Political Correctness

Neoconservatism sucks. Neoconservatives suck. But given the choice, I would rather wipe out political correctness than wipe out neoconservatism. A matter of priorities.

I really want to know exactly how Political Correctness happened. I assume its some unholy combination of Victorianism/Puritanism (removal from the body, clean, spotless), a desire for a lack of confrontation, and insecurity over the transition from melting pot to multiculturalism.

One of the things I’m pleased about in popular culture is an attack upon Political Correctness. Young people by and large are against it. Rap, Grunge, and Hip Hop culture all have a distinct anti-Political Correctness bias.

The reason I’m posting this now is my recent viewing of a quote in the movie Roger & Me by Bob Eubanks, which is the most direct pro-Politically Correct statement I’ve heard in a while…

note: This references The New Newlyweds Show, hosted by Bob Eubanks

Roger: What about questions like, “How heavy are your wife’s breasts?”

Bob: I’ve never asked that question. I will say “How much does your wife’s chest weigh?” But there’s a lot of difference in that question you just asked and a lot of… a hell of a lot of differences… and that’s where I think we get a bad rap… people like yourself will, will quote a question like that and I wouldn’t ask that question for anything in the world… I wouldn’t even say ‘breasts’.

I suppose that sums it up. The Pro-Political Correctness position sees a “hell of a lot of differences”, and prefers the less immediately apparent term. I see pretty much no difference and prefer the direct term, for the sake of simplicity and communication.

The Newlywed Show I see as an early reality TV show, the sort of thing that was a pre-cursor to Geraldo and Phil Donahue as well as later shows using the term. The show is embarrassing… asking personal questions of strangers and exploiting them for “entertainment” purposes.

Now… what exactly is going on? What exactly is the mindset that leads someone to “a hell of a lot of differences” between the heaviness of a woman’s chest (by which is clearly meant breasts) and the heaviness of a woman’s breasts?

Is it that the Politically Correct can convince themselves that there is a substantial difference, and then use “chest” instead of “breasts” to gain some sort of benefit?

If so, what benefit is that? Perhaps retaining their purity, their wholesomeness, while using a term that otherwise would soil?

If this is not an extreme example of hypocrisy, I’m not sure what is.

I’m not a big fan of Nick Berg’s beheadedness, or dead Iraqis or Americans in that conflict, but I must admit that if Bob Eubanks turned up without a head tomorrow, I would not be unhappy. Perhaps as a soccer ball or a doorstop, it can finally be put to good use.

Reader’s Digest condensed Koontz:

First, the Eubanks quote comes from a period when political correctness (a phrase so overused that it has lost almost all meaning) was hardly a consideration - it was more an issue of taste and audience sensibilities. Though there is undoubtedly some similarity in purpose here, the undergoing motivations between PC and appealing to a PG audience are completely different. One is consciously political, the other isn’t.

Second, I nominate:

I’m not a big fan of Nick Berg’s beheadedness

as the most awkward opening sentence in the ongoing Qt3 discussion of the war.

Troy

My opinion: it’s the expression of human nature, the natural swinging of the pendulum to the other extreme. We had the repressed, control-actions-through-coercion social sickness from the 40’s and 50’s, and now we’ve got the sanctimonious, control-actions-and-speech-through-condemnation-and-sometimes-legislation fascism of the 90’s held over from the 60’s as a replacement.

And, dood, Bob Eubanks? That’s the example of political correctness that comes to mind? Not the councilman in D.C. who was forced to resign his position because some nitwits got offended when he correctly used the word “niggardly” and chose to pressure him out of office rather than just look it up, or schools across the country being coerced into changing their name from “The Tigers” to “The School Supplies”?
Well, Bob Eubanks saying chest instead of breasts is cool too I guess.

Political Correctness develops with age. We all start out life being rebellious and questioning and then the burden of mortgages, illness, children, and marriages starts to weigh on us and we turn into intolerent fucks. :wink:

PC certainly gained awareness in the '90s, but it existed far before that (it was well known in the '80s and the website I’m linking to places it with the Baby Boomers). The Moore film with the Eubanks quote is from 1989.

Read This Website

I’ve always hated (many elements of) Baby Boomers and hated Political Correctness. After reading that website, I hate them both even more.

Political Correctness Must Die.

Check out the link. PC is a form of rebellion.

Oh, come on. Next you’ll be saying that ‘hotness’ is awkward. Or that it should not be used in a post that includes ‘Political Correctness’ out of rationing of the suffix ‘ness’. Also…

big… Berg… beheadedness

TSG: There he goes again with the wordplay!

