Political Correctness gone too far?

[COBRA-6]

There are, trust me.   When I was in elemantary school, my grade 6/7 teacher was an ultra-hardcore feminist hippy (not a pseudo hippy, but real friggen hippy who never left the 60s/70s).   We had to refer to a snowman as a snowperson, policeman as police officer etc. The kicker was when my class went on a weeklong trip to an outdoor education centre (basically camping) we had to refer to the Coleman stoves and lanterns as ColePERSON.   For our school christmas open house for parents my class (both years I was in her class) acted out "The Night Before Christmas" (at the time the school and neighbourhood were quite WASPy so there was no need to accomadate other religions), both years she only let a girl play Santa.   Why? Well from what my parents told me in conversation years later, they asked my teacher and she had told the parents that Santa and Mrs Claus were negative gender stereotypes, and to make things more equal a female was going to be Santa.

So yeah there are people who are that uptight about trivial little things.

People like that are alive only because it is illlegal to monkey-stomp them into the dirt...  the fact that they are allowed to indoctrinate children with their PC propaganda, unchecked by the school board, makes me want to vomit... 

 

[SHF]

Not to piss on the flames of sarcasm and ridicule, the original editorial seems to be providing some mistaken facts to entice us members .  In a true google fashion, as best as I can tell the Americans started using the term uninhabited aerial vehicle as far back as 2001 and perhaps 1994.  I'm quite sure that the Canadian government's penchant for political correctness did not influence the US.  As to the term infanteer, it has been around at least since WWII and examples are listed for the infantry branches of several countries around the world.  The members with and without members may or may not be actual fact, it's hard to google that quote.  If the editorial was written to make us b**ch, it worked.  : 

Cheers

 

[pbi]

Speaking of unbridled political correctness, I offer two examples.

About ten years ago, in the Ontario town of Tweed (between Belleville and Ottawa), there was a municipal beautification program called "Adopt-A-Hydrant". If you had a fire hydrant on your front lawn, you could paint it up any way you liked, plant flowers around it, etc. So far, so good. Well, a couple in town wrote in to the local paper complaining bitterly that the use of the word "adopt" denigrated all people who were adoptive children by associating them with inanimate objects. How traumatic!

And, yesterday, I read in the Torono Star that some group of worthies has decided to complain about the use of the word "blind" as an adjective (i.e.: blind drunk, blind rage, etc). This, they apparently feel, is actually an insensitive linguistic assault on the vision-impaired.

Just where do these people come from, and why do they have nothing better to do?

Cheers.

 

[The_Falcon]

Please, please tell me your joking. Please.

Coleperson??

I wish I was, this woman had a few screws loose.

 

[George Wallace]

On a serious side, Norad has made some changes in the recent past.  From earlier this summer:

Military commands drop Indian terms from exercise titles

By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The U.S.-Canadian military commands responsible for protecting North America from terrorists have changed the names of key readiness exercises to more politically correct words that do not offend American Indians.
    U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs have struck the word "warrior" from one major exercise and replaced it with "phantom," according to a July internal message from command headquarters. The message went to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the Joint Chiefs and other senior leaders. A copy was obtained by The Washington Times.
    A NORAD spokesman, Air Force Master Sgt. John Tomassi, said "warrior" and other words were changed with Indians in mind. He said, "They have been using these names for quite some time, and I don't know of any complaints."
    An exercise called "Amalgam Chief" has been changed to "Amalgam Arrow," the message states. And an exercise dubbed "Amalgam Fabric Brave" is now "Amalgam Fabric Dart." "Fabric Indian" was deleted in favor of "Fabric Sabre."
    Northern Command and NORAD are keeping exercise labels of "Northern Edge," "Vigilant Shield," "Ardent Sentry," "Amalgam Mute" and "Vital Archer."

    The bottom line: warrior, chief, brave and Indian are out; phantom, arrow and dart are in.

