From: dmonger@yabbs
To: laelth@yabbs
Subject: re: PC
Date: Sun Aug 14 15:33:09 1994

In message re: PC, laelth said:
> First off, let me say that I hate the term PC.  Some neo-nazi ideologue 
> came up with that term in order to give some liberal college professors a 
> bad name, and to degrade their thinking, their teaching, and their 
> argumentation.  And it worked ... too well.

no, i think its the way that this movement has implememted itself that 
degrades it.  I agree with the idea that you stated below, but not with the
superficial way in which i have seen it implemented, which has been by
trying to change the names and titles that we use for each other.

> But since we have no other way to "name" this phenomenon, then we might as 
> well call it PC, just so that we can communicate.  Basically, being PC 
> means standing up for all the traditionally oppressed groups in our world 
> and in our society.  It means defending the rights of women, of 
> minorities, of gays, of people with AIDS, people with disabilities, etc.  
> Is that such a bad thing?

The road to hell ... 

> Of course, most of the attacks against political correctness are masked 
> under the guise of protecting freedom of speech.  But let's face it, the 
> PC people are liberals.  They'll defend your right to say and to think 
> whatever you want. But what they won't defend is your continuing to 
> exploit and oppress the weaker members of our society.  I believe that 
> NAZIs have every right to pass out their literature, parade, and get 
> attention in any legal way, but I cannot condone racist ACTS.  No more 
> lynchings!

hmm, interesting.  name calling == lynching?  i don't know about this.
While i do agree that there are many terms used to describe minority groups
that could be deemed offensive, because they were associated with them 
in a negative form in the past.  But what's going to happen three years down
the road when someone decides that being called physically challenged is
now being used in an offensive context and thus is also degrading.  

the goal of the pc movement as i have seen it is to change people's perceptions
of these minorities (which is a good thing) only by changing the way we 
describe them.  It doesn't try to change their status, it doesn't really
try to break down stereotypes, it attacks the symptoms, not the disease.  

> It's very easy in our current political climate to be very anti-PC.  But I 
> ask you to consider that being anti-PC (for many) means being anti-women, 
> anti-minorities, anti-gay, and a lot of other ugly things.  

and being pro-choice makes you a baby killer.  Odd that this argument 
(which i don't really agree with) when applied to abortion is usually 
discounted.  non pc does not mean racist, there are many reasons other than
that to dislike the movement. 

> Is that really 
> what you want to be?  I mean really, who's the victim here?  Is it the 
> poor college student who's challenged by a liberal professor?  Or is it 
> women who are raped, African-Americans who are denied quality education, 
> gays who are beaten just for being gay, Jews who were gassed by the 
> millions this century?  At whom do you want to be angry?

or is it the person who is being told that they chose their words because they
are racist, sexist pigs, even when that isn't the case.

what does that have to do with the words i use.  If i spell woman instead of
womyn (something which was being argued about quite a bit on my campus for
a while), does that make me sexist.  If i call an 18 year old woman who acts
14 a girl, how am i saying anything against women?  But both of these are 
statements that i don't think the PC movement would disagree with.  

and i want to be angry at the hyper-liberals who have decided that they are
going to police my thoughts and language, and make decisions for me about what
i will say based on their perceptions of what is and what is not offensive.

I don't call black people black if they ask me not to.  I don't call them
by any of the more offensive terms unless they ask me to.  I use the term
men in cases where people claim i should say men/women, not because i only
picture men in the position of the subject, but because its sounds better to
me.

if you really want to call me anti gay, woman, minority, whatever feel free.
while i may find it offensive, it is your right to say and believe what you
want.  Enjoy it while it lasts

-peter