DMan Disclaimer: This is a political rant. I am conservative and proud of it.

The term political correctness in my mind means the suppression of conservative opinion. You see, in today's political world, mudslinging, slander and defamation plays a big part. Really, in the age of TV politics, and all those people who watch TV and are so easily influenced by ads, whoever gets less slandered wins. Of course all the ads are aimed negatively toward the opponent.

That's all well and good, until you realize that the American press is inherently liberal. For a prime example, see dannye's node The Liberal Media In-Training. Any press institution that dares to present itself as conservative is immediately slammed as hatemongers, old-timers and ignorant bigots. It is funny how the liberal media always speaks of conservative smear while the liberals themselves are mudslinging like a pack of dirty hogs and it is alright because they are the "progressive group", arguing for "enlightenment of society". Yeah right.

You give me ONE GOOD REASON how liberalism is progressive. The word progressive was used in the old days when yes, the conservatives really were old-time bigots, who were blatantly racist and sexist and bad bad people. You see, those days are past. Conservatives today are just slightly different from the conservatives from days past. To label today's liberalism progressive is wrong. It is generally recessive (not all, in general), because it abandons logic and morality trying to achieve an impossible goal. Sure there are things liberals support that I am 100% for. But those are few and far between.

I have argued in a previous node that the press is more powerful than the government. Of course it is. Today's candidates, more than anything, aim to please the press for positive portrayal of themselves on TV, in the newspapers, on all forms of media. They need exposure to the people, after all, that is the only way to win. The problem is, due to the inherent leftism present in all media, the only way for conservative politicians to do that is to suppress their views and say what the press wants to hear, not what they really believe in.

In comes political correctness. This is the term widely used by society today to demonstrate the leftist intolerance for conservatism. It is society's attempt to hide the truth by putting it behind a veneer of politeness, or just banning it outright altogether to say it. It is hate speech to be anti-gay. It is old-timer to be pro-life. It is inconsiderate and cruel to cut social welfare benefits. If you believe the treehugger view to be radical you kill little cute baby seals on a daily basis. The list goes on and on. Blah blah blah.

That is why today only moderates and liberals get elected to office. You have to please the almighty machine for liberal agenda (also known as the press) to get elected, so you must be politically correct. Or prepare to be buried by torrents of mud. The press will destroy you.

I am not an fascist. I agree on some liberal stances. Just because I am an overall conservative, do I deserve to be labelled a "hatemonger" or a "bigot" or a "conservative bastard"? If you ask me, liberal slander is just politically incorrect as the perceived conservative smear.

Update: Am I racist? I am a minority member. Many of my friends are Jews. Yet I am conservative. Somehow. And no, where I live it is the gays who are the militants. I just ignore them and they call me "narrow-minded" for doing that.

Update 2: Nice node, Jet-Poop. Now for the response.

You might also check out pingouin's and my additions to that node for some fairly rigorous debunking of the opinions presented there. Of course, you'd prefer to ignore them, because they don't support your presumptions...

Just as you say that dannye's node is false, I think that article provides enough evidence for it to hold true, and your "debunking" to be dismissed. We all have different view. I am presenting mine that is all. And you are presenting yours. Your attitude is well appreciated.

About the conservatives in Congress, I don't think they are even conservative. They're all a bunch of moderates, just like Geroge W. Nothing wrong with moderates at least.

Seriously, DMan, making stuff up doesn't make it true.

Thanks, but your attitude is unneccessary. I find your writeup highly childish too.

Oh yeah, more conservatives holding office would be a good thing.

Certainly not. I prefer to label you a hatemonger, a bigot, and a conservative bastard (as well as troll and a whiny noder and a generally unpleasant dude) because I've actually read some of your nodes.

And fuck you too. I find you offensive, childish and rude as well. You could hold your obnixious attitude back in line a bit though. Have some manners please. Thank you.

Whiny eh? If you were a low-level noder whose nodes got barraged by - votes you would be bitching too. And don't call me a troll, you bleeding heart liberal moron.

It was meant to be sarcastic, Jet-Poop, if you haven't realized that.

the late, great jim henson had a wonderful rebutal to america's sudden concern over being PC. one of his 'monsters' did a public service announcement stating,
"we prefer to be called cosmetically challenged."

Jet-Poop,didn't you know you can't call African-Americans black? Thats not politically correct.

In most things I am liberal. However, PC is stupid. It was put forth by liberal groups, but it restricts free speech. That is the most important right there is IMHO. Restricting that in the name of being polite should be entirely internal. Granted, one should weight the external social cost of making statements that disagree with the general feeling of any group, but ideas should not have to be structured using only certain words. As far as I'm concerned, white guys are white, black guys are black, not Caucasian and African-American. Citing it is a cliche but in 1984, the government tried to force everyone to use the same words. This limits thought, and ideas.

I think its obvious that the press is liberal, but that's for another time. I think there are conservatives in Congress, but again, another time I may talk about that.

Restriction of speech and thought by anything, whether government, corporation, social trend, or taboo, is stupid. Therefore, PC is stupid.

Response to knifegirl

So you decided to use certain words because you didn't want to hurt someone, and thats a moral thing IMO. Yet, it was not forced on you. Notice what I said about social costs above.

And Yes I have been told not to call blacks black. Many times. I was given detention because I wouldn't call someone I'd been friends with for almost 5 years and who didn't care either way (I directly asked him) African-American instead of black. I threatened to go to private school, and they didn't want that because I am by public school's standards bright so it was let go. But I've had random people tell me the same thing, but none have ever been black. I don't consider calling someone black a slur.

Political correctness makes slurs bad not because they hurt people but because it goes against the accepted way of speaking. Again, thats why its stupid.

The purpose of civility and politeness is to make people comfortable and at ease. Part of civility is to not refer to people by names they (and, lets face it, you too!) find offensive. It has nothing to do with your political agenda, it is downright civilized behaviour. Any discourse, personal or public, that uses slander or offensive, diminutive and contemptuous phrases intentionally and repetatively is inciteful and non-democratic. One of the basic principles of democracy as I see it, is the ability to respect even your opponents.

Political Correctness is a way to avoid showing such disrespect even to your adversary.