How about a thread about PC
 

I am speaking Political Correctness.

I have a whole lot more questions than answers.

Was Frank Zappa ever politically correct in his life?

How much social approbation does one deserve by using a politically incorrect term in good faith; by using the term "Hispanic" incorrectly; by using the term handicapped instead of disabled; by rooting for (not boycotting) the Chiefs or the Indians; by saying black instead of African American; by giving more weight to being a grandmother than a grandfather; by using the term cracker; by using the term redneck; by using the term teabagger; by not understanding the significance of all of the initials in LGBT?

What are the good and bad points about trying to operate with political correctness?

Regards,

D-Ray

Hell if I know. I guess I like Pollacks and Limeys so Pete's covered. The jury's still out on lawyers. What're are you getting at counselor? <grin>

Not using those terms around other people will usually increase your estimation among people you know. Think about it. The people you respect the most in your life will generally be too sophisticated to use those terms. In my life anyway.

Political correctness is sort of weaponized manners. Manners are the start of it--don't be offensive to others. But that value is then mobilized as a weapon of political fight.

Don't imagine for a second that such weapons are only used by those of the left.

How one feels about it depends on the situation. If it's a fight, then a weapon can be a good thing to have. I personally don't want to fight, but certainly see it as necessary at times. Others have more anger, or more relish of battle, and take their own stance.

And I suppose it is possible that getting hit upside the head by 'PC' may be a step in the consciousness raising of some folks....

The bottom line for me is that if someone says something offends them, then I take that on with good grace, and try not to offend them. Unless I have reason to....

If someone is getting all over me because I inadvertently offended them, well, depends on the situation. Mostly, that sounds like a thing to walk away from.

It boils down to knowing your audience.

Bob, what I'm getting at is that political correctness has always been awkward for me. Those who know me know that I don't appreciate racial or sexist jokes, and will not use them around me. Most people I am close to are unlikely to do so anyway. Some things that I have had to be consciously sensitive to are things that come second nature to those in my sons' generation. What they experience is what I think political correctness should evolve into. Not a necessarily a need to accommodate differences as if they are a liability, but to accept differences just because they are there.

The comments on this thread have been great. Manners are an extremely important aspect of political correctness - all social interaction for that matter.

Regards,

D-Ray

But still, no one has answered the question whether Frank Zappa ever practiced political correctness.

Regards,

D-Ray

After Joe's Garage can you really think you do not know the answer already?;)

or are you trying to be like Socrates and trying to draw us out into an ongoing debate:


"What is Political Correctness?"

SSSHHHHHHHHH!! :cool:

Regards,

D-Ray

p.s. actually I was thinking about Camarillo Brillo ("And she was breeding a dwarf, but she wasn't done yet.").

Really?

You have to ask?


Zappa was normal, the rest of the world was out of sync!


He did tone it down some after Apostrophe and Don't Eat the Yellow Snow made him known to a larger audience.



Barney

Being "PC" is another way of saying "I'm not saying things that will intentionally offend other people." Another way of saying that is "not being a dick".

Ah yes.....not saying things that will offend others can be called PC. But cannot one be "a dick" through use of correct grammar without slurs or epithets/swear words?
That is the crux of the discussion.

Ask Mrs. Gore about his political correctness. :cool:

We need a very precise definition of this expression (what is hardly possible) so we may all talk about the same. Otherwise a lot of misunderstandings will occur.

And Happy Birthday America!

Using correct grammar is being a dick? Sorry. You lost me.

You have equated political correctness with not using certain language......




is that what PC is bad language? or is it something else?

I think you are on the right track.......please provide a definition so we can all understand what PC is once and for all. At this point open and frank discourse as to the form of PC is essiential....

Your comment is ironic? Is that right?

It took me most of a lifetime to learn it but I think it is summed up in 1 John 4:8.

Ach du Liebes Bichen!

(I think that is German for Good Grief!;))



Without proposing questions we cannot find out what PC actually IS,

'Political Correctness' is an abstract term...hard to point at something and say 'that's it.' The most usual usage, I think, is sort of 'language use that avoids showing a 'lack of sympathy,' or even animosity, to the sensitivities of persons discriminated-against.' Sometime, 'persons discriminated against' morphs into 'persons making radical social criticisms and claiming sensitivity based on their particular POV.'

A wider usage encompasses other enforcement of some political orthodoxy, beyond choices in usage of language.

A civil expression of common courtesy and respect, yes.

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Does it really require anything more than common courtesy? Words can hurt and can be chosen with just that purpose in mind. They can also please or at least be neutral and neither flatter nor offend. Much of what is called PC may simply be a case of regarding your audience as individuals or as one individual whatever the case may be.

It was not a case of being politically correct but the exercise of courting my wife across 500 miles was an interesting, but nearly daunting task. I had to express what was truly in my heart but to do so I had to find words that to a technical writer were most certainly unfamiliar. And to write them to a woman that I really did not know all that well, up to that point we had only shaken hands. Well there were two phone calls that got quite intense.

