links, not op-ed pieces. By the way, #2 has not happened.

I have an anxiety disorder. I have a mental disorder. When people say that is Alana, she is nice something she has a mental disorder, that bothers her, so she can't go out to dinner with us tonight. Is empowering rather than people calling me crazy, insane and other words that are not politically correct. I fight for other people that have a mental disorder and are called backwards things. Using rude backwards words for groups does hurt and helps keep stigma which can result in people not seeking the help they need or result in shame and misunderstanding.
[nami.org]

I too have been diagnosed with Bi-polar disorder since the age of 14, though in those days they called it manic depression, so I empathise.
I think you may have misunderstood me, I was rather angry when I originally posted this.
I completely agree Political correctness WAS a successful effort to change attitudes by moderating language and have people think about what they say before and as they said it.
That however is a far cry from what is happening now, where suppression and censorship of speech as being "unacceptable" and "provocative" has replaced reasoned discussion and explanation as to why some intents behind words and phrases can be seen as perpetuating and stereotyping negative myths about groups of people.

As with everything else a loud minority of people with extremist views or simply a desire for personal aggrandizement have become the face of movement remolded in their own image.
When I ask a woman why she is not a feminist and she says because she is not one of those horrible man haters, some thing has gone wrong with the general perception of feminism.
When I ask anyone what they think of Political correctness and they say it is dangerous and bloody stupid, something has gone wrong with the general perception of political correctness, in peoples minds it is not the abolition of racism and sexism they think of as those being wrong seems to go without saying for the vast majority of people, it is the general perception that the entire western way of life is under threat by a dictatorial, censorial regime of humorless, easily offend idiots who want a world of carbon copy "perfect" people appointed to jobs not by ability or desire but in order to fulfill equality quotas.

1

You forgot to state "in your opinion"

3

There is no "political correctness", there is only "change". We all fear change in some ways but good or bad, change always happens. The sooner a person accepts good change the better they will be at running their own life. Change is necessary.

6

"It called for an end to social oppression on the grounds of race, gender, creed, class or other accidents of birth.
Problem was it worked..."

Wow - you let the cat out of the bag there. I was in agreement till that point.
Fyi bigotry, racism, sexism, homophobia and xenophobia in the UK were not a thing of the past by the 80s. They are still very much with us, as is the need for normalising human decency and civil discourse.
A few people take progressive measures to an exaggerated extreme, and that is the green light for every regressive, oppressive, overprivileged conservative who sees their sense of entitlement being eroded to cast themself as the victim of a witchhunt.

I'm a white male who has come from a long line of poverty dating back to the 19th century when my ancestors were forcibly brought over as indentured servants from Ireland. I have no idea what privilege or entitlement feels like, I have been shit on, pissed on, stepped on, fucked with, and pointed at my entire life. I have been beaten up before simply for being white at the wrong school. I have been harassed by the police before simply because I looked like I "didn't belong in the neighborhood". I had to go deep into debt and work my way though college because my parents were poor and there were no scholarships for white males. Yet I constantly hear about how bad and evil white men are because they have historically held power and some of them are greedy, cruel, prejudiced, misogynistic assholes. Well, those individuals deserve our animosity, but for the other 99.99% of white men who are decent human beings, it gets old constantly having the actions of a reprehensible few being attributed to our entire group. In fact when this is done to minorities, we call it racism and hate the people who do it to them, and applaud the minorities for standing up to being targeted simply for the color of their skin. So what gives going the other way? Why is it okay to hate white men because of assholes like Kavanaugh, Trump, ore Weinstein, but not okay to hate all blacks because of OJ Simpson, Bill Cosby, or Don King? What am I missing here?

@Piratefish I'm not sure how this relates to my post, but I'll engage. Firstly, I wouldn't put the fraction of white males who are decent as high as 99.99% but I would accept it's the great majority. Unlike you, I am not aware of ever having met anyone who hated me just for being white, and I have travelled quite a bit (although I have met other white men who hated me for being English). I very much doubt if anyone on this forum nurses any such prejudice.

@Gareth There are a few places right here in my city I can direct you to where you will get a firsthand experience in being hated simply for being white.

