# Political correctness - do we really need it?



## Trina

I do not know if this is as rife in other countries, but here political correctness seems to be getting out-of-hand. 

 In fairness, the idea was well-meaning. Our language should be changed so as not to offend. Derogatory labelling should be abolished but when we start replacing the word "blackboard" with "chalkboard" so as not to offend people with dark skin, I believe we are taking it too far. (I can't begin to think what we should replace whiteboard with! ... perhaps non-permanentmarkerboard  )

Do people with dark coloured skin find "blackboard" offensive? I doubt it. 
  
Another example:
"height-challenged " (what is wrong with short?) At 5ft 5, I much prefer to be called short rather than height-challenged. (Having said that,  Randy Newman's song is not on my playlist)
xxx-challenged  seems to me, insulting.


Are we really this sensitive? Do we really need this protection?


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## ElaineG

Where did you come across those examples?

My best friend teaches in the inner-city here in Brooklyn.  She assures me that it is still called a blackboard.

I've never heard anyone say height-challenged except as a joke.

Have you found those terms being used seriously where you are?


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## Trina

I don't mean this is happening everywhere (in Sydney), but every now and then you read or hear of a school that adopts it. 

As for being "used seriously",  I suppose that is rather subjective. 
To the advocates of political correctness, I am certain they are using it seriously . 
To me, I find it idiotic. (seriously-challenged?)

These were just a couple of examples which sprang to mind. 
"Atmosphere"  = movie extras (actors)
"Wait person" = instead of waitress or waiter


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## cuchuflete

We have had many other threads on this topic.  Rather than starting over, I suggest you use the Search function to find one of them—I've participated in or started quite a few on this topic— and add your thoughts to an existing conversation.

regards,
Cuchuflete
(Who chokes on the excesses of pulliticul kerrectitude)


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## cuchuflete

Here are a few of the existing threads that address the topic:

(There are many more!)
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=119239

http://forum.wordreference.com/showp...6&postcount=18

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=55264

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=19416


http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=18693


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## cuchuflete

What do the beneficiaries of PC language have to say?

 Gaaawp!


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## cuchuflete

> Gender is a grammatical term that refers to the classification by which nouns are grouped and inflected. Sex refers to the divisions into which people, male and female, or animals and plants, are divided with reference to their reproductive functions. I have no idea why it's politically more correct to use the term gender rather than sex or to use gender interchangeably with sex, but it'd sure sound strange if one were overhead saying, *"I was having gender with my wife last night when the phone rang."*


source


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## Kajjo

I am a vocal opponent of political correctness. I believe it is important to directly, clearly and precisely be able and allowed to say what you think. Of course, it is desirable to avoid to insult, to be derogatory or offensive, but things should be called what they are.

Many political correct terms are so "avoiding" that they are in itself insulting, because you could think the subject to be avoided is so horrible in itself.

Kajjo


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## emma42

Of course he has an "idea" why people choose to say "gender" instead of "sex".  It's because "sex" makes people think of sexual activity.  I think this relatively new definition of "gender" is a very useful one.  This is borne out by the fact that so many people use it in this way.  Quoting etymology and original uses merely makes opponents of such evolution look stuffy.

And my phone often rings when I'm having gender.


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## emma42

Kajjo, I totally agree with what you have said in Post #8.

The problem I find is that "political correctness" means different things to different people.  For example, the right-wing press in England tends to  leap on any initiative, linguistic or otherwise, to lessen discriminatory practices, and call it "political correctness".  A potentially useful initiative may be put side by side with a silly and misleading idea - such as a call to outlaw the use of words such as "blackboard" - thereby trivialising any real attempt to deal with unfair discriminatory practices.  

So, I try to avoid the term "political correctness" altogether.  If someone wishes to discuss the concept, I will ask them to be specific.


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## la reine victoria

emma42 said:


> And my phone often rings when I'm having gender.


 


The earth always moves for me when I'm having gender.  

Political correctness has reached such ridiculous heights over here that we can no longer say we have free speech.




LRV


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## Paulfromitaly

la reine victoria said:


> Political correctness has reached such ridiculous heights over here that we can no longer say we have free speech.
> 
> LRV



I do agree: nowadays some people have heightened the political correctness  to such a ridiculous level that it's been reached a paradox: they can be more offensive speaking through incomprehensible circumlocutions than actually explaining the concepts they have in mind in a simple way, doing it by using the proper yet possibly unfair words.


