The earliest mention of something that is not politically correct is found in the U.S. Supreme Court decision Chisholm v. Georgia (1793). In 1792 in South Carolina, Alexander Chisholm, the executor of the estate of Robert Farquhar, attempted to sue the state of Georgia in the Supreme Court over payments due him for goods that Farquhar had supplied Georgia during the American Revolutionary War. United States Attorney General Edmund Randolph argued the case for the plaintiff before the Court. The defendant, Georgia, refused to appear, claiming that as a "sovereign" a state did not have to appear in court to hear a suit against it to which it did not consent.
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Chisholm but the particular phrase in the argument we are interested in today is:” The states, rather than the People, for whose sakes the States exist, are frequently the objects which attract and arrest our principal attention. . . . Sentiments and expressions of this inaccurate kind prevail in our common, even in our convivial, language. Is a toast asked? [To] ‘The United States’, instead of [to] the ‘People of the United States’, is the toast given. This is not politically correct.”
In this case, the reference to political correctness involved a point of law. The States often forget that they exist for the sake of the people and while a sovereign entity within the United States, that sovereignty does not insulate them from their responsibility to the people they serve. It is obvious that in the 18th century, political correctness meant exactly what it sounded like; a political stance that was legally correct under the generally accepted interpretation of law.
Marxism would pervert the meaning of “correctness”, much as it does everything else it touches. According to Marxist ideology, “correct” is anything that is in keeping with the will of the central party. The notion that the State would conform to a set standard of law for the good of the people had been lost as the central party became a new class of ruling elite. The set standard of law was replaced with a notion of dynamic law that would allow the laws to adapt as the party’s needs changed. In the end, the party, not the people could only prevail since the party was responsible for issuing the newest interpretation of law as often as was needed.
Political correctness didn’t begin to take the form we know today until the counter culture emerged in 1960’s America and began to describe a manner of thought consistent with liberal ideology as “politically correct”. Much as today, the radical left had so overused the notion of political correctness that even moderate liberals found it laughable and a cause for ridicule. It wasn’t until the 1990’s until the term political correctness became a pejorative used by the right to describe the extremes in liberal thought.
Most of what we know about political correctness today is the idiotic fear of offending anyone. The enlightened wordsmiths of our more liberal Universities constantly regurgitate a stream of new “non-offensive” descriptions for nearly everything that is human or has been affected by human behavior. Indians are now “Native Americans” even though anthropologists can trace their roots all across Asia and eventually into the African continent. Anyone that has a modest degree of education in modern man knows that “Native Americans” are as native to North America as the Europeans are.
Every known human malady or frailty is now considered a “challenge”. Despite accurate clinical descriptions that gauge mental ability based on medical criteria, anyone that falls below the norm is “mentally challenged” because the clinical names for each degree of disability is considered by the “enlightened”, to be demeaning.
Other human descriptors are expected to display compassion, tolerance and acceptance. Then there is the whole arena of “people first” language issues. No matter who or what you are, it is now considered important to recognize that you are a person first as if that somehow makes a difference. Short people are now “people of small stature”; minorities are “people of color” and the disabled are now “people with disabilities” of course. I suppose the only exception to that rule is being fat. Apparently every attempt to find a kinder, gentler way of saying fat didn’t meet with the approval of the afflicted so they are taking a completely different route.
1968, the NAAFA or The National Association to Aid Fat Americans was founded by William Fabrey to provide social activities for the large. As the group shifted to political activism, it changed names in the 1980’s and became The NAAFA (The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance). The NAAFA works to eliminate discrimination based on body size and provide fat people with the tools for self-empowerment through public education, advocacy, and member support. In short, their membership is fat and you had just better accept it.
Truthfully, I really don’t care what people want to call themselves. If dropping one name for another allows people to embrace help for a particular condition or it just plain makes them feel better about themselves, then more power to them. My argument with political correctness is a deeper and more dangerous manifestation.