Brian Koontz: Guilty as charged. {Bows head and shuffles away}

I don’t remember if this is the last word or not, but I believe the DC guy (who was actually an aide to Mayor Williams) was rehired about a month later, with apologies from everyone involved (except the guy who apparently never studied vocabulary for his SATs).

See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/williams/williams020499.htm

A fucking PC rant? WoooAOAOAHAOAOAHH it’s the fucking 80s all over again! Wasn’t George Carlin at Carnegie Hall a scream? Also: you’re stupid. I’m going to show you just how stupid you are, and in what ways. That sure isn’t PC, so it’s kind of like a didactic session of your newest bullpuckey thesis-fart. Using a famous search engine (I know you have no idea what the hell those are, but never mind), I snagged a site with a handy explanation of neoconservatism, since my knowledge of it wasn’t all that strong and yours, as usual, is nonfuckingexistant.

The neoconservative movement has always been a movement of university professors, literary figures (mainly in New York City), and, after 1980, non-profit think-tanks, which are located mainly in the New York City area and Washington. The neoconservatives moved from the halls of ivy or the canyons of New York City to the Washington beltway.

Oh, now I get the 80s time frame. Otherwise, I can also see why you don’t like it: professors, literary figures (what are those? Again, never mind), think-tankers. Crazy people who research stuff and like, think about it. A two-step process which you skip over Step One and step into, as always, Number Two. What does ANY of this have to do with any other damn thing you go on about in this post? Hmm, maybe neoconservatives support the war in Iraq, and you have a bit about that further down? Oh, okay.

No, you don’t. You make your gay little assumption next, and we all know that’s enough for you on any subject.

GET THEE BEHIND ME, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION!

Victorianism:

Like Elizabethan England, Victorian England saw great expansion of wealth, power, and culture. (What Victorian literary form do you think parallels Elizabethan drama in terms of both popularity and literary achievement?)

In science and technology, the Victorians invented the modern idea of invention – the notion that one can create solutions to problems, that man can create new means of bettering himself and his environment.

In religion, the Victorians experienced a great age of doubt, the first that called into question institutional Christianity on such a large scale. In literature and the other arts, the Victorians attempted to combine Romantic emphases upon self, emotion, and imagination with Neoclassical ones upon the public role of art and a corollary responsibility of the artist.

In ideology, politics, and society, the Victorians created astonishing innovation and change: democracy, feminism, unionization of workers, socialism, Marxism, and other modern movements took form. In fact, this age of Darwin, Marx, and Freud appears to be not only the first that experienced modern problems but also the first that attempted modern solutions. Victorian, in other words, can be taken to mean parent of the modern – and like most powerful parents, it provoked a powerful reaction against itself.

The Victorian age was not one, not single, simple, or unified, only in part because Victoria’s reign lasted so long that it comprised several periods. Above all, it was an age of paradox and power. The Catholicism of the Oxford Movement, the Evangelical movement, the spread of the Broad Church, and the rise of Utilitarianism, socialism, Darwinism, and scientific Agnosticism, were all in their own ways characteristically Victorian; as were the prophetic writings of Carlyle and Ruskin, the criticism of Arnold, and the empirical prose of Darwin and Huxley; as were the fantasy of George MacDonald and the realism of George Eliot and George Bernard Shaw.

More than anything else what makes Victorians Victorian is their sense of social responsibility, a basic attitude that obviously differentiates them from their immediate predecessors, the Romantics.

Just shooting from the hip as usual, aintcha Brian? Pretty progressive, those Victorians. But your dumb ass, like every other ignorant jagoff, equates “Victorian” with…well, whatever the hell you’re equating it with. Usually it’s sexual repression, missing how that translates to this retarded PC argument.

Puritanism:

Puritanism generally extended the thought of the English Reformation, with distinctive emphases on four convictions: (1) that personal salvation was entirely from God, (2) that the Bible provided the indispensable guide to life, (3) that the church should reflect the express teaching of Scripture, and (4) that society was one unified whole.
The Puritans believed that humankind was utterly dependent upon God for salvation. With their predecessors in England and with Luther and Calvin they believed that reconciliation with God came as a gift of his grace received by faith. They were Augustinians who regarded humans as sinners, unwilling and unable to meet the demands, or to enjoy the fellowship, of a righteous God apart from God’s gracious initiative.

But Puritans also made distinctive contributions to the general Reformed idea of salvation. They advocated a “plain style” of preaching, as exemplified in the masterful sermons of John Dod (1555 - 1645) and William Perkins (1558 - 1602), which was consciously designed to point out simply the broad way of destruction and the strait gate to heaven. They also placed a new emphasis on the process of conversion.