    NORAD is a U.S.-Canadian organization commanded by U.S. Adm. Timothy J. Keating, who also heads Northern Command. The twin structures have taken on added importance since the September 11 attacks. NORAD has new procedures in place to protect American airspace against al Qaeda-style air attacks. Its largest exercise to practice those tactics is the twice-yearly Amalgam Warrior, which is scheduled for next April and is now Amalgam Phantom.
    "We did change them because of the references to Native Americans," Sgt. Tomassi said. "And the initiative wasn't U.S. or Canadian. It was just NORAD. We are sensitive to such issues. We don't have a professional sports team like the Washington Redskins. But we still are sensitive to the same sorts of issues that those organizations are. When Admiral Keating arrived, the staff was already in progress, saying this was an initiative we wanted to take on, and Admiral Keating embraced it."

    Sgt. Tomassi said the word "warrior" often connotes an American Indian, so it was struck.

    Amalgam Fabric Brave, which is now Amalgam Fabric Dart, involves deploying fighter jets to various NORAD regions to check their response times.
    With the name changes, the military is following a similar trend in other segments of society. Some schools have banned politically incorrect mascots in favor of wildlife or inoffensive symbols. The National Collegiate Athletic Association last week prohibited schools who have Indian mascots, such as the Florida State Seminoles, from hosting postseason tournaments or bringing their mascots to these events.
    Under the leadership of Adm. Keating, U.S. Northern Command has projected the image of an organization aggressively defending the United States.
    Adm. Keating on July 19 released a vision statement that said that "United States Northern Command defends America's homeland --protecting our people, national power and freedom of action."

 

[career_radio-checker]

I wish I was, this woman had a few screws loose.

You can't use that word anymore: "woman" is derogatory. It's Female... no wait... Ladies... no then ladies is disrespectful to dead people... :brickwall: "members without members" it is

 

[Monsoon]

Could someone explain to me again why we're getting all worked up into a froth over this?

 

[George Wallace]

Could someone explain to me again why we're getting all worked up into a froth over this?

Probably because we see the humour in how utterly stupid and a waste of our Tax Payer's Money it truly is.

What do you see in it?

 

[Monsoon]

Probably because we see the humour in how utterly stupid and a waste of our Tax Payer's Money it truly is.

How much of our proverbial Tax Dollars do you think were spent deciding to name it an "Uninhabited" vehicle rather than an "Unmanned" one?  I'm pretty sure there wasn't a Working Group formed over the matter.

What do you see in it?

I see it as a harmless submission to the small number of people who really care about gender neutral language.  I, for one, couldn't care less, so it doesn't bother me one way or the other.

 

[George Wallace]

I am sure that there were indeed some Working Groups convened to decide on what will be Gender Neutral in all of our speech and documentation.  There is no way that these decisions come "Out of the Blue".  People who take offence to words like: person, ladies, policeman, etc., do not write Government Policy without some form of Working Group or Committee.  That does burn up vast amounts of Tax Dollars.

As a harmless submission to the small number of people who really care about neutral language, it may be another instance of the Government bending to the whims of minorities, rather than doing the Democratic thing of ruling in favour of the majority....but what the hey, we're Canadian, eh!  The Majority will never notice.

 

[48Highlander]

Every time you allow others to infringe on your rights, it becomes easier to do it again in the future.  Start of with something small, like forcing everyone to call a policeman a police-person, or a manhole cover a personhole cover.  Pretty soon you're banning books and punishing thought crimes.  I prefer not to take that first step.  If anyone finds my language offensive, they're welcome to leave.

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

I would just like to find out what the salaries and overhead are for the group of twats who have nothing better to do in NDHQ but examine the world for this kind of crap.

I cannot believe there isn't a better use for this money....



Matthew.  :blotto:

 

[S McKee]

IMHO this whole gender neutral thing is all part of a vast international plot by hardcore feminists to emasculate the male species.  :-*

 

[Scarlet]

Every time you allow others to infringe on your rights, it becomes easier to do it again in the future.  

How are some name changes infringing on your rights?

 

[GO!!!]

How are some name changes infringing on your rights?

Nice pic!

So let me guess, you are going to be the first womyn ninjaperson-nongenderspecificsniper?

The first in herstory?

 

[48Highlander]

How are some name changes infringing on your rights?

FORCING me to use those words would be infringing on my rights.  For example, if I were in the class of the ultrafeminist teacher mentioned earlier, chances are I would be under pressure to conform to her standards of speech and behaviour so that I would not be unfairly graded.

