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Hi, my friend mentioned about political correctness today, and I am very curious about it. She mentioned the words like nigger (we use 'black people' now) and Chinks (we use 'Chinese people' now).
Could someone tell me what is political correctness? and Can you give me some other examples of a word or words that were used in the past but are not politically correct now? What word or words do people use now?
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in macy's department store: a department called "Macy's woman" (means oversized, fat, etc).
see also Wikipedia "Political correctness":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_correctness
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<<She mentioned the words like nigger (we use 'black people' now) and Chinks (we use 'Chinese people' now).>>
Those two words haven't been PC for the past 30 to 50 years! What does "your friend" mean by "now"???
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Hillary,
Political correctness seems to consist of a lot of new names and terminologies for things. For example, "Mobile home" for trailor home; "Myanmar" for Burma, "Beijing" for Peking; Saami for "Lapp / Lapplander"; "Gays" for homosexuals"; "Senior Citizens" for old people; "Native Americans" for American Indians; The physically challanged" for handicapped people; "People of Faith" for holy rollers and other types of Protestant religious conservatives; "People of Color" for non-Caucasians etc. There are even jokes about "sanitary engineers" being the politcally correct term for trashmen or garbage collectors and "Snow White And The Seven Gnomes" as political correctness for "Snow White And The Seven Dwarves."
There are various reasons for inventing politically correct terms. Most of them have come about with the well-meaning but misguided intentions of not offending anyone. This is ultimately an impossible dream. Some portions of any human language are always going to offend certain members of their societies no matter what you do.
Ironically, the word "political correctness" is itself a sort of politically correct term. Some of its more cynical critics prefer to call it "Double-Speak" rather than politcal correctness. This is the term that George Orwell more or less used for it in his famous novel "1984."
While political correctness would certainly disapprove of any derrogatory names for people ( Chink, Greaser, Limey, Kraut, Mick, Nigger, Queer, Spik etc.), objection to them actually pre-dates political correctness. Even when I was in the public school system in the 1950's and 60's and pc still wasn't around, American school kids were already being discouraged from using these words in public.
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Many terms were perfectly acceptable until the advent of "political correctness" a decade or two ago.
Exactly why some of these terms are considered unacceptable has never been satisfactorily explained, as they tend to be either simple abbreviations or Anglicisations of words themselves considered perfectly acceptable, or simple descriptive (and thus non-pejorative) words which have been in use for centuries.
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I asked an American friend and he said "African American" is used in most occasions instead of "Black people" now.
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Political Correctness is simply being polite, and having some manners in my opinion.
"Mobile Home" is not a politicaly correct term here in the UK, we use it as many times as we us caravan, its just a posh way of saying it.
The name changes for Burma and Peking are not politicaly correct ones, they're just name changes, your not going to offend some one by forgetting that the name has changed, Its like if you reffered to Eire, instead of the Republic of Ireland (the name was changed wasn't it?)
Senior Citizen is a mark of respect more than any thing, its similar to calling someone a pensioner. You wouldn't want to offend that generation would you? Native Americans instead of American Indians, well that is what they wan't to be referd to as, the other is offencive.
Saami was actualy a derogative term in Sweden, similar to Gypsy in my country being turned into "Gypo" by narrow minded idiots. But Saami is what they have been called for a long time, and it is a mark of respect to call refere to some one how they want to be.
"People of Colour" I don't like that one, bit dodgy to me.
"This is ultimately an impossible dream. Some portions of any human language are always going to offend certain members of their societies no matter what you do. "
If you refere to people how they want to be, you can't go wrong.
Now for "political correctness gone mad", normaly around Christian holidays this comes out. Now this is not Politicaly Correct to change names of holidays etc. and in fact is really offencive to other religions. Somewhere I heard Christmas being refered to as the "festival of lights", which actualy could mean either Hanukkah or Diwali. All my Hindu and Musslim friends enjoy Christmas, they send cards etc. it doesn't offend any one, to change the name does, it belittles every one.
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Queers are now called puffs.
Women are not called hoes.
