Political Correctness?

[AbandonedPixie]

What do you think about it? And are we going overboard with it?

Personally I think it's gone to far with stupid things like not being able to sing "Baa Baa Black Sheep"...it's a nursery rhyme why is it such an issue? And where my Dad works he isn't allowed to ask for a "Black" coffee it has to be "coffee without milk". I think it's become over the top.

[If this is in the wrong place, feel free to shift it]

[The One Who]

There's really very little need for political correctness. I could go on a rant about it but I'm not going to.

[BlindSpot.]

Haha. The coffee thing is so ridiculous. It is ****ing black! If someone called it n****r coffee i'd understand.

It's all stupid. Everyone i know who is in a certain 'minority' group hasn't got a problem with these things and only notice they could be meant that way when we're suddenly not allowed to say it.

Ali xox

[Sharloid.]

Banks in Blackburn took posters of piggy banks out of their windows incase they offended muslims.
Lol.

[[Purple_Rain]]

we now have to call brainstorms 'thought showers'

i know someone who gets these, and they couldnt care less at the term brain storm beign used. they're acutally peeded of about the government tryign to interfere and be 'understanding'

[Caru y Nos]

Political correctness only creates resentment, hostility, and hate;
aimed towards the sects of society which government seperates out, and says 'they maybe offended'.

Divide and conquer springs to mind :P They create the mirage a problem so they can appear to solve it :D


There are lots of things that bug me, political correctness been one, as well as been insultive to others.
A person striving to be PC, just means they're out for themselves to me!!! ;]

[sweet_pain]

In Canada, well Toronto at least, they are trying to make everything more excepting. Not necesarilly a bad thing. But we are not allowed to say "Merry Christmas", there was a christmas tree in some goverment building and they were forced to move it to take it down. As the government is trying to support other religions, they are quieting others. You have to either let everything happen, or let nothing happen. You can't pick and choose which holidays you will allow and which you will not.

[~invisible~girl~]

It's ridiculous. Using "politically correct" words really has very little to do with true tolerance anyway. Obviously using derogatory epithets or slurs isn't okay, but to start banning words that have a legitimate meaning, and aren't even offensive in any context makes no sense at all. To use race as an example... obviously it's not okay to use the n word in any context, but as far as describing someone as "black," it all depends on how it's used - it's entirely possible to make offensive generalizations about black people, but that doesn't have anything to do with the word itself... most of the black people I know describe themselves as "black," but the PC term is still "African American" even though not all black people are from Africa, and it doesn't leave any way to talk about black people outside of the US. With something like the n word that's used exclusively as a derogatory slur, there's no context in which it wouldn't have that implication, but neutral words are simply not offensive just because they can theoretically be used in the context of an offensive statement.

And the brainstorm thing makes no sense - besides that it's actually a positive thing anyway, the term really has no relation to epilepsy. If "brainstorm" were actually a medical term, and had been before it came to be used to describe a creative process, that might be different, but it's not. Just because it sounds like it could conceivably describe a seizure doesn't make it offensive. Lots of words sound like they could describe something other than what they actually do.

[linder surprise]

i don't care about political correctness. not that i don't care about using it, i don't care that the government is.. "making us" do it.
it seems like i am the only one.
i'm so sick of hearing people complaining about it when it's just like boo hoo, so what.. whatever.

[AbandonedPixie]

I don't understand why they are trying to make us more accepting to other religions and when people move to England from other coutries, sure welcome them but don't change everything. England is England and we are how we are I don't get why the government feels the need to change it and adapt it so people fit it...they moved to our country so technically shouldn't they change to fit in with us?

[LadyMacbeth]

I agree with Linda. I think people moan too much when it's really not that bad. Most of these are random incidents as opposed to political correctness taken over. I go to a school that is 90% non white and we seriously have none of this stuff. It's like scaremongering. But not cause it's not scary. And even if it's true so what. It's not really going to kill you.

[Ratatouille strychnine]

From a previous thread i made about a similar issue:

"I’ve been wondering for a while why there is such a taboo over certain specific words in the English language. Why do people take offence at certain words and not at others that mean the same thing? At the end of the day they are still words like any other. Words are neutral. Words are innocent. I don’t believe in bad words and bad language. It is the context they are used in and the intention behind their use that makes them good or bad. For example, if you take the word “nigger”. We aren’t offended when Eddie Murphy or Richard Pryor uses the word because we know they’re not racist.

Why is the s word so much more offensive than crap? They are both slang words that mean the same thing. Why is the c-word so offensive and yet vagina is perfectly acceptable? If you look at where the word vagina comes from, you’ll find it comes from the French word for a scabbard. That’s why in French it is a masculine word. Why is it inoffensive to name the vagina after the housing of a piece of weaponry (implied to be the penis) and yet the c-word causes such outrage?

At the end of the day, these are words that have evolved and developed as any other words. We can’t be afraid of words that speak the truth; even if it’s in unpleasant truth like there’s a bigot and a racist somewhere in pretty much any street in the world.