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## TimeHP

If we are well-disposed towards our neighbour, political correctness is useless. If we aren't, it's a hypocritical attitude.
Nevertheless there are a lot of intolerant people in the world and I probably support better hipocrisy than racism and intolerance... 

Ciao


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## Kajjo

TimeHP said:


> If we are well-disposed towards our neighbour, political correctness is useless. If we aren't, it's a hypocritical attitude.


I agree.



> I probably support better hipocrisy than racism and intolerance.


I don't think so. Supporting hypocrisy does disguise and subsequently support hidden racism and intolerance. While neither sort is good, I prefer the open form rather the disguised one. The former is easier to recognise, to be opposed to and to deal with.

Kajjo


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## TimeHP

What I meant Kajjio is that I prefer, say, that people - pretending to be democratic and correct - engage someone who could be discriminated,  
much more than people that refuse to give a work, a house or whatever else to someone they don't like.

Hypocrisy is a problem that the hypocrites have to deal with.

Intolerance is a problem for everyone.

Ciao


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## Brioche

> Gender is a grammatical term that refers to the classification by which nouns are grouped and inflected. Sex refers to the divisions into which people, male and female, or animals and plants, are divided with reference to their reproductive functions. I have no idea why it's politically more correct to use the term gender rather than sex or to use gender interchangeably with sex, but it'd sure sound strange if one were overhead saying, *"I was having gender with my wife last night when the phone rang."*


 
The Womyn's Studies brigade acknowledges that sex is natural, but contends that the roles which males and females play in society are artificial, unnatural and the result of socialisation.

The moon in German is masculine, but feminine in French. Similarly, the sun is feminine in German, but masculine in French. For one branch of Womyn's Studies, masculinity and femininity in people are constructs, just as contrived as gender in language.

So when such people talk about_ gender_ they mean to deny that there is any link between biological sex and sociological gender.


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## emma42

May I ask what you mean by the "Womyn's [sic] Studies brigade"?

Also, you have misspelt "women's".


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## Brioche

emma42 said:


> May I ask what you mean by the "Womyn's [sic] Studies brigade"?
> 
> Also, you have misspelt "women's".


 
You must have lead a sheltered life, if you haven't come across the word Womyn! 

Quote from Wikipedia:
_*Womyn* is one of a number of alternate spellings which some promote as a way to remove the perception of gender bias from the English word _women_. Other variants include wimmin (plural), wom!n, womban and womon (singular)._
 
_The earliest use of the term "womyn" attested in the OED is in the name of a 1975 "womyn's festival" ..._
 
The Womyn's Studies brigade are those persons who subscribe to, and seek to impose,  the ideology exemplified by the use of such a alternate spelling.


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## cuchuflete

More on the elusive Womyn's Studies matter: I spent about half an hour looking at Google entries, and it appears to be used mostly by those taking satiric pokes at the idea of Women's Studies.  It is often listed together with basket weaving.  Many of the citations are from Limbosian blogs which fulminate against anything that has happend to upset the perfect world order of the Eisenhower-John Foster Dulles era.


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## Chaska Ñawi

"Womyn" showed up most regularly (and tediously) in the eighties in Canadian university circles, although not in official uiversity documents.  The same people who insisted on using "womyn" also, with a complete lack of etymological understanding, substituted the word "herstory" for history.


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## ireney

Chaska you _must_ be kidding! This goes far beyond the plain of PC talk! Although I disagree with the whole "someone forgot their umbrella" buisness I can see a point to this. But a) it's mind boggling to think that someone would make "history" into "herstory" (I just cannot stop laughing!) b) why is it OK to call something herstory? Why not "theirstory"?


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## maxiogee

ireney said:


> Chaska you _must_ be kidding! This goes far beyond the plain of PC talk! Although I disagree with the whole "someone forgot their umbrella" buisness I can see a point to this. But a) it's mind boggling to think that someone would make "history" into "herstory" (I just cannot stop laughing!) b) why is it OK to call something herstory? Why not "theirstory"?



Better yet, let's be all-inclusive and call it ourstory, then we can let people's natural casualness of pronunciation bring it all to its logical conclusion.


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## cuchuflete

maxiogee said:


> Better yet, let's be all-inclusive and call it ourstory, then we can let people's natural casualness of pronunciation bring it all to its logical conclusion.



In some variants of spoken English, that might be offensive to
oysters!  Why should they have to be held accountable for the foolishness done by mankind allinclusivehumanoidkind.