Again, my point is that there is very much a double standard, which is relevant to the topic. Not everyone who points this out is a "regressive, oppressive, overprivileged conservative who sees their sense of entitlement being eroded", either. Many of us are decent human beings who simply see a double standard. That is all.

@Gareth I live and have lived in a relatively open and safe environment. Mixed racial and not very separated by social status (but getting worse) and even I know where to go if I want to be hated because I'm white. It isn't that far from here and I could find 4 or 5 places within 10 miles.

@Piratefish @CK-One I'll grant that there are areas in the US that a white face would not be welcome in, but that's hardly for reasons of political correctness (the topic of the thread).

@Gareth

You're correct. I apologize for getting off topic. I need to learn to better save my comments for when I am not having a less than stellar day. 😀

No one is actually saying that all white men are... well, anything except white and men. But there most definitely IS privilege in being white and male in America. This does NOT mean that you have not experienced challenges or hardships or even once or twice encountered a sitauation that was worse for you because of one of this characteristics.

America has long treated whiteness and maleness as the “standard,” the default, for all things. It’s not something you notice when you are surrounded by it. Especially if you are invested in believing that white privilege doesn’t exist.
It is not an attack on you. It merely acknowledges that the world makes different assumptions, and responds differently to, people when they are “other” and that for most of the country, that means “other than” white and male.

1

I can see where you're coming from with this. I hate to blame white folks, as I'm white, myself, but it was really white activists who started paring things finer and finer, which is how we got things like 'womyn' or the newer 'womxn,' and neologisms like 'herstory' instead of 'history,' not to mention the flurry of unweildy terms like 'person with narcolepsy' instead of 'narcoleptic' or the disastrous attempts at gender neutrality in job titles like 'waitperson.'. That it so quickly changed to 'server' that a lot of folks (not 'folx,' this isn't the 90s) don't even remember 'waitperson' speaks to at least some form of sense. However, we still have people hunting for gender/racial/whathaveyou insult in everyday verbiage, and 99 percent of them are white.

The generational point speaks mainly of heavy internet users on Livejournal and now Tumblr and Twitter, who co-opt real oppression and stretch it to fit every inconvenience that comes their way. This is how concepts like 'triggers' and 'privelige' have become so nebulous and annoying in the eyes of the general public--they've been over used to the point where the words are just meaningless noises, now.

As to a 'reign of terror,' I see that as a bit hyperbolic. Then again, I don't know how terrorising the period of French history in question was, but I suspect it wasn't very, by today's standards.

@PalacinkyPDX look further down the thread you will see I discuss this at some length

@PalacinkyPDX okay, all though I agree with you about The Sun, the Daily Mail and Piers Morgan you're obviously projecting, and so it is impossible to have a rational conversation with, and I have no more time to waste on you. ✌

2

I suspect you would not know a real "reign of terror" if you tripped over it. It is not a reign of terror that minority groups get to tell their stories, including stories of actual harms they suffer for merely being different.

But don't worry, if things keep proceeding like they have been in the US, the UK, and now in Brazil, the world will soon be consumed by real reigns of terror so that you will know what really deserves the label.

I was brought up with an Muslim best friend, west Indian neighbors, I'm part Jewish and am married to a disabled druid.
You, know nothing about me, I on the other hand now know you are a presumptuous arrogant loud mouth.

@LenHazell53 Len ... I was not accusing you of being a xenophobe, as I know nothing of you in that regard. I was suggesting that you're overstating your case about PC speech being a "reign of terror". Nothing more nor less. I actually presume nothing at all here, other than making an observation concerning what you said.

Since a "loud mouth" is a person who talks too much in a loud or offensive way ... I am sorry you took what I said personally, and were offended. But I think the only thing that actually happened is that I simply failed to agree with your statement, and said so. Did you mean "reign of terror" to be hyperbole? If so, I apologize, as I do have a mild tendency to take things over-literally sometimes. If you were simply exaggerating to make a point, then I should not have suggested you don't know what a reign of terror is or is not.

I have no personal quarrel with you or your right to your views. I hope you can return the favor.

