I loathe political correctness.
I think that political correctness is poison to society, and poison to human friendships and relationships.
The idea that we must speak according to the strict and punitive dictates of a political agenda so as not to "offend" others who do not want to hear a different (yes even "offensive") viewpoint? It's abhorrent to me.
The demands of political correctness (and its growing fruit, the speech code) are a bit totalitarian, are they not? To mandate, with real social and now even financial/legal penalties, that we speak according to what one group of Americans finds "comfortable" and "acceptable" is dangerous.
Promoters of political correctness will insist that PC's aim is simply civility, respect, and politeness. Nonsense. I am at the same time anti-PC and pro- civility in discourse, pro- respect for human dignity (not respect for all ideas), and pro- politeness in dealing with others.
No, political correctness is something else altogether. It's about control and coercion, not manners. It's about suspicion and conformity, and it's about forcing agendas that not everyone accepts.
I am so, so sad for the purveyors (prisoners) of political correctness. They truly believe that they are shaping, effecting, and marching toward a golden age of social justice, a utopia of equality and harmony. What they are actually doing is killing discourse, killing human relationships, and ending the free-flow of ideas among people of goodwill. PC is a strait jacket on thought and speech, which is a barrier to real human intimacy.
PC is enslavement, and we've been warned about it for many decades. Remember George Orwell's classic book, 1984, published in 1949? Do students read that anymore? This, and other classic books like it, were cautionary tales, yet it appears a whole segment of society (including a whole lot of young Americans who have never seen life any other way) didn't heed the warning.
Last night I looked up Newspeak, the mandated new language forced on the populace in Orwell's novel:
Newspeak intended not only to force the populace to conform their thoughts and ideologies towards those of The Party, but to make it impossible to even conceive of any other point of view.
Thoughtcrime, a word used in the novel to describe the act of thinking socially unacceptable thoughts or holding opinions that are ideologically distinct from The Party’s.
Thought police, the term for the group in Nineteen Eighty-Four that monitored the populace for any signs of unorthodox thought or action.
Sounds a little too familiar, doesn't it?
I'm going to give you my rules for speech, for anyone who wants to talk to me or be my friend:
1. Be polite and respectful when in dialogue, but do not limit thoughtful discourse out of fear that an idea you have might "offend" another.
2. Black people/White people/Hispanic people/Asian people are all human beings and are allowed to comment and have opinions on any aspect of any human culture or human nature. I place no restrictions based on ethnicity or race. You all have free speech, without fear!
3. Women can comment on "men's issues", and men can comment on "women's issues." In fact, since men and women are human, you all can comment on any human issue whatsoever, without fear!
Basically, I have just given you your freedom. I have confirmed your human dignity. It is beautiful and joyful to be free, isn't it?
I will never in my life surrender my human dignity and my free conscience.
I have never felt like a victim (nope, not even as a woman in this land of the "war on women" -- I must have missed the memo), and I have never spoken the words or even implied, "You are not allowed to speak on that because you are a woman/man/Latina/African-American/Caucasian!"
I am a mother, I am middle-aged, and I have a longer perspective on what has come to pass recently in our society. Therefore, I am compelled to say this:
I am truly sad, even heartbroken, for all those who are growing up in a PC culture without knowing anything different. Not only are we less polite and more coarse as a society these days, but those slavishly committed to PC will find it a struggle to achieve interior joy. PC is a fearful, suspicious, closed-off place to be.
I wish and pray that the politically correct and perpetually offended could feel what freedom of speech and freedom in relationships -- the true and honest give-and-take of a human conversation -- feels like. Because it must take a lot of energy to stay in line with "approved" speech and thought, to constantly walk on eggshells wondering if one has a "right" to speak about or discuss an idea. And since the "rules" about exactly who can say exactly what are ever-changing and increasingly restrictive, the difficulty, division, and misery inherent in political correctness is only going to get worse.
Get out while you can! Run, I say!
Now, I imagine this post has been a "microaggression" to some, but as long as it's still legal for me to speak and write what is politically incorrect, I will continue to do so. And if I'm ever jailed for my "offenses" someday, I'll still be gloriously free in my mind, and that's no small thing.
