Why I Hate the Term "Political Correctness"

By Alex Wolf on June 19, 2016

I’m sure this is a term you’ve heard a lot in conversation lately. Whether it’s on the news, in a classroom, or from a racist or homophobic relative claiming they can no longer speak their minds without someone getting offended and criticizing them. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, “someone who is politically correct believes that language and actions that could be offensive to others, especially those relating to sex and race, should be avoided.” Likewise, Urban Dictionary defines political correctness as, “a way we speak in America so we don’t offend whining pussies.” Clearly, people are divided on what political correctness actually implies.

In America, especially with the current presidential race being run in part by a man who shuns any form of restraint when he speaks, issues of race and gender are on the forefront. Last week Orlando, Florida marked the deadliest shooting in American history, with fifty dead and many more seriously wounded. The shooting took place in an LGBTQ+ nightclub, and likewise many of the victims were members of the LGBTQ+ community. Violent instances of police brutality against unarmed black teenagers are all too common. In the wake of these tragedies, people from these groups are not only demanding an end to the violence, they are demanding to be treated with equal respect and importance as the “privileged” groups in America, meaning white people.

That shouldn’t be too hard . . . right? In here lies the real meaning of political correctness. Minorities are no longer sitting back and letting people use derogatory slurs and offensive stereotypes to describe them. And for this, people are angry.

And that’s why I hate the term political correctness. Here’s what I think it should be called: common human decency. 

Many people seem to think that this term means that they are responsible for the feelings of an entire group every day or night. But in reality, it’s much more simple than that. If you interact with someone who is a different gender/sexuality than you, it’s not like the world will suddenly explode if you say the wrong thing. Here’s what you should do: understand that you made a mistake, and apologize. You do it all the time without even realizing it: if you’re talking to someone and accidentally call them by the wrong name, you immediately admit that you were wrong, that your actions hurt their feelings, and you apologize. You also make a point to never call that person by the wrong name again. The same logic applies here as well.

Amazingly, the best example of this I’ve seen comes from Disney’s Zootopia, a kid’s movie that came out this year. This movie cleverly adapted a world in which animals have human-like qualities and live in a giant city into an allegory on racism, in which non-hunting animals have a bias towards “predators,” because they once hunted them in stone-age times. Although the whole movie is brilliant, I found myself drawn to one particular exchange between Judy Hopps, a bunny who is the main protagonist, and Benjamin Clawhouser, a secretary at the Zootapia police department. When Clawhouser refers to Judy as being “cute,” Judy is visibly uncomfortable. She explains that, while it’s alright if a fellow bunny calls her cute, when other animals do it, it can be seen as degrading or even racist. Clawhouser immediately apologizes, telling her how terrible he feels, and Judy calmly smiles and tells him it’s okay.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEj5qwsDn3o

And that is what needs to happen. For people who are in Judy’s position, if someone truly doesn’t mean any harm, it doesn’t help anything if you react violently. Just tell them you feel uncomfortable by their statement. If they are decent people, they will correct themselves. It’s amazing to me that a kid’s movie explains this concept more eloquently than most adults can.

Which brings me to the not-decent people. People who complain about political correctness like to hide their true motivations behind rants about free speech and how the people who get offended are just being overly sensitive. The truth is that people are just mad that they can’t say racist, homophobic things anymore. That is why they’re rallying around an orange-skinned bigot. They think he will protect their right to be an asshole. But the world is changing. People are no longer going to suffer people’s ignorance and let them get away with it. People are afraid they will be exposed for what they really are: terrible, ignorant human beings.

I hate the term political correctness because the action of being respectful to other people should not have to be a political statement. People asking to be treated with respect should not infringe on your rights as an American. One of the basic concepts of America is that everyone should be able to live their lives without fear of persecution and hatred. That should be the right everyone in this country strives to protect, not anyone’s right to be an asshole.

Again, I move for the term political correctness to be changed to basic human decency. Replace it on all the news shows, the protests, the speeches. We’ll see if anyone objects to it then.

 

Sources: Cambridge Dictionary (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/politically-correct), Urban Dictionary (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=politically%20correct), CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/12/us/orlando-nightclub-shooting/), Quora (https://www.quora.com/Is-political-correctness-good-or-bad-for-society-Why), and The Odyssey (https://www.theodysseyonline.com/defending-political-correctness).

 

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