As a nation, political correctness is in its fiftieth year of its mission to completely disable the American people from being to state with conviction that something is right or wrong. We are being forced to accept the unacceptable in the name of tolerance and now under the threat of “hate crimes”. Slowly the definition of a hate crime is being changed from protection against violent acts perpetrated in the name of bigotry to a whole host of new crimes based on…you guessed it…the spoken word. Regardless of your convictions, the right to be a freak has taken precedence over the rights of society to establish a standard of normality and those that speak out on moral grounds or on the grounds of conservative ideology are being methodically attacked as spewing hate speech.
To me, there is a big difference between saying “This is wrong” and expressing an idea that promotes violent action. However, the left now has the new monopoly on morality and the conventional ideals that this country was founded on have now been replaced with their “superior mantra” of acceptance and tolerance. Do not forget that Aristotle once said that “Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society.” Once a society has lost the ability to speak openly against dangerous and perverted acts, it is not long before demoralization dissolves the last threads that bind its peoples together.
Of course, even the champions of tolerance need an enemy to coalesce their power base. After all, how could you possibly bring attention to your cause if there wasn’t someone to rally against? The tolerant left has no tolerance for Judeo-Christian religions, pro-life beliefs, conservative ideals or American patriotism. Religion has openly been the target for the so-called tolerant in America since the 1950’s when the ACLU backed every half-witted law suit to drive religion from any and all, public venues. The same suspects fight every battle against pro-life groups and protect those that burn flags as a legitimate form of protest.
This is the most dangerous path that the left have taken us down. We are at a critical juncture in our history as our very existence is challenged by crippling debt and a failing economy. We provide fertility services to the poor but cannot guarantee the right to be born once conceived. We protect the rights of Muslims against “dangerous speech” but not the rights of Catholic churches to refuse gay marriages based on clear edicts within their holiest book. We protect the habitat of a Spotted Owl while private homes are being seized by the state under manifest destiny; not for public use, but to provide an incentive for corporations to build new facilities.
If you ask me, the mass shootings at Columbine and Virginia Tech had little to do with gun control and were caused entirely by the elimination of traditional morals in our schools and society. What is there to stop disturbed or depressed individuals from committing these heinous crimes if there is no belief in a life beyond this one especially if we are no longer allowed the ability to guide people into a socially acceptable model of human behavior because we can no longer say…”This is wrong”.
Paul
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Chisholm but the particular phrase in the argument we are interested in today is:” The states, rather than the People, for whose sakes the States exist, are frequently the objects which attract and arrest our principal attention. . . . Sentiments and expressions of this inaccurate kind prevail in our common, even in our convivial, language. Is a toast asked? [To] ‘The United States’, instead of [to] the ‘People of the United States’, is the toast given. This is not politically correct.”
In this case, the reference to political correctness involved a point of law. The States often forget that they exist for the sake of the people and while a sovereign entity within the United States, that sovereignty does not insulate them from their responsibility to the people they serve. It is obvious that in the 18th century, political correctness meant exactly what it sounded like; a political stance that was legally correct under the generally accepted interpretation of law.
Marxism would pervert the meaning of “correctness”, much as it does everything else it touches. According to Marxist ideology, “correct” is anything that is in keeping with the will of the central party. The notion that the State would conform to a set standard of law for the good of the people had been lost as the central party became a new class of ruling elite. The set standard of law was replaced with a notion of dynamic law that would allow the laws to adapt as the party’s needs changed. In the end, the party, not the people could only prevail since the party was responsible for issuing the newest interpretation of law as often as was needed.
Political correctness didn’t begin to take the form we know today until the counter culture emerged in 1960’s America and began to describe a manner of thought consistent with liberal ideology as “politically correct”. Much as today, the radical left had so overused the notion of political correctness that even moderate liberals found it laughable and a cause for ridicule. It wasn’t until the 1990’s until the term political correctness became a pejorative used by the right to describe the extremes in liberal thought.
