Isn't being PC just a way of not being rude and trying to be fair?

Being PC is not about blurting out everything someone thinks of you. It is refraining from racist, sexist, stereotyped remarks about all others. Yes, it has gone too far in some respects, where people take offense at every little thing but better too much than too little if you want to get right down to it. What does “tell it like it is” really mean anyway?

One can tell it like it is without resorting to racist or sexist slams so those that think that telling it like it is gives them carte blanch to insult others based on race, sex, gender affiliation, etc. are nothing more than bigoted, classless, buffoons.

Fun story:
A female AFD politician recently called for the abolishment of “Political correctness” in one of her speeches, so in response to that, a satirical TV show called her a “Nazi Skank”.
So she sued the station for defamation.
She lost.

In my eyes, the behavior that some will call “PC” is really just people suggesting that others not be assholes, or people refusing to give others a platform upon which to be an asshole, when providing that platform was not an obligation in the first place.

Then people get all up in arms about their free speech, as if it’s being suppressed.

Nobody’s denying anyone the right to be an asshole, but rather suggesting that maybe you shouldn’t be an asshole, or that maybe there are consequences in life for being an asshole. The question I’m left to wonder is, why would you want to be an asshole so badly anyway? What does the world lose by being a little kinder to one another?

Free speech zones, trigger warnings and safe spaces is “PC” gone too far. When you can’t speak about the realities of life without being labeled as hateful then it is too much. The rest is as mentioned, simply being a decent human.

I’m not, like, a huge defender of trigger warnings or safe spaces or anything (and I don’t know what “free speech zones” are), so please just view this as me playing devil’s advocate: how do these things prevent you from being able to speak about the realities of life?

Asking for a trigger warning is just asking for a preface before your content. You can still say whatever you want, you’re just being asked to provide a content warning first.

As for safe spaces, does all speech have to be accepted everywhere? Are airports a safe space because you shouldn’t talk of bombs or explosions there? Would you barge into somebody’s home and insult them? Is it not okay to want to have someplace you can go and feel comfortable, such as your own home? You can still discuss “the realities of life” elsewhere.

These things don’t really feel like they’re infringing on any rights to me.

I’m really speaking about some of these things as they apply to trends in higher learning. Kids are not getting the whole picture, “PC” has been more about extremes and not really so much of telling people not to be jerks.

Please give some examples of things ”...that apply to trends in higher learning”, @ARE_you_kidding_me

I don’t know if things have changed drastically in the last 2 years, but there was no cry whatsoever for safe spaces or trigger warnings or whatever else at my college when I was there. I feel like a few incidents have been overhyped by the media and it really isn’t as much of an epidemic as some might think.

I agree and I would not call it an epidemic but it’s a growing trend.

@canidmajor https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safe-space

@ARE_you_kidding_me I know what a “safe space” is. Citing a Wiki article that says such things exist doesn“t indicate a “trend.”
Have you been personally negatively affected by someone being PC?

PC language seems to have gone overboard, and is actually even more insulting and smug than using “politically incorrect” words, especially because of that “I’m so nice and caring of you so I’ll give you these sour, despicable names to protect you from all the baddies” attitude.

Fake-ass cretins. No one asked for your “respect” so you can fuck off with the fake politeness.

My owner likes people being honest, not pretending to be nice. but she hates overly polite people in general, so…

And btw: using “nice” terms and controlling language in order not to hurt all the oversensitive drama queens is not going to change anything. People will still be whatever-ist assholes they always were, they will just find another way to insult. Language should be free and develop on it’s own. Change people’s mindsets and attitudes, not control their language.

The problem of course is that decency is so subjective. Each of us has our own parameters on what we find acceptable, as well as what we are willing to tolerate in the behavior of others. It seems to me that @Pandora is correct in stating that PC is just another way of labeling attitudes and behaviors within limits found acceptable to the herd at large. There is constant and turbulent warfare over those boundaries, because there are always folks wired to operate beyond those limits. It seems to me that the term PC is used derisively whenever those throwing it around feel it necessary to trivialize an issue that is in fact far from trivial for those targeted.