@mordant
Of course it was a hyperbolic metaphor, if that was not obvious given that I had only a few words before paraphrase the slogan of the French revolution, that too is indicative of the knee jerk reaction responses of the overly sensitive state of modern society.
I simply drew a comparison with how good intent can be hijacked and corrupted in to something as bad or worse than that which one initially sought to over throw.

Political correctness, a call for decency tolerance and good fellowship has been taken and turned in to something literally fearful that destroys freedom, destroys lives and inhibits art and creative thought in favour of homogenized conformity, limited speech, thought and action.

@LenHazell53 There, we found common ground. That wasn't so bad!

I made the point on some other thread today that political correctness is an attempt to control speech through taboos rather than to have reasonable discourse based on real-world harms and benefits, concerning what society should [dis]approve of. I think two things happen:

  1. People assume that advocating for social justice is political correctness, when it is not necessarily, and we CAN tell them apart pretty objectively;

  2. People assume that political correctness demands have no element of genuine social justice advocacy to them.

I think in other words there's no discrete bogeyman here, I think SJWs stray into PC at times and people who tend to be overly PC have some legitimate SJ concerns. People should understand the difference so they can avoid muddying the waters and recognize what about political correctness is bad and why it should be avoided -- without feeling that in avoiding those harms they have to let go of their investment in their causes.

That leaves us, I think, with folks mindlessly stereotyping liberals as fragile snowflakes pushing political correctness, in one corner ... and the potential for a genuine and useful critique of political correctness among people who really are working or a better world.

As such I don't think liberal activists were too successful and are trying to compensate for working themselves out of a job, so now they are making stuff up. From the point of view of actual activists of any stripe, their desire is to accomplish the changes they want to see in society, and they don't see those goals as accomplished -- so they are doubling down on the wrong emphasis, namely, political correctness. They think they can shame their opponents into silence when what they are actually doing is radicalizing them. Hence we have Trump, Brexit, and now this new fresh horror named Bolsonaro over in Brazil. Talk about over-playing your hand ...

1

Many that complaint about others being racist, homophobic, sexist or whatever are often worse than the ones that they criticise. The so called political correct sometimes is used to disguise cowardice. I admire people who can make good criticism, tell the truth that hurts without offending the person that has to hear it because they know how to express well their ideas. I'd rather someone blunt than people who say things indirectly. How come people don't know how to separate things any more?

Well said

5

Sorry, but with all due respect, this just sounds like yet another diatribe from people that want to justify holding on to outdated opinions. Opinions they know would be looked at unfavorably, so they want everyone else to "loosen up" so they can get away with sowing their little seeds of hate and divisiveness whenever they choose to.

Not saying this about you, because I know nothing about you, but it really strikes me that the pushback against political correctness is mostly coming from two main groups. Those being a large segment of the elderly that have hit a wall as far as change goes, and white conservatives with racist leanings.

What outdated opinions am I supposed to be holding on to?
What hate am I preaching?
What are you talking about?
Did you actually read my post?

@LenHazell53 did you read it?

2

Is this a troll? Disapproval of the use of epithets and stereotypes in everyday conversation is not, and never was, a "reign of terror". Inventive explanation, I'll give you that.

Simply a metaphorical comparison, sorry if using the names of actual historical events are beyond you.

@LenHazell53 Hey, if you want to conflate bald assertion and shaky logic with actual historical events, I can't stop you. LOL

1

Nice. Even though I do not agree 100% (and there is no need to be in perfect agreement) with what you said, I believe you nicely captured the evolution/devolution of that phrase.

The concept of "politically correct" originated from the perspective that there is an objectively accurate way to view and analyze our political (this includes economical, social, and personal) behaviors and institutions. It recognized that those in power promote the language that distorts the objectively accurate view of the world around us to benefit their agenda. PC movement was developed to call out such distortions and combat misperception of the reality. Nothing more, and nothing less.

Thank you, nice to know some people can still be rational.

5

Simple politeness, being courteous, not judging a book by it's cover, anyone?

I agree if you do not call it just 'truth' then you most likely have a hidden agenda.

Spot on

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