As it stands right now, theres nobody around to "make" me use any of these PC terms, so no, my freedom of speech isn't being violated.  As long as it stays that way, we're ok   However, government agencies (or even corporations) don't have the same freedom.  While it's rather difficult for any groups to protest against the use of certain language by an individual, it's relatively simple for them to target large organizations.  As an example, look at the controversy over sports teams using American Indians as mascots.  When enough pressure is applied by special interest groups, organizations CAN be forced to make changes to things like mascots, names and terms, and can even be forced to implement "speech codes", as is the case at several US colleges.  Which eventualy translates into a limitation on the freedoms of the individuals who make up those organizations.

Clear as mud?

 

[brin11]

IMHO this whole gender neutral thing is all part of a vast international plot by hardcore feminists to emasculate the male species.   :-*

Damn it, you found us out!  It doesn't seem to be working yet, though  ;D

 

[George Wallace]

.....   As an example, look at the controversy over sports teams using American Indians as mascots.   When enough pressure is applied by special interest groups, organizations CAN be forced to make changes to things like mascots, names and terms, and can even be forced to implement "speech codes", as is the case at several US colleges.   Which eventualy translates into a limitation on the freedoms of the individuals who make up those organizations.

A la my Reply # 25 in this thread.

 

[ZipperHead]

Changing things for feminists, or any group, is rarely a good thing, including for religious reasons. Just be thankful that our "Bible Belt" is a lot smaller than the States. There was a movement to replace the greeting of "hello" with "heaveno". For those that need it spelled out, "hello" contains the word "hell"  > . And, ironically, the word I spelled out will be replace with "heck" because of the filtering on this site. Here's a link for some of the hub-bub it (heaveno) created: http://www.lubbockonline.com/news/020897/heaveno.htm

Or the parent(s) who wanted the skateboard brand Natas banned (natas is satan spelled backward) even though it is the name of the founder/owner, Natas Kaupas.

When they change the name 'midwife' to something more neutral, I will be more inclined to even think about saying these other gender-neutral terms. Or herpes, to ourpes. Or hernia, to ournia. Or......

Al

 

[teddy49]

I agree with 48Highlander, it's censorship at it's most basic level.  And it's most insidious level.  It offends me that people waste oxygen worrying about what we call the big steel plate that covers the sewer access in the middle of the street.  Or what we call the radio controlled airplane that takes pictures of the villains.  Can I call them villains, or are they just differently moralled?

I'm not old by any stretch of the imagination but even I can remember a time in this country, where we were proud that people could spout the most hateful, despicable, vile crap.  Not because we agreed with anything they said, but because their ability to say it, meant that we were a free people.  IE:"I may not like what he has to say, but I will fight to the death his right to say it."  It used to be that if you disagreed with someone, you either, exercised your right to free speech and offered debate, or simply stopped listening.  It used to be the Right to Free Speech, not the Right to Not Hear Stuff You Don't Agree With.  Lately it seems to me that the only debate that is offered, is that an idea offends.  As if this is enough.

A democratic society should have it's values defined by that society, recorded by government, and enforced by the courts.  Instead, it seems to me that we are having values defined by the fringes of society, and enforced by they courts in the name of human rights legislation.

Now I agree that "educators" should not be allowed to extole the virtues of National Socialism, or expound on the threat that the Jewish people offer to "Aryan civilisation" to young captive classroom audiences.  But that is why we have curriculum's in our schools.

If you don't like what a politician has to say hold him or her to account at the ballot box.  Anyone else, debate them, or ignore them, but don't infringe on their right air their viewpoint.

It seems that Political Correctness hacks are trying to shape society into some kind of homogeneous, oppressive, Orwellian Utopia, where conflict is unknown, because competing ideas and speech are not tolerated, as they might "offend".  In a country as ethnically and culturally diverse as Canada, this is a pipe dream.  Conflict is guaranteed.  But this is good.

Societies that do not allow new debate over new and fresh, and maybe offensive ideas, will stagnate and rot.

We seem to have lost the ability to Agree to Disagree.  To respect the opinions of others.  And as a result a conformist mindset seems to have set in.  We as a society can in no way benefit from this.

The only way to combat this, IMHO is to call it what it is, censorship.

I guess that's just my $0.02

Final Note:  Just so that there is no misunderstanding, I DO NOT think that there are any virtues to National Socialism, or that the Jewish people offer any kind of threat to anyone.