Yes it is and yes sometimes people take it to the extremes.

I’m so confused by the whole hubbub surrounding “PC Culture.” To me, it is exactly what you’ve described in your question, @Pandora, and nothing more. But then there are people who seem to use some of the concepts a little too liberally, or with a little too much triumphant zeal. And there are people who seem to have undue vehemence towards the whole concept… (For the record, I’m not referring to anyone on Fluther in either of those two descriptions. Just what I’ve seen in my own life or through other media.)

And so I just feel like the popular discussions surrounding the issue focus so much on the chaff-bathwater, while the wheat-baby of “let’s all be kind, okay? And how do we want to do that?” sits neglected in the corner. I don’t know. I’m just getting tired. It feels like the straw man version of the concept is, at least in some respects, overwhelming the actual concept?

Well, PC is as PC does. The right wing can whine and cry about “Lefties” going too far on the PC agenda, but I’ll tell you what – visit a conservative web site and offend any of them by “telling it like it is” on any of their hot button issues, then duck and cover. Unless you want to dance around issues like sane, sensible gun control legislation, or the extremes of Fundamentalist religion.

@NomoreY_A Who says it’s only the right wing that “whines”?

One does not need to be the part of a herd to be annoyed by the sheep.

Conservatives are just as adept at ignoring reality as the purveyors of PC culture are.
@canidmajor I have lost a few good friends because they became engrossed in being overtly PC.

I’ve joked before that I named the goose and duck barn at my friends ranch property ” China Town.”
Hey, it houses Peking ducks, white Chinese geese and one lone french goose. Toulouse Lautrec was the minority. haha

Depends on what you’re talking about. I like frank and honest talk. But some things people would say are honest and also reveal deep-seated prejudices, and some ways of speaking trample on other people in callous and indifferent ways.

So if clods can go ahead and say lewd and racist offensive crap in front of other people, well, ok, but are they ready to deal with the full-on impact of that?

And yeah, I wish the media and politicians would all be not PC if they’d also be honest. Which means saying all day long how fucking corrupt as sin most all of the bastards are, and how they should mostly be locked up and kicked out of office.

They probably don’t want to hear real gloves-off opinions about the quality of their Christianity, or the righteousness of their wars on drugs or terror, either.

But no, I reckon that brand of “anti-PC” anti-“liberal” folks don’t want the gloves off for the those kinds of honesty.

@Zaku Well of course not because, you know, it’s all about dishing it out but taking it is a whole ‘nother thing.

Fuck no. PC is a way of using peer pressure to force others to self censor. It is invariably invoked by passive aggressive attention whores who immediately fold in on themselves at the slightest disagreement, then run from the room screaming, “HATE SPEECH! HATE SPEECH!”

I’m social democrat.

If I were politically correct I’d not be who I am. There are folks who’d prefer I go PC all the way. How boring.

past! @Zaku I’m a Christian. Do you really believe all that stuff about me?

@avoice True, I have seen it on both sides. Left and Right. Their are times when people are being overly sensitive on both sides.

I’ve been attacked by the right and the left and the right when I ride that middle rail. I usually try to do it in a PC way. To get others to see that there may be slight cause on either side. Not because I believe one is right over the other but because not all things are clearly black and white. There are two sides to a story. I thing somewhere along the way, what was once called being a mature and respectful person (an adult) was changed to PC and became a dirty word. One for people to manipulate and use as a stone to smash each other over the head so they can have tantrums like an out of control child.

But to me. It still means to behave in an appropriate manner that is respectful of others.

Good etiquette is there for a reason and it suffices. There is no reason to politicise speech.

Fact: There are rude and crude people. Don’t force them to hide behind a veil of correctness. It is more usefull that they reveal themselves. Then you know who they are.