Most of what we know about political correctness today is the idiotic fear of offending anyone. The enlightened wordsmiths of our more liberal Universities constantly regurgitate a stream of new “non-offensive” descriptions for nearly everything that is human or has been affected by human behavior. Indians are now “Native Americans” even though anthropologists can trace their roots all across Asia and eventually into the African continent. Anyone that has a modest degree of education in modern man knows that “Native Americans” are as native to North America as the Europeans are.
Every known human malady or frailty is now considered a “challenge”. Despite accurate clinical descriptions that gauge mental ability based on medical criteria, anyone that falls below the norm is “mentally challenged” because the clinical names for each degree of disability is considered by the “enlightened”, to be demeaning.
Other human descriptors are expected to display compassion, tolerance and acceptance. Then there is the whole arena of “people first” language issues. No matter who or what you are, it is now considered important to recognize that you are a person first as if that somehow makes a difference. Short people are now “people of small stature”; minorities are “people of color” and the disabled are now “people with disabilities” of course. I suppose the only exception to that rule is being fat. Apparently every attempt to find a kinder, gentler way of saying fat didn’t meet with the approval of the afflicted so they are taking a completely different route.
1968, the NAAFA or The National Association to Aid Fat Americans was founded by William Fabrey to provide social activities for the large. As the group shifted to political activism, it changed names in the 1980’s and became The NAAFA (The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance). The NAAFA works to eliminate discrimination based on body size and provide fat people with the tools for self-empowerment through public education, advocacy, and member support. In short, their membership is fat and you had just better accept it.
Truthfully, I really don’t care what people want to call themselves. If dropping one name for another allows people to embrace help for a particular condition or it just plain makes them feel better about themselves, then more power to them. My argument with political correctness is a deeper and more dangerous manifestation.
As a nation, political correctness is in its fiftieth year of its mission to completely disable the American people from being to state with conviction that something is right or wrong. We are being forced to accept the unacceptable in the name of tolerance and now under the threat of “hate crimes”. Slowly the definition of a hate crime is being changed from protection against violent acts perpetrated in the name of bigotry to a whole host of new crimes based on…you guessed it…the spoken word. Regardless of your convictions, the right to be a freak has taken precedence over the rights of society to establish a standard of normality and those that speak out on moral grounds or on the grounds of conservative ideology are being methodically attacked as spewing hate speech.
To me, there is a big difference between saying “This is wrong” and expressing an idea that promotes violent action. However, the left now has the new monopoly on morality and the conventional ideals that this country was founded on have now been replaced with their “superior mantra” of acceptance and tolerance. Do not forget that Aristotle once said that “Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society.” Once a society has lost the ability to speak openly against dangerous and perverted acts, it is not long before demoralization dissolves the last threads that bind its peoples together.
Of course, even the champions of tolerance need an enemy to coalesce their power base. After all, how could you possibly bring attention to your cause if there wasn’t someone to rally against? The tolerant left has no tolerance for Judeo-Christian religions, pro-life beliefs, conservative ideals or American patriotism. Religion has openly been the target for the so-called tolerant in America since the 1950’s when the ACLU backed every half-witted law suit to drive religion from any and all, public venues. The same suspects fight every battle against pro-life groups and protect those that burn flags as a legitimate form of protest.
This is the most dangerous path that the left have taken us down. We are at a critical juncture in our history as our very existence is challenged by crippling debt and a failing economy. We provide fertility services to the poor but cannot guarantee the right to be born once conceived. We protect the rights of Muslims against “dangerous speech” but not the rights of Catholic churches to refuse gay marriages based on clear edicts within their holiest book. We protect the habitat of a Spotted Owl while private homes are being seized by the state under manifest destiny; not for public use, but to provide an incentive for corporations to build new facilities.
If you ask me, the mass shootings at Columbine and Virginia Tech had little to do with gun control and were caused entirely by the elimination of traditional morals in our schools and society. What is there to stop disturbed or depressed individuals from committing these heinous crimes if there is no belief in a life beyond this one especially if we are no longer allowed the ability to guide people into a socially acceptable model of human behavior because we can no longer say…”This is wrong”.
Paul
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