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## emma42

Really, cuchuflete, you could have just said "humanity".

I remember seeing "herstory" over and over again the first time I read "Spare rib".  I was astounded.  I agree it is probably ridiculous, but I do baulk at this wholesale contempt for a certain kind of feminism.  Without some of these people, women might be in  a worse position than they are today.


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## cuchuflete

Is the contempt for any kind of feminism, or for silly distortions of language that make some kinds of feminism appear raucously foolish, and give Neanderthals something to make fun of?


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## emma42

I agree, cuchuflete, but my point is that Neanderthals don't need any excuse to have a go at any kind of feminism, and I just like to examine the motives of each group before wholesale condemnation.


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## mytwolangs

Trina said:


> I
> Do people with dark coloured skin find "blackboard" offensive? I doubt it.
> 
> Are we really this sensitive? Do we really need this protection?


 
Probably, we cannot do anything to their liking anyways.
We could call it "board of color, board of ethnic background" or something...

Look, no matter what one says, some sensitive a-hole is going to get offended.

The most fun way to aggrivate people is to say obnoxiously stupid thngs like that. 
You cannot say these words without angering someone - Black, white, brown, tan, any nationality word, hairy...


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## emma42

mytwolangs, what exactly do you mean by "Probably, we cannot do anything to their liking anyways"?  Who is "their"?

Also, why would you want to aggravate people?


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## Trina

Chaska Ñawi said:


> [...] substituted the word "herstory" for history.


Personally, I would vote for "itstory" (I know it should be double S but that looks messy)

Recently I was at a party and someone told a joke which would be considered politically incorrect by the advocates of PC. The reactions were interesting. Most found the joke hilarious but there were some who were either shocked or pretended to be. One person was outraged.
Jokes poke fun at various people all the time. There probably isn't a person who doesn't fit into some joke category whether it be by race, haircolour, profession, or simply where one lives. 
There are jokes in this forum which could be considered PinC (politically incorrect). http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=237368
My point is why can't we just see a joke for what it is?  Simply a joke. 

Earlier, LRV noted:


> Political correctness has reached such ridiculous heights over here that we can no longer say we have free speech.


It's ridiculous when we start having to think about every word that comes out of our mouths.


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## emma42

I don't have to think about every word that comes out of my mouth, but perhaps that's because I'm not a racist, homophobic, xenophobic, sexist, Telegraph/Daily Mail-reading bigot.


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## cuchuflete

What's the PC term for someone who is not challenged in any meaningful way?  Perfect?

What is the PC term for a good progressive who is intollerant of many, not all, conservatives?  Perfect?

Is perfection an acceptable term from the viewpoint of the pulitickly kerrect?  It is not especially inclusionary.  

OK, in deference to the PC crowd, I shall henceforth eschew the terms 'perfect' and 'perfection', as they might leave some fine person of great unrealized potential feeling just a bit excluded.  

PC definition of diversity:  (1) Allowing the presence and opinions of those who differ, but not very much, from my viewpoints.  (2) Inviting many people of different ethnic, religious, national, and physical types to be present when they agree with me.


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## la reine victoria

What is the PC term for someone who is big-headed? Hydrocephalic?





LRV


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## ireney

I am pretty sure "hydrocephalic" is not PC itself. I am not quite sure if using pretty to denote "quite" is though.

Anyway, we don't need PC talk. If one respects people who belong to different "groups" who are different from him/her in any way he or she will choose the proper way to address them anyway and will avoid any term that this "group" finds insulting. 

Other than that, whether you say about me that "I suck at math" or that I am "mathematically challenged" I still can't make heads or tails of trigonometry.


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## la reine victoria

> Ireney
> Anyway, we don't need PC talk.


 

But we do, Ireney. In the UK, which, as you wil know, has a very large number of immigrants from countries worldwide, there are still those who call people of a different race the most disgusting names. The same thing works in reverse - many black people call white people "white scum", for example (and that's quite mild).

There have been so many racially motivated attacks, rapes and murders that we have a law in place which makes it illegal to "incite racial hatred".

This article, in the Independent Newspaper, gives one something to think about. It deals with the need for a further strengthening of the law against racial hatred, based on the recent "not guilty" verdict of members of the BNP who were charged with this crime.

Every person in the world should be treated with equal respect, unless they prove themselves unworthy because of crimes they commit. Alas, in the UK, I fear this will never happen.



