• Political Correctness

  I’m starting to get really annoyed with the idea of ‘political correctness’.
  
  Don’t get me wrong - I’m all in favour of it in theory, but the way it is being put into practice leaves a lot to be desired. There seems to be three different flavours of political correctness - the sensible route, where purposefully offensive words and actions are targeted, avoidance and repression.
  
  When I say ‘avoidance’, it’s just a short way to describe how certain words or actions now have to be avoided, for fear of possibly offending someone. Everyday words like ‘blackboard’ somehow get targeted in a zealous attempt to eradicate anything that could possibly be twisted into an insult. It is overkill to insist that ‘black coffee’ is now an offensive term. Coffee, sans milk, looks black - it’s a description, not a racial slur. It will still look black, even if it’s being ordered by a glowing green Martian.
  
  Additionally, by making ‘rules’ about what we should and should not do, the differences themselves are thrust into the spotlight, and become a big deal when they should mean no more than the diversity in eye colour. Of course, cultural and religious differences have always been a cause for conflict, but I doubt that highlighting them is helping.
  
  ‘Repression’ is more about companies banning employees from wearing religious items, or councils not putting up Christmas decorations, because it might offend the non-Christian population. This is like trying to pretend the differences between cultures don’t exist. It’s blocking the symptoms, but not treating the cause; it might actually be making it worse.
  
  Confrontations sparked by the outward display of cultural differences may be avoided, but it’s not addressing the root cause of the problem. It would surely be healthier to be as open as possible about these differences, and in time they’ll blend into the background as it becomes normal for people to do things differently. It strikes me that what is needed is acceptance, but all we’re managing is denial, and in doing so we’re just putting off what really needs to be done. Unfortunately it’s easier to make rules than it is to educate people, especially as many people will be reluctant to change.
  
  And therein lies the problem.
  
  So many different things contribute to racism, religious discrimination, etc… that anyone would be forced to admit that tackling the causes will be a lengthy and expensive process. Where do you even begin to combat a centuries old prejudice? You can educate people in school about other cultures, but school is only a small part of their life. You can expose people to unbiased information through the media, but you can’t restrict their access to biased information either. On consideration, it would probably be helpful to not be invading another country at the time, as well.
  
  So I can’t help wondering, what will it take to make that the easier option? How long can we keep papering over the cracks before they show through anyway because nobody fixed them?
  
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