So in discussing a sensitive subject with perfect strangers choosing your words becomes an interesting exercise. What is your intent? Are you presenting an idea or concept for discussion? Or has the discussion already progressed to the stage that you really want to shock and upset. BTDT. This may well be the crux as we presumably are discussing politics hence PC. People usually have fairly definite ideas and positions and so if we hope to persuade them to examine their ideas we must tread softly. Reasonable people will examine proposals and re-examine their own ideas honestly. Hard and fast believers will simply respond with canned phrases. Now can we call such a response PC? I submit that it is not because the responder has simply dismissed the idea or concept out of hand.

Almost correct: it is "Ach du liebes bisschen".

:)

Interesting question. Zappa was a relatively sensitive person so maybe he did on occasion. There are some things that just require a certain amount of sensitivity.

Zappa had a Syrian background. So his family being Arab Catholics must have had some influence. He wrote a lot about religion. He was a full blown Atheist.

This is what he had to say about the Reagan administration:

"The biggest threat to America today is not communism, it’s moving America toward a fascist theocracy. And everything that’s happened during the Reagan administration is steering us right down that pipe".

Our country is becoming evermore fascist on a daily basis and I for one am getting very scared. (me)

Fuck political correctness. I don't go out of my way to intentionally offend most people, but that is not political correctness, that is politeness. I don't refer to short people as vertically challenged, and I still call garbage men garbage men, not sanitation engineers. Last I looked you didn't need a bachelors degree to pick up garbage. I know black people who prefer black, and black people who prefer African/American. There are Mexicans who don't like to be called Hispanic, but are perfectly fine with being called Latinos. I am not racist and there are names I would never call them, but I will not go out of my way and worry about whether I pick the right word not to offend. No matter what you say, there is always the possibility that someone will be offended by it and life is too short for me to worry about it.

As for Zappa, I don't think he was ever intentionally politically correct. Usually he went out of his way to be politically incorrect, but I feel he actually despised "political correctness" as much as I do and for many of the same reasons.

I agree with this. I think people do it because they believe it works for them to bring about a particular outcome, and generally speaking they're right. It works, because folks knuckle under to it, cave in to it, because most folks want to be "liked", or in more public arenas don't want any negative publicity.

I disagree that such "weaponization" should be allowed control public discourse. When someone feigns offense because they are looking to create discomfort to exercise control over discourse, its probably because they're argument or idea would otherwise fail on its own merits. Whether or not we agree with the agenda of the individual using such poor debate tactics, IMHO we need to redirect the individual or group using such tactics to a more productive form of discourse.

I applaud your new devotion to productive forms of discourse.

Well said!

Thanks for the input here folks. This thread is an example of what Political Chat can be. A lot of differing ideas have been expressed here trying to get a handle on what has been at least a controversial sociological concept for several years. The perspectives I have seen here have been helpful in my understanding.

I would refer back to the link Vanishingpoint provided about nonviolent expression. Political correctness at its best would be communicating with others not as defined by their group but by their humanity.

Regards,

D-Ray

Most true.

However does PC (or the violation of PC) require an audience to exist?
If I course the lightning storm, but there is no storm present, is the storm offended?

If you utter offense against your neighbor, but they do not hear you, did the violation of political correctness exist?

that is the deeper question

I guess that depends on what your definition of PC is. I believe it does require an audience. In my view being PC is an action that requires conscious though, not a belief system that would occur naturally as an accumulation of your life experience. I guess put simply, your beliefs may be PC, but PC isn't a belief.

When you're by yourself, there is only the battle with yourself.

I recently heard again Randy Newman's song "Short People." The hubbub surrounding it was an example of political correctness carried to absurdity. The song itself was a wonderful satire on the attitudes reflected in any sort of prejudice, but many people took it as a mean-spirited song. Many of those missed the point that Randy Newman is indeed a short person. More importantly, they missed the point of the song that ridiculed the type of attitude reflected in the lyrics.

Regards,

D-Ray

Back in the day there was this older black guy I worked with...Sam Charles was his name. I remember one day, back in the late 60's, Sam went on a rant at work..."What's this Afro-American shit? I don't play that. I ain't no African!!!" Pissed off some of the younger black guys on the shop floor. And every time James Brown's "Say It Loud...I'm Black and I'm Proud!" came on the radio, Sam would crank it up.

And then in 1989 Jesse Jackson saw a poem on a "Black History" calendar and he decided that his people were no longer "black" but "African American". The media bought it because it was Jesse. And ever since, depending on who I happened to be with, to one level or another, I was nervous using either term. What's a well-intentioned white boy to do???

Take your best shot at being well-intentioned. If someone objects to a noun or something, apologize sincerely and assure them you meant no offense.

If they stay pissed it's not your fault.

"Black is beautiful" and African-American is a recent immigrant.
And Jesse Jackson has been called a race baiter.

I don't know what the correct au courant ref is for Americans of mainly African genetic heritage. I try to just follow the principle of common courtesy and respect and that is generally understood in my daily affairs.

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I've pretty much let African-American go...I suppose mostly because Jesse. And the fact that all of us Americans are actually African-Americans. Mitochondrial Eve from Africa is, after all...everybody's genealogical mom.

Truth, that. Hey mom!

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