Again, taking the misguided layman’s definition for concepts you neither understand nor have bothered to read about. Just espousing your usual nonsense pap smears all over the place. You could posit the rise of the (in caps for your mental masturbatory pleasures) Litigation Nation for the PC surge, coupled with Affirmative Action / Gender Equality issues and wow my balls off, but nay.

This from a fruit who’d crap his didies if someone look crosseyed at him. You imply this is somehow bad, I take it?

What the fuck is the difference? Never mind, I’d rather not suffer through your absurd ad hoc definitions, they probably suck.

Earth to Brian Koontz: the Grunge movement died nearly ten fucking years ago. Additionally, the Grunge movement was more about angst and inner turmoil than guerrilla PC attacks, you nincompoop. Also, why did you list Hip-Hop and Rap seperately? I’m dying to hear your distinction, since it was important to make one and completely omit modern alt-rock, Nu-Metal, Rap-Metal, and assorted other anti-PC-themed musical genres. How about Sinatra? The Lady is a Tramp? How rude!

You suffer from Korsakov’s Dementia, and think you’re 12 years old and it’s 1983?

I just laughed my fucking colon up out of my mouth, intact and inverted. Say the bolded part again, Brian; please?

Jesus H. Ballsniffer, I had to look down and see if I was wearing bell-bottoms (note correct placement of hyphen) and communicating to you by mail. Tsk-ing a decades-old show? And it’s The Newlywed Game, you fucking dullard.

Oh Christ, some old geezer gets nailed with some dumbass anachronistic trite question from a bothersome fatty, and it’s supposed to buoy your latest cerebral flatulence? How old was Eubanks during the filming of Roger and Me, 150? The producers fed him his lines anyway, what the fuck?

The. Show. Is. Decades. Old.

Oh, maybe the Puritanical Victorian censors only allowed Bob to say “chest” and not “breast”? That took about a fraction of a nothingth of brain power to suggest. Do you ever really think about anything at all? This argument, discussion, theorem, hypothesis, whatever, is so goddamn ridiculous it should be in greasepaint and sweeping up spotlights under a big top.

In next week’s No Shit Weekly: Brian’s bolded sentence.

AAAAH! Topic Timequake!

50 years ago, an affable yet treacly gameshow host read silly lines to tittering couples for harmless placid enjoyment by the viewing audience. And Brian wants him dead. My nonexistant God Brian, you suck. With all your corpulence and social dysfunction and mild retardation, this is what gets your panties in a wad? Say it ain’t so, Joe.

Yes, I’m sure there are certainly examples you can point to that show instances where political correctness has gone too far. But, Brian, that link isn’t exactly making your case.

The set of values that are detested are those held by the previous generation (those who fought the Second World War ), which is why the terms niggers, coons, dagos, wogs, poofs, spastics and sheilas, have become heresy, for, in an act of infantile rebellion, their subject have become revered by the new generation. Political Correctness is merely the resentment of spoilt children directed against their parent’s values.

Is it more infantile to say “coon” or “poof” or to rebel against these values. Wait! I forgot - by rejecting those words, they are actually promoting them, right?

He also defends an ex-member of Australian Parliament who said (in her first speech of her term):

Today, 41 years later, I talk about the exact opposite – the privileges Aboriginals enjoy over other Australians. I have done research on benefits available only to Aboriginals and challenge anyone to tell me how Aboriginals are disadvantaged when they can obtain three and five per cent housing loans denied to non-Aboriginals.

Now I’ll cop to not knowing anything about Australian politics or much about Australia in general (except Rabbit-Proof Fence was a good movie :)), but this sounds suspiciously like Americans arguing that because of affirmative action and other programs, it is now whites who are discriminated against. Which is ridiculous.

Basically what the guy in your link is arguing, Brian, is that the decline of western civilization is apparent in the fact that we demonize people who use the pejorative “N-word”. That’s not what you’re arguing, is it?

Well, guys, since Brian will probably never answer us: how about them T-Wolves? W00t!

Actually responding to points that your opponents bring up is so… plebian.

my favorite un-pc line was from a ryan (tall guy with colorful shoes) on who’s line is it anyway? with the topic “unusual battle cries”:

“don’t shoot until you see the whites!”


Og kush

As I thought about this thread a little more, I sort of came to the conclusion that the funniest thing about it was the revelation that Bob Eubanks was cognizant of and tried to exclude content that would make the Newlywed Game seem lowbrow. Oh, Michael Moore, you inform us like no other obese, paranoid sloven who flunked out of college ever has!

But then I saw the B-Dung beatdown, and that was the funniest.

And then there was this gem, which is the winner:

this sounds suspiciously like Americans arguing that because of affirmative action and other programs, it is now whites who are discriminated against. Which is ridiculous.

