Opinion of people who unironically complain about political correctness?

[Lief 🗽]

HP, obviously.

This is of course the seminal work on political correctness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmsV1TuESrc#t=56s

[Antonio the Sixth]

Some extremities of political correctness can strike as a bit silly and ridiculous. But yeah, people who make a fuss about "free speech being menaced" are almost always horrible people.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

FF's, naturally.

[RedSLC]

I find that the most people who complain a lot about "political correctness" are either religious fundamentalists who attack anything that prevents them from enacting their religious beliefs into law as "political correctness", or are just outright bigots who justify themselves by saying something along the lines of "I'm just politically incorrect."

Both groups are HP, but the first group is the one that usually complains ironically, since they complain about "political correctness", yet themselves often engage in some form of censorship campaign against anything that doesn't conform to their beliefs.

[Mechaman]

Both groups are HP, but the first group is the one that usually complains ironically, since they complain about "political correctness", yet themselves often engage in some form of censorship campaign against anything that doesn't conform to their beliefs.

Yep, a lot of people who complain about "political correctness" are actually some of the most "politically correct" people.

[barfbag]

We should do ourselves a favor and practice being as politically incorrect as we can be.

[Mechaman]

We should do ourselves a favor and practice being as politically incorrect as we can be.

Sounds like a good plan.  Perhaps you should apply this kind of behavior on a test run basis and see how people respond to you.

I'm sure you'll make lots of friends this way.

[barfbag]

We should do ourselves a favor and practice being as politically incorrect as we can be.

Sounds like a good plan.  Perhaps you should apply this kind of behavior on a test run basis and see how people respond to you.

I'm sure you'll make lots of friends this way.

I'd be around the right crowd.

[rejectamenta]

I think they are usually well intentioned, but prone to hysterical outbursts about the constitution and free speech. Like that brown bag/citizen thing in Seattle - it's hard not to laugh and roll your eyes at upon first glance, but a reasonable person would realize in about five seconds that it's merely a suggestion to a subset of governmental employees who aren't under any obligation to give a s**t.

I think the dumbest example was from a year or two ago, when standardized tests were advised to remove culturally specific wording in their questions to eliminate any potential disadvantages for kids (mostly children of recent immigrants IIRC) who might not be so familiar with objects and scenarios that are second nature to most of us. People were crying about PC gone wild, and sure, maybe the anticipated culture shock was overblown, but it made perfect sense to me to go ahead and remove all doubt before it possibly became a problem. I'm hazy on specifics, so forgive me, but in retrospect it's difficult not to view those that bought into it as quasi-racists hungry for an opportunity to bag on immigrants and poors.

[barfbag]

political correctness= coded speech which doesn't upset any Democrats

[Lief 🗽]

political correctness= coded speech which doesn't upset any Democrats

Let's assume this definition is true. The question is then: why would you want to say things that you know upset other people?

[dead0man]

Seriously?  You never say something just to get a rise out of a certain group of people?

[Lief 🗽]

Seriously?  You never say something just to get a rise out of a certain group of people?

Sure, but the speech I use to get rises out of people doesn't insult or demean their historically marginalized immutable characteristics, which is what the anti-PC people are usually complaining about. I might call a conservative a fascist or a teabagger; that's very different from thinking its okay to use "retard" as an insult or calling a trans person by the gender they explicitly don't identify as, for example.

[barfbag]

political correctness= coded speech which doesn't upset any Democrats

Let's assume this definition is true. The question is then: why would you want to say things that you know upset other people?

I don't want to upset people but I won't allow my freedom of speech to be limited by Democrats. I'm not fat, I'm a person with a different life choice. It's not shell shock, it's battle fatigue, no wait it's operational exhaustion, up no it's post traumatic stress disorder. Notice how we're up to eight syllables. Our definitions keep getting totally removed from the situation and as a result we have a softer society. Soon we won't allow pets to be called pets but now animal companions.