Question… Was “PC Culture” first used as a derisive term, or as a deliberate self-description? Because I remember “politically correct” and “political correctness” being used in different ways a decade or so ago. At least I think I do…

Nobody is asking anyone to hide. We are simply asking you to take responsibility. I think ARE_you_kidding_me is a cunt. I can totally say that.. At least I have the balls to not bitch if there are any repercussions.

Nobody really wants to live in a world where you are on pins and needles and have to tiptoe around everyones feelings. I don’t want to live in a world where you can’t call me a cunt without being called out for being insensitive to people who are less fortunate and were just simply born neck bearded cunts.

Just think what a mess we would be in if mind reading were a human attribute.

@snowberry No, I don’t think all that about you, and I didn’t mean my example of non-PC-ranting to be an opinion directed at all Christians. One of the disadvantages of ranting is that it tends not to communicate clearly. Rants seem so much clearer when one is spewing one’s own rant. Beyond that, the right/left Internet conversations such as @Pandora was asking about in this question (“people comment that they hate the left because they are always so PC”) tend to trample many people and collapse many ideas inaccurately even when they feel a bit like they’re getting at something true. I was trying to give an example of a non-PC counter-position. And, I was trying to say that it seems to me that the “people” who tend to post things like @Pandora mentioned tend to identify as “right”-wing and Christian, and tend to be ones who also have non-PC things in mind that they’d like to be free to say, which tend to seem extremely un-Christian to me.

All of which points to the good and constructive reasons for careful inoffensive phrasing, because when it’s well-done, it tends to avoid all of the above problems…

… but what is “well done”? Some audiences don’t understand or recognize some types of careful inoffensive phrasing, and may be angered by it and think of it as annoyingly “PC”. :-)

I can’t decide if I have the energy to weigh in on this, though I have a lot of feelings on the topic. lol. Fuck it, let’s do it.

The problem with our current “PC culture,” if you will, is that you have people like you or I who wish to encourage kindness and respect of others… and then you have people who want to control what other people say and think and feel entitled to do so because it is necessary to address systemic inequality, and we all tend to get lumped together.

I think that changing language requires education and understanding and time. For crying out loud, it’s 2017 and some people still use the “N” word, so, we also have to be realistic. I care about my words and how they affect others and I don’t like to dehumanize others (including people that most others are happy to dehumanize) but I fear that the current path of social activist groups is potentially harmful to the very people that we are trying to give a mic to. Political correctness often comes off as self-righteous, aggressive, condescending, and policing. And, whether right or wrong, most people don’t like being told what to do (especially what to say or think, which is a good thing, as thoughts and speech should not be restricted by law.) As a result, people become resistant and push back against things that they might otherwise be open to learning or changing on their own over time are less likely to be open to because they feel it’s being shoved down their throat.

So much about this past election has been incredibly eye opening to me as a person living in a swing state and in a swing county. People aren’t nearly as inaccessible or closed minded as a lot of others believe them to be, but they are also people (and calling them fragile or racist or bigots doesn’t really make our perspective more appealing.)

^^very much in agreement

Calling them “people” is political correctness run amok.

Wow, @ragingloli not very PC there.

@ragingloli You amuse me.
@ANef_is_Enuf I concur.
@Zaku You get me.

@Pandora I think PC has gone waaaaaaaaay overboard. And what others think of me is none of my business.

@si3tech I love that saying.

@Zaku I wouldn’t have been offended if you DID think that, or worse about me. There are folks here on Fluther who do, and have let me know it, quite clearly. But that’s their problem, because it’s not really me they’re mad at. I remind them of someone from their past or maybe I represent their experience of Christianity and it has absolutely nothing to do with me or what I believe.

Regarding PC culture, it’s supposed to be designed to avoid offending people. But I have found it much easier not to take offense where none was intended.

According to whom? You have a brain.