We have a lot of trouble dealing with reality so we’ve invented a soft language to protect ourselves from it and it seems to be getting worse. To give an example, take the word shellshock. It is the name of a very common condition in combat where a fighting person is under so much stress and anxiety and the trauma of what they have seen have just become too much. It was called shellshock. That has two syllables. It’s short. It describes the condition well. Yet during world War Two the very same condition was called “Battle Fatigue”. We’re up to four syllables now and the words themselves are losing their meaning. Fatigue is a nicer word than shock. It doesn’t sound so bad. It doesn’t seem to hurt as much. By the Korean War, the very same combat condition was called “Operational exhaustion”. We’re now up to eight syllables and the pain is completely buried under jargon. Operational exhaustion sounds like something that might happen to your car. Then by the the Vietnam War, they decided to change the name again to Post traumatic Stress Disorder. If it was still being called Shellshock, those Vietnam veterans might have got the treatment they needed at the time

I don’t see the need for all the euphemistic language in common use today. Why is the word “cripple” so offensive? I can find no shame attached to it in any dictionary. It doesn’t take five minutes to describe that condition. But we don’t have any cripples any more. We have “physically challenged” or “differently abled”. One of my best friends from university is a wheelchair user and I have the utmost respect for what she has to put with every day but changing the name of her condition to something softer and nicer doesn’t change the condition at all. Whatever you call people like my friend, they still have to go through the same things every day.

If people start to use words like “cripple” or “Nigger” commonly and with no stigma or offence intended by it (and those words were commonly used only 3-4 decades ago) then I don’t see why they can’t be accepted back into our language as legitimate words without any intrinsic offence implied by them. And if that were to happen, would that not be better as it would mean that there are no words left for those people who do use those words with malice and intent to hurt the person the directed at and wouldn’t that be a victory against racism and bigotry? I think the politically correct obsession with language and obscenity is actually perpetuating the very problem they are trying to eliminate because they reinforce the stigma attached to certain words and so reinforce the offence they can cause."


And I didn't use the words themselves purely because it censors my post and I wanted to be clear which words I was referring to.

[mesmerized.]

It's ridiculous. And I do see it as a big deal. Because it isn't about being more accepting at all, it's nothing to do with being tolerant. It's to do with making everyone conform to a certain set of opinions and be ridiculously over-cautious in everything they say.
Why shouldn't I be allowed to use the word 'black', for example? It's a ****ing description, it's not offensive.
And if I want to wish someone 'Merry Christmas', then why on earth shouldn't I be able to? Other religions can celebrate whatever they like, but I am a Christian and I celebrate the Incarnation of Christ.
And if I want to have an opinion that isn't 'politically correct' then why can't I? I'm not offensive about it, I would just prefer it if the thought police didn't try to control my every thought.

It does matter. Because trying to censor what people think is always dangerous.

I'm avidly against political correctness but I also try to respect people's wishes...or at least the wishes of those I care about. Like my mom, for example, hates the n word. Understandably so, since we're black. I've learned to not use that word at all, especially around her. But I do find it pretty funny when I had to teach my boyfriend (who's Puerto Rican and has never associated with many blacks) that calling me a "black" person is okay, and that I prefer it over "African American."
I've never really been the type of person to censor myself excessively, just because I wasn't raised that way. It is possible to speak/act honestly and realistically as well as respectfully.

The world is a bit bonkers really!

I just think we should all be respectful of others. Maybe one day that will happen. I don't know.

Pointless story. When I was at home working at Easter this obnoxious girl (I know her, she is a bitch..simple as) came in and was saying something stupid and used the derogatory word for Chinese people. I physically wanted to jump over the counter and slap her. I'm not sure if she saw the Chinese girl I was serving or not, but I gave her a look of disgust. Stupid bitch.

People throw around words without thinking. As for banning certain nursery rhymes..I don't get it. It was perfectly fine when I was a kid!

[this too shall pass]

quoted in the guardian pg 13 today

"remove the additives from products including sweets, cakes, ethnic minority seasonings and mushy peas"

do we now have to repect the race and other diffences of our food products now? will their be calls for equal opportunities, how would this be implemented?

surely a seasoning is either just a seasoning or it is a mix of products therefore termed for example 'indian seasoning', 'morrocan spices' and so on

the world has gone mad

[Caru y Nos]

^

LOL, the guardian! :P

[TimesLikeThese]

Apparently we can't even say "Snow White and the seven Dwarves", it's now "Snow Coloured and the seven Vertically Challenged".

Daft, or what?

xx

[Caru y Nos]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamCatchMe--

Apparently we can't even say "Snow White and the seven Dwarves", it's now "Snow Coloured and the seven Vertically Challenged".

Daft, or what?

xx

LMFAO!!!

[LadyMacbeth]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Domicile of Madness

^

LOL, the guardian! :P

How dare you laugh at the wonderful guardian. =P

An d no offence to people who have posted in the thread but I am laughing. The whole thing appears a bit over-the-top. It's very amusing but people getting righteous about the issues...odd.