[dead0man]

Seriously?  You never say something just to get a rise out of a certain group of people?

Sure, but the speech I use to get rises out of people doesn't insult or demean their historically marginalized immutable characteristics, which is what the anti-PC people are usually complaining about. I might call a conservative a fascist or a teabagger; that's very different from thinking its okay to use "retard" as an insult or calling a trans person by the gender they explicitly don't identify as, for example.

Even if somebody is being retarded or the tranny in question is generally a douche?

[opebo]

I'd be around the right crowd.

Coward.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Seriously?  You never say something just to get a rise out of a certain group of people?

Sure, but the speech I use to get rises out of people doesn't insult or demean their historically marginalized immutable characteristics, which is what the anti-PC people are usually complaining about. I might call a conservative a fascist or a teabagger; that's very different from thinking its okay to use "retard" as an insult or calling a trans person by the gender they explicitly don't identify as, for example.

Even if somebody is being retarded or the tranny in question is generally a douche?

There are thousands of ways to insult someone extremely harshly without using words that happen to insult an entire group of people for no reason.

[dead0man]

I understand what you're saying, at least in regards to "retarded" (or "gay" or whatever) and can agree with you in principle, but I just don't think it's something worth getting worked up over 99% of the time people get worked up over it.  I've known retarded people, hell, I've loved retarded people as I've been fairly close to several in my life.  I would certainly never want to offend a retarded person or their loved ones and I don't think calling someone acting stupid "retarded" does that.


(and I'm playing devil's advocate here more than anything.  "retarded" isn't a word I throw around very often and I currently don't know any trannys....douchebag or otherwise.  I think being an asshole is much worse than being stupid anyway....and I'm an expert at both )

[Mechaman]

Okay, time for some thread commentary:

In general, I'm not really a huge fan of advocating "political correctness".  To me it seems like kind of a waste of time.  Sure I will readily admit this is from the non-neutral POV of a White Anglo-Dutch-German-Irish-Swiss Middle Class Male from FLYOVER LAND who has never ever faced true hardship or oppression in his life.  I will readily admit that status of privilege that so blinds me to the struggles that the non-privileged face every day.

With that out of the way, let me say first what I'm not doing.  THis isn't a defense of being "politically incorrect".  Political "Incorrectness" sometimes DOES have it's place, but all too often it's abused.  If you're doing like the George Carlin ripoff routine where you are making fun of battle terminology regarding to being "shell shocked" or whatever the hell it's called now days, yeah that's all good and fun.  Calling someone a loser because they keep losing bets at the horse tracks is also okay.  In fact I would encourage that, because only losers gamble.
What isn't cool, however, is being an obnoxious loudmouth who just decides one day to throw around the "n" word to get a rise out of people.  Or to reword it, "while one has the right to yell "n!" in a crowded theater, it's not cool.  It's just not cool at all, man."  Granted, the Jew ran liberal establishment kind of goes insane with the PC mantra, freaking out over brown bags and sh*t, but lest us not forget that some "political incorrectness" is just not cool, dudes.

I will admit, I'm a pretty big offender when it comes to using words like "retarded", "gay", or even "f****t" in almost everyday conversations in pretty negative but not at all related to the way society thinks of it kind of ways.  Like in the IRC, I have a horrible habit of calling somebody who acts like a horrible GD POS a "f****t", regardless of whether or not they are homosexual.  In my defense, I didn't start saying "f****t" in the eighth grade while me and my buddies were going around beating up the homos during lunch.  No way were we into poof bashing, that's something that retarded harebrained redneck meth addicted football players did.  Our intellectual superiority was far above such base tendencies.  Usually, we would start throwing out the "fag"bombs while playing Xbox Halo over a LAN game when some cheating queefhole was waiting at all the respawn points and fragging us.
DOes our ignorance make it right?  I would probably say "no", though I do bring up the "retarded teenager's loophole" in my legal defense against the PC Mafia.  Surely, if they weren't bought and paid for by monied Bilderberg JewZIONIST! elites me and others wouldn't even have to make this kind of defense.  I mean, good lord settle down, bitches!