Yes, quite. Laws that require discrimination based on race clearly do not lead to discrimination based on race. To think otherwise is ridiculous.

Oh and yeah, go Timberwolves - get Sam a pacemaker for his 75 year old lumbar.

I knew that was a mistake to put in as is - I should have either clarified or omitted it entirely. Yes, obviously policies that differentiate treatment based on race are de facto discrimination.

What I was trying to respond to, though, is the claim made by Pauline Hanson (the Aussie parliamentarian) that because of, for example, some favorable housing loans policies it is actually the white Australians who are disadvantaged. That is, not just that this policy is more advantageous for Aborignals, rather that in general white people have less advantages.

So what I’m calling ridiculous was the assertation that the sum total of benefits given to minorities adds up to an overall disadvantage for whites.

Bill, Brian doesn’t have to know what something means to Know what it means, if you catch my drift. Much as he doesn’t have to watch movies to Watch them, or inject semen into women to Inject Semen into them. Brian’s the most totally virtual human being in these funny little forums; everything about him is inexpertly rigged and painted by a desperate mind sweating under the limelight, looking for some form of validation from the audience. And when the jeers finally can’t be twisted by his ears into applause, he tries to compare himself to better and more honest personalities: Jason M, Crypt, Anax, The Entity.

In the absurd and ultimately pointless deconstruction of relativity he calls his worldview, and what we call the childish egomania of a posturing shitheel, the only definitions that matter are those that Brian thinks he knows, and we should all be forced to negotiate language on those terms most conducive to his hapless desire to appear an intellectual giant. On a videogaming message board, no less.

Edit: I should add that Brian’s original post is probably the most shameless and blunt attempt he’s made to broach the idea that he some sort of impartial intellectual Solomon amid us rowdy heathens. Neoconservatism is the cause du jour of the Republicans, and Brian despises it! Political correctness is a banner for the Democrats, and Brian also hates that! ZERO SUM POLITICAL IMPARTIALITY HAS BEEN ACHIEVED; ENLIGHTENMENT IS FORTHCOMING. (Never mind that most conservatives on this board aren’t neocons, nor are most of the liberals PC advocates. To suggest such only encourages the sort of aimless pedantry that distracts from the more high-minded Koontzian perspective.) As a total non-sequitur, though, or as a trenchant parody of a college freshman philosophy student, his entire argument is brilliant, at least in the same sort of way the ramblings of Alzheimer’s patients might be interpreted as genius – Koontz-bashing provides its own credibly entertaining context entirely independent of the subject. Genius with a capital “G”, even!

How long until Koontz admits that he’s never actually watched the Newlywed game either?

Personally, I liked the idea of the suggestion for the 70’s show “Bill Cosby and Hitler!” that a audience member shouted out and they were about to do before the director stopped them.

Nice smackdown, Bill. Funniest post I’ve read in weeks.

That whole diatribe on DrCrypt’s Underground Army, intent and obsessive on getting Brian, Crypt’s “nemesis,” was the fucking silliest, funniest thing I’ve read in quite some time. I love a good Crypt beatdown as much as the next guy, and anyone can tell that blowing Brian out of the water takes no secret pacts or dedicated obsession. Maybe 15 minutes of post construction, mostly because Brain rambles on and I appreciate Crypt’s attention to every line. When a guy is digging a hole for himself so valiantly, that doesn’t mean you should waste the dirt in covering his ass up.

And this is where Brian and I have problems. The one-two punch of idiotic arrogance and ostrich head-plants when challenged are too much for me to abide. Never, not once has Brian responded to me. Do I care? No, it’s just an obvious crack in the facade, a peak behind the curtain of his malcontent dog and pony show that fools no one. I used to think Brian was respectable at least inthe sense that he weathered insults (especially Crypt’s) with ease; now, not only does he counter with paranoid ridiculous scenarios of persecution, he inappropriately insults those simply trying to argue a point with him, or proving him wrong. I’m not one to declare DERR INTARDNET VIKTERY when a guy stops posting during an argument, but Brian went running like a little hurt puppy after he was shut down in the 2001 thread and the extraterrestrial life thread, so he could in time defecate another stillborn thought into the forums, figuring we’d all have forgotten or something. His every post insists on ignoring every other post before it, as if we all really buy he’s intelligent or The Most Barf Gag Choke in Etc. and has never been shut down hard on a regular basis.

The kind of Genius that makes you stupid. Tough break for Brian.

If someone replaced Brian with a PHP script that took the name of a random movie from imdb.com and mixed in random words found in the talk.philosophy.misc and alt.flame usenet hierarchy, as well as chomsky.info, artbell.com and penny-arcade.com, would anyone notice?