BNP is the greatest political party.(just thought I'd mention it)
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I think it's difficult to keep up to date with words as the appropriate terms for particular groups change every 5-10 years.
"Cripples" became "spastics", then "handicapped", then "disabled", then "physically challenged" before ending up as "people with disabilities".
"Retards" became "remedial" or "backward" before they became "learning disabled". Now they are "people with learning difficulties".
I got into trouble last week for referring to "shanty towns" in South Africa. I was told that today they are referred to as unplanned erections or something equally absurd. "Unplanned erection" sounds like something pubescent schoolboys get!! I wouldn't mind but I learnt that term from Human Geography textbooks, it certainly wasn't derogatory when I was at school.
I blame the people who have an overwhelming compulsion to label everyone in the first place. The only people who should be labelled are those very same people...........twats!
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It's all very well to use terms that are inoffensive to various groups of people of whatever kind....that's only being polite and considerate, and displays acceptance and tolerance.
The problem with political correctness is when it's taken to ridiculous extremes and is taken advantage of and capitalised on by the various groups concerned......that's when it verges on the insane. Britain regularly sees examples of "PC gone mad" under the directives of diktats issued by the of PC Guardian Angels.
When commonsense free speech goes out of the window because certain groups of people are "over sensitive" to any form of criticism or claim discrimination at every turn of phrase or statement, and ordinary people are scared of saying "the wrong thing".... that's when it becomes a whole load of PC bollocks.
All the minority groups (and one minority group in particular which in reality is a majority group) all jump on the discrimination bandwagon at every perceived breach of PC.
And this statement comes from someone who is a member of a minority group himself...I live with it quite happily... very happily in fact, but I dinnae care much for the stupid "protection" of PC extremism.
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***directives of diktats issued by the of PC Guardian Angels**
delete "of "
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Political correctness is one of the most stupid things to have ever been invented and I'm not surprised that Yorkshiremen Jim C thinks it's a good thing.
Political correctness is now rife in Britain, all thanks to the namby pamby PC Brigade and their Left-Wing, Liberal allies.
It's thanks to political correctness that a shopkeeper in England got into trouble a few weeks ago when some crazy member of the public called the police and accsued him of racism. His crime? Selling golliwogs in his toy shop.
In some schools, we don't get taught "history" we get taught "herstory" as some crazy deluded member of the PC Brigade thought "history" was sexist against women, so came up with the idea of changing its name to "herstory." Never mind that the "his" in "history" has nothing to do with gender and that, by following the same crazy rules, "herstory" must surely be sexist against men.
Last week, after a miserable week for Tony Blair and the Labour Party, one newspaper had this headline on its front cover: "A Black Week for Blair), or words to that effect anyway. Then what happened? Some Church of England priest or vicar then complained against the newspaper, saying that putting the word "black" in a headline was racist!!!!!!
girls
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"Snow White And The Seven Dwarves."
In Britain, it should be called "Snow White And The Seven Vertically Challenged People."
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Damian, I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but you're not refering to your self as a "minority" (I hate that term, along with "ethnic" were all bloody ethnic!) because your Scottish are you? I just heard a guy from the SNP on the radio say Scots are a minority group. He was complaining about the BBC's choice of song for the World Cup coverage, a piece by Handel which was writen to celebrate the defeat of the Jackobite rebelion for the Duke of Cumberland, stating that it was offencive.
The BBC's responce was that they wanted a Handel piece as he was a German living in England, seeing that England is playing in the World Cup in Germany. They also stated that it is a popular piece, which has been used numerous times in Scotland.
How do you feel about it?
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The condition is called Dwarfism, and I was under the impression Dwarfs dont mind being called such.
Sure there are those out there that make complaints etc under the guise of PC, but for their own means, or simply because they have something to prove. Often this is white people trying to pre-empt complaints from other sections of the community (complaints which won't come) the changes they try to cause are actualy offensive to other groups by belittling them, and assuming THEY have a problem with other culture, etc. etc.
And Adam, what do you suggest? every one walking around making racist, zenophobic comments aimed to hurt other people?
Or wouldn't you prefere every one was polite to each other, and respected every one? Have some bloody common sence.
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