Beyond PC

From what I can determine, PC, or political correctness, has become almost a tired and trite phrase, and I can see why. It really doesn’t fit the politics and cultural conflicts of the present, and the reason it doesn’t is because there’s very little that’s “correct,” let alone accurate or effective, in most of today’s politics, political policies, and especially in the shouting past each other that passes for political discussion.

Add to that the fact that very few political figures, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders excepted in some, but not all cases, have the political courage to “tell it like it is.” And for that matter, neither do most individuals in positions of power… because almost all of them are afraid that accurate evaluations of situations will cost them power…as well as endless litigation.

I’ll offer a few examples. With the exception of the comedian and political commentator Bill Mahar, no one seems willing to offer a public assessment of the Islamic faith. How can anyone with a shred of objectivity offer a favorable assessment of a faith that predominantly believes that: (1) women are second or third class individuals whose rights should be determined by the men in their lives; (2) that anyone who leaves the faith should be put to death; (3) that anyone who criticizes or mocks the prophet deserves to be put to death; (4) that women are responsible for all sexual violence perpetrated upon them and should be killed for dishonoring their families in such cases. Studies from all around the world confirm that a majority of Muslims believe all of the above, and what a religion truly is must be based on what its practitioners believe and what they do, not by its scripture. This isn’t a just matter of “differing beliefs.” Those beliefs, as presently manifested by the opinions, attitudes, and actions of Muslim believers, denigrate and literally demonize those who do not agree with them, with the results being everything from mass murder to honor killings in the name of Allah.

In historical terms, the Catholic Church wasn’t much better, at one time turning most of Europe into a charnel house with religious wars, and Catholicism still minimizes the worth of women and places their value as vessel for childbearing above anything else, while denying them equality in the theological structure.

The United States certainly isn’t particularly honest in its self-assessments, either. The LDS faith and extreme Christian evangelicals are both essentially and excessively patriarchal and place women in socially and theologically inferior positions, with their greatest value apparently as brood mares, and yet anyone who says this is ignored, dismissed, or attacked.

Yet anyone who mentions loudly these problems is shouted down for being “disrespectful” of other religions. Accuracy in description is disrespectful?

The failure to face facts goes well beyond religion.

The idea that more weapons in more hands will stop crime is insane, especially given that we have both 300 million weapons in private hands, the greatest number of deaths perpetrated by private individuals of any country in the world, and also the greatest percentage of our population incarcerated. Likewise, given those 300 million weapons, the idea of getting rid of privately owned firearms is a pipe-dream. Black male inner city culture is toxic and a disaster, and while poverty, discrimination, and police procedures definitely play a huge role in the excessive murder rate of blacks by blacks, the role of inner-city culture is conveniently dismissed as another facet of discrimination. Yet a comparison of black murder rates to other poor areas with different racial and ethnic backgrounds still finds blacks with a far higher murder rate than other poverty-stricken ethnic groups. When in certain cities, police patrols recently became less intensive, the crime rates in those inner cities went up.

Now, stories are appearing about how college students are actually suppressing free speech and demanding “trigger warnings” because they don’t want to hear news, facts, discussions, or opinions contrary to their feelings or beliefs – and all too many of them see anything that disturbs them as disrespectful or even verging on “hate speech.” In fact, a recent Pew Research study found that forty percent of Americans in the 18-40 age range favored government censorship to prevent speech offensive to minorities. One of the big problems with this idea is that even the most accurate and relevant facts can be offensive to someone’s beliefs, as I’ve certainly discovered over the years.

The largest overall difficulty with all of this is that it’s impossible to even attempt to find solutions to problems if any form of complete discussion of these problems is effectively muzzled by the desire not to offend and the outrage of those who are offended… and when the only people who will bring them up bluntly are demagoguing politicians like Donald Trump or liberal comedians like Bill Mahar.

9 thoughts on “Beyond PC”

  1. Corwin says:

    Preach it brother, I agree with everything you have written. We need more people like you to stand up and be counted and I’m not even an American.

  2. Daze says:

    The major problem with your rant: the word “predominantly”. The overwhelming majority of practicing Muslims do not remotely believe in your four statements.

    If I applied similar logic, I could say that the majority of American Christians believe 1) that God sent the Asian tsunami to punish gay people, or 2) that the universe was created in 6 days around 4000BC. I could then go on, if I were DonaldJTrump, to say that Americans should be banned from the rest of the world until we work out what’s going on here.

    1. I’m sorry to say that, this time, you’re wrong. Surveys of every major Islamic nation with the possible exception of Indonesia, show overwhelmingly that they do. Check the statistics several posts back.

      1. Grey says:

        LEM, you are comparing (averaging?) apples and oranges here – the views of American (and also, e.g., European, Turkish) Muslims are vastly different than the global/non-US data you are extrapolating from here and in your prior post. (Pew has done polling on this.)

        Thus the problem with you using the term ‘predominantly’ – there is a big-enough gulf between ‘western’ Muslims and those globally that it’s not useful to lump them together.

        1. You’re right about “western” Muslims, but they’re a very small percentage of the 1.6 billion followers of Islam. The U.S. Muslim population is roughly 3 million, the U.K. Muslim population slightly less than that. So “predominantly” remains correct, since Turkey’s population of 77 million is 98% Muslim, Iran’s population of 77 million is 99% Muslim, 95% of Egypt’s 80 million are Muslim, 88% of Indonesia’s 205 million are Muslim, and 96% of Pakistan’s 180 million are Muslim. Even as a minority in India, there are still 15 million Muslims there. The more moderate views of Western Muslims are totally outweighed by the views of the Muslim population in the rest of the world, and it’s incredibly deceptive to suggest that the views of moderate western Muslims carry much weight in the greater Islamic community. By the way, most of my figures are from Pew.

  3. Daze says:

    PS: 3) Cecil the lion would have had a better chance against the American dentist if he’d been armed …

  4. Tom says:

    ” … the outrage of those who are offended … ”

    Are we not in the age of lack of self-control? If so, what is it that has created this common reaction of people and what can be done to achieve the opposite?

    Anybody can become angry – that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way – that is not within everybody’s power and is not easy.
    Aristotle

  5. Wine Guy says:

    There are many people in the US who seem outraged these days.

    Why? I submit it is because they are thinking more about their rights than their responsibilities. People have the right to speak their mind in the US. For some reason they also think that this means we must agree with them.
    If you don’t want to hear what I have to say, vote with your feet and walk away. Or discuss it with me… but we can’t do that these days because a dicussion and actual exchange of ideas makes a person look weak and indecisive.

    The media is quite willing and able to jump right down the throat of any single mis-spoken word. So called ‘fact checkers’ start snorting and stomping if someone is off in their recollection by 5%.

    Soemwhere, we’ve forgotten that we’re humans. Humans make mistakes. They live their life not just in their heads but also in their hearts (or conscience, if you prefer).

    ps.
    News is more about entertainment instead of facts. Why else are there so many T-heads telling me what the news means instead of giving us the facts? I can figure out what it means and I don’t much care for other people trying to interpret things for me because spin (including my own) is ubiquitous. Why else are there 10 minutes of commercials per hour of “24 hour news?” And why else would the ‘reporters’ and ‘anchors’ be celebrities?

    I’d rant about religions… but this is long enough.

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