Political correctness run amok

[7Wannabe5]

Life is hardly worth living without the opportunity for lively debate, and how can one instigate lively debate if one is barred from making provocative comments? Therefore, I will jump on to the anti-PC end of the see-saw, but first make the observation that there is a difference between stating a true personal preference or emotional response that might offend (1), making an opinion-based generalization that can not be proved or disproved and may offend (2)and offering up a factual statement that may offend for peer review(3), and only (1) and (3) are strictly necessary for free speech and debate. For examples:

1) I do not feel happy when I observe somebody who tested as INTJ on the MBTI drowning chipmunks.
2) INTJ's are the worst because they are the type of heartless robot thugs who would most likely commit the heinous act of drowning a box full of chipmunks without compunction if the poor innocent creatures were found running around in their attic.
3) According to a survey and test administered by Save the Chipmunks, those who tested INTJ on the MBTI were most likely to openly admit to engaging in the practice of chipmunk drowning.

I am willing to take this stand even though I, myself, living and loving in a multi-cultural environment, have been made to feel some degree of pain or anger by comments such as:

1) White people do not know how to cook barbeque sauce. (Mildly irksome, but maybe true-ish?.)
2) Poetry written in the English language can not even be compared to Persian poetry. (Made me livid at first, but actually true on some level.)
3) You are a big Polish girl. ( "Tall American woman of 50% Polish heritage, puh-leeze. Do you think I just came from getting my ass slapped by the tavern spigot to shovel your turnips? Wait, don't answer that question." But, I didn't really mind that much because everybody knows that Jewish guys talk too much sh*t in bed.)
4) You look like somebody whose favorite movie would be "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" (Truth be told, I am still pretty damn bitter about this one.)

[jacob]

The soccer match insults reminds me of this ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flyting (yeah, epic rap battles go waaayyy back... and now I'll be spending the evening watching more battles ... Bonus link for 7wb5: It has both Detroit and muscles )

[7Wannabe5]

lol- fair shot.

[jennypenny]

I'm officially changing my position on PC culture.

I've been working with a reporter today who's covering the Million Student March. I can't believe the video, quotes, and tweets that have come in. I've never seen such manufactured injustice and outrage. Some has been intentional, some has been unintelligible, and some has been unintentionally hilarious. When I saw a quote from a student who said that masters degrees were racist because of the term "masters", I knew my days of arguing in favor of political correctness were over.

I'm also amused at the demand that college should be free. In one interview, they asked a student why it should be free. The woman replied that it wasn't fair that people should be in debt their whole lives just to go to college. Who told these kids that they should borrow all of that money in the first place? And why isn't a college kid smart enough to figure out the giant flaw in that argument for themselves, especially one from Amherst? (apologies, Zalo)

Nuts.

[GandK]

When I saw a quote from a student who said that masters degrees were racist because of the term "masters", I knew my days of arguing in favor of political correctness were over.

You're kidding.

[jennypenny]

No.

It's so frustrating because there are plenty of students with legitimate grievances who are being drowned out by people who just want to be part of the show.

[wood]

Screw political correctness and be respectful instead, I say.

In our house we've taken the opposite direction. If I want to kiss my wife, I tell her to "bring those nigga lips closer", and she frequently remarks to me on the dancefloor that my "white sense of rythm needs to be worked on". All with a big smile of course, we just laugh it off. People need to chill sometimes.

[Ego]

I've chuckled several time in the past week over the "NO MEDIA, SAFE SPACE" brouhaha.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXQkXXBqj_U

Bully-proof windows. Troll safe doors.

[GandK]

I thought of this thread when I spotted this on CNN today:

Mizzou, Yale and the culture of entitlement in colleges

This quote summed up the problem, IMO:

Erika Christakis [at Yale] wrote an email to students recommending radical advancement: Lighten up, academe, and trust students to pick out their get-ups. Christakis suggested that Halloween costumes should be allowed to scare people and, in ghastly moments, even offend them. She wrote, "Free speech and the ability to tolerate offense are the hallmarks of a free and open society."

Crazy talk, a student responded. "It is not about creating an intellectual space! It is not! Do you understand that? It's about creating a home here!"

Yeah... we wouldn't want intellectual space at a university like Yale. What the hell was she thinking.