LRV


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## ireney

But the way I see it it's not PC not to call someone ugly names!
Not calling someone "white scum" or whatever is not a matter of PC talk or not. PC talk was not an issue when I asked my mom for a word I had heard and she told me what it means and that I should never use it because it's racist one and I shouldn't do it.
It's not a matter of being Politically correct (I never understood the choice of term all that well to tell you the truth by the way); it's a matter of respect.

Before PC was "invented" it was still wrong and punishable by law to call someone the Greek equivalent of   "nigger" because it's an insult and insults are punishable and wrong. I assume it's the same all over the world.

I don't know why this person wasn't convicted. I think however that it has nothing to do with what the law says but how people chose to interpret it. The law would probably be enough if these people didn't want to clear him. Unless we go back to iron laws that "regulate" free speech which can cause other problems I cannot see how a law can help. 

Changing people's way of thinking is maybe more difficult but definitely better and what we should aim at; If people don't say something but THINK it the end-results will not be really satisfying will they?


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## emma42

Ireney, I agree (!!).  I don't believe attitudes can be changed by forcing people to use certain words and terms.  Once attitudes have changed, language will follow.  How to change those attitudes, however, is another question and one which, if I were to discuss it here, would probably be off-topic.

Edit:  this refers to post #33.


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## emma42

Indeed, it has been illegal to call someone a n****r in this country, certainly since the Public Order Act 1968.  There are various Sections which would apply, including Section 5, which prohibits behaviour or talk "likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress".


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## Layzie

Being a minority, I'm rather lenient with my own use of language because it's somehow more acceptable coming from a non-white.I think that's bullshit. I'm rarely politically correct, and rather than be a hypocrite, I encourage any white/black/asian/whatever person that is talking with me to lighten up and speak whatever is on their mind. It's important to me because I discuss evolution, anthropology, sociology and psychology; so it's necessary for me to discuss things the way they are.


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## Hutschi

In Germany, we hav now a discussion wether it is appropriate to say "Unterschicht". The politicians introduced the new word "prekariat" for it as political correct word. But they do not change the environment.
They like to discuss rather than to do something that makes both words obsolete. 

They introduced the political correct word "Studierende" ("studyings") instead of "Studenten" (students) to make the gender neutral. Bur "Studierende" has other context, and in some context it is absurd (Nach dem Unfall waren einige Studierende tot. - after the accident some studying were dead) 

All this does not change anything in the society but the language.

I think, PC was a good idea, but lost its goal. Now it is only a satirical comedy, or tragedy sometimes.


Best regards
Bernd


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## Redisca

In a highly multicultural city like New York, politically correct lingo can have hilarious results.  It is preferable, for example, to say "African-American" rather than "black".  However, you will encounter plenty of people here who are black, but neither African nor American; still, the rules insist that you call them "African-American".  At the same time, you can find people who are both African and American, but white.  In that case, it is politically incorrect to refer to them as African-American, even though this is accurate.


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## emma42

Now, I did not know that, Redisca.  In England, "black" is the preferred word (obviously, it would not be African-American).  One can still hear older people using the word "coloured", but they are not necessarily racist.


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## Redisca

emma42 said:


> One can still hear older people using the word "coloured", but they are not necessarily racist.


Ooh, you wouldn't use "colored" here if you value your life.  Although, we still have the NAACP.


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## Trina

Something I have wondered about ... I know that "n****r" is considered derogatory but (if movies are anything to go by) why do African-Americans use the term (and not always in any insulting fashion)

This happens here in Australia as well. "Black" is considered  derogatory (I wonder if there ever will be a day when nobody gives a damn what colour skin anyone has) and Aboriginal was the acceptable word of choice. Now, Aboriginal is no longer acceptable and (for the moment?) Indigenous Australian is in. But Indigenous Australians refer to each other as "Blacks" and the rest of Australia as "Whites".

Another thing that amazes me is that if a crime is committed by a "caucasian" this is broadcasted by the media. If a crime is committed by a non-caucasian their ethnicity is often not revealed (so as not to offend that particular community). Usually the only inkling we have of the criminal's ethnicity is taken from where the crime was committed.


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## emma42

I understand that black people use the "n" word amongst themselves because they have "reclaimed" it for themselves.

I wondered if you still had the NAACP.  "Coloured" is not considered acceptable here either, but, as I have said, some people of a certain age still use it because it is a word with which they have grown up, and it is not by any means always used in a racist way.


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