Anyway, be that as it may we need to be more respectful of other peoples and cultures.  Walking up to a minority and calling them a slur isn't cool.  Neither is making race jokes (even when you're with your hammered black Irish friends at Bogtrotters R'Us), which according to the Human Rights Association is just Step One to BECOMING NAZI GERMANY!  SURELY YOU DON'T WANT TO BECOME NAZI GERMANY RIGHT?!  STOP MAKING RACIST JOKES, YOU FUCKING POLITICALLY INCORRECT COCKSUCKERS!

Anyway, I kind of think there should be some sort of middle ground obviously.  Idiot cracker commentators on the radio who yell "nnnnn!" for shock value should be condemned.  And fired.  THat act is tired, stupid, and isn't a moneymaker.  Oh yeah, and it's extremely rude, racist, and bigoted.  I mean really, good lord guys, what possible excuse is there to use the "n" word?  Unless you want to make the compilation of "Dumbest White People Ever"?  Also, I don't really see how we should go easy on people who say they got "Jewed out" of their money.  I mean really, that's just ascribing stereotypes or some sh*t like that.
Which going back to my story from eighth grade, what gave me and my friends the right to call each other "f****ts" for using cheap assault rifle kills in Halo?  Well, if you want to be literal about it the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights does so nobody could arrest us for it.  However, I bet that a few homosexual individuals might feel that we were probably being a pain in the ass, what with our disrespectful ascribing of their national slur with our Halo games?

Before I start beating the dead horse over and over, let's actually do a serious critique of "political correctness" that goes back to my original point of it being kind of a waste of time.  We got issues like poverty, AIDS, the destruction of non-rich America, discriminatory law enforcement policies that result in a disturbing incarceration rate of non-whites in this country, a sh*tty judicial system that will give a white man 8 months (if not a get out of jail free card) for a crime that would get a black or hispanic man the needle, gay couples not having hospital visitation rights, women having their reproductive rights taken away from them, etc etc etc and we're losing our freaking sh*ts whenever someone says something that isn't politically correct?  Like it shocks us that something would happen in a nation with those kind of problems?
Perspective, my droogs.  Perspective!
This isn't to say that we roll over and encourage people to be politically incorrect, but to keep in mind why society is at a point where people still feel like saying things that are offensive.  Pouting over offensive words and jokes doesn't save society, attacking the evil root of the problem does.

I will now accept my accolades.

[barfbag]

I'd be around the right crowd.

Coward.

My point is that Democrats won't limit my freedom of speech. All else is rhetoric.

[morgieb]

Complaining about "free speech being destroyed" is pretty much a code word for racism. So I voted HP.

But in some ways political correctness has gone too far.

[DC Al Fine]

Way less annoying than the people who complain about it ironically.

[Torie]

I tend to laugh at PC derisively rather than complain about it myself - and of course rather assiduously make an effort to ignore that little convention. To me, janitors are still janitors, rather than sanitation engineers, and the human resources department is still the personnel department, and count me out for almost anything PC regarding anything affecting Greenness.

[opebo]

I tend to laugh at PC derisively rather than complain about it myself - and of course rather assiduously make an effort ignore that little convention. To me, janitors are still janitors, rather than sanitation engineers, and the human resources department is still the personnel department, and count me out for almost anything PC regarding anything affecting Greenness.

Well, sure, you're on the oppressing side in all of that.  But how about if someone calls you a fruit or a fairy?

[Torie]

I tend to laugh at PC derisively rather than complain about it myself - and of course rather assiduously make an effort ignore that little convention. To me, janitors are still janitors, rather than sanitation engineers, and the human resources department is still the personnel department, and count me out for almost anything PC regarding anything affecting Greenness.

Well, sure, you're on the oppressing side in all of that.  But how about if someone calls you a fruit or a fairy?

Fine with me. It's accurate.