I am deeply afraid for the future of America if the young people matriculating from the universities that have produced so many of our nations leaders are so damned fragile these days.

Also, I find it deeply amusing/disturbing that our increasingly "secular" society has an exponentially growing belief in the Fairness Fairy.

[Dragline]

Interesting podcast on the rise of the culture of victimhood: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2015/11/0 ... d-culture/

[jacob]

Eloi-burgers anyone?

[jennypenny]

I thought this Marine's tweet was a great response to the demand for a free college education ...


I wanted money for school, so I marched too... #millionstudentmarch
This one was about 25 miles... #USMC


Today's tweets from Mizzou students complaining that the spotlight is now on Paris are in poor taste. They are as bad as Lauricella's article in Ms comparing the sexual harassment US college women face with the sexual harassment women in the Middle East face.

[heyhey]

I have no idea what you are talking about with watermelons -to me a watermelon is a food and has no other meaning any more than broccoli or carrots - but to say this is offensive for me:
"When they played the Hun school" .. to you that may mean a specific school. To me it sounds anti-German.
The best thing is just to say as it is, and not use 'nicknames' for different nationalities.

[jennypenny]

I have no idea what you are talking about with watermelons -to me a watermelon is a food and has no other meaning any more than broccoli or carrots - but to say this is offensive for me:
"When they played the Hun school" .. to you that may mean a specific school. To me it sounds anti-German.
The best thing is just to say as it is, and not use 'nicknames' for different nationalities.

Sorry heyhey, I wasn't using a nickname. That's the actual name of the school. It is named after mathematician John Gale Hun ... http://www.hunschool.org

[heyhey]

OK!

[IlliniDave]

It's truly getting out of hand. There was the recent MSNBC host (forget her name) who apparently interrupted a guest because she was offended by the term "hard worker" because it hearkened back to slavery and slaves worked hard and were not rewarded for it (which of course is true). Therefore apparently, positing any connection between hard work and success is insensitive and should be censored lest people be offended.

I agree about the tactless whining that the Mizzou students are doing over having to share media attention with Paris, and the ongoing attempts by some (dunno if it's students or the professional offendees) to continue to propagate the narrative of a recent KKK attack that was fabricated. Political correctness of course shields all that from any sort of scrutiny.

I recently made a statement on FB, intended to encourage my mother during her chemo, about making the best of things despite difficult circumstances. I was promptly descended upon and excoriated by a couple "progressive" friends, who recently detected that I am a moderate and on a couple issues lean rightward, and thought it was awful and insensitive of me to think that way much less say something like that because I'm a white, educated, heterosexual, male, natural born US citizen with no handicaps nor a criminal record. They caught me on a bad day and I didn't back down or even attempt being conciliatory. In truth, me calling them friends is probably no longer accurate. I failed their litmus test.

[heyhey]

.

[jennypenny]

@heyhey--I see you deleted your question, but I'm going to answer it anyway. The picture is of a person in basic training in the military. Many people in the US join the military to earn money for college through what's called the 'GI bill'. I thought it was a good example of someone who took the initiative to earn the money for college instead of whining that college should be free. There are obviously other ways of earning the money needed for college, but I thought that tweet got the point across succinctly.

Also, regarding the Hun School reference -- I admit I never made the connection between the name of the school and the fact that it's also a German slur. I live near Princeton, so the use of "Hun" is almost always a reference to the person I mentioned. It's similar to you (and other europeans) not getting the 'watermelon' reference, even though it has a racial overtone that goes back over a century in the US.

I think that gets back to the point of the thread. On this forum, I always assume the poster isn't trying to offend someone (unless, of course, they're trying to offend someone ). I'm glad you pointed out the Hun reference to me, and honestly, if I'd realized it I would have made it clear I was talking about the actual name of a school. That said, I hope people assumed I wasn't using it as a slur and make the same assumptions about everyone else here. Always assuming that a slight was intended is what the title of the thread is all about.

[enigmaT120]

I thought the mix up was funny.

[jennypenny]

I hadn't heard about the brouhaha at Yale over the use of "master" in the residential colleges. That must be the seed that started the debate over its use in educational settings. Grammarphobia did an article on it. It's a bit of a history lesson, but it's worth a read.