From: monk-y@yabbs
To: dmonger@yabbs
Subject: re: PC
Date: Mon Aug 15 01:22:27 1994
I speak as a hyper-liberal.  As someone who would probably be called
PC.  As one of those dreaded "Tenured Radicals." As an "Illiberal
Educator." As one of those smart-ass, college campus, pseudo-hippie
Jansport-backpack-touting, Birkenstock-wearing, et cetera, et cetera

About five years ago, when the Gen X thing was just getting off the
ground as a summer cover story for Time, Newsweek, et al.,(these 
stories get heavy rotation in summer, I notice) I had a chance to watch
the whole PC thing accompany it.  Five years ago, PC was about 
being environmentally conscious, reacting against the Reagan 80's, 
in some (not all) cases, being pro-choice, pro-alternate lifestyle,
and a variety of other positions, most of which were receiving little
if any representation in our government.  We didn't want to burn down
our college president's house, but we did want him to know that making
money from investments in a country which operated under apartheid
did not represent our interests.

Nowadays, all that PC is good for is coming up with new euphemisms for
old problems, and I agree that it's over the top.  But I think Laelth's
point was not to call dmonger anti-anything, or make insinuations about
Natalie.  It was to call attention to the way that the "movement" has
been constructed through the media to point of parody and caricature.
When you judge us (and I guess I'll assume the mantle of PC, much as I
hate to) by _our_ actions, we've done plenty.  But on TV, and in the 
newrags, all you get are words. And the words you get are isolated
examples of the extremes, just as the actions/words of Jerry Falwell
hardly represent the mainstream of Christianity.  

Perhaps one point worth making is this: just because you choose not to
euphemize with the rest of the Puritans, you are not anti-.  But the way
the whole debate has been constructed, we are all made to feel as though
there are only the two options.  And if I recall Laelth's post correctly,
he was making the point that if we do restrict ourselves to those two
positions, he'd rather sit on the PC side of the fence, because it's
easier to live with euphemisms like "mentally challenged" and to work
for positive change, than it is to resist the whole package.  

_STOP_ I'm not accusing here.  I am explaining how he (and I, for that
matter) perceive the situation, and how _we_ respond to it.  If you do not
agree, it doesn't make you evil.  It makes you different.  But then, that
used to be the point that became PC, five years ago.  There aren't only
two positions, however much they want us to believe there are.  

Restlessly
The Monkey King, Great Sage, Equal to Heaven