Can anyone tell me who, and when it was decided that we should Politically Correct?

Question

I thought that this was supposed to be a Country which enjoyed Freedom of Speech.

I for one am fed up with ***** footing around people who are so sensitive that they cannot listen to an honest answer, and who haven't got broad shoulders. (Yahoo havePC'd my expression for a cat)

I pressume it all came about when we had to have an influx of immigrants from other continents, and when Homosexuals became "Gay". Don't get me wrong here. But everyone nowadays seems to be up in arms about some sensitivity they may have.

After all when the US forces were over here everyone called them Yanks.....did they moan.....no.
The Australians call us English......Pommies.... do we moan....NO.
When black people came here to Britain they called us white honkies.... did we moan or object ......NO.


So whats it all about then?
and when did it all happen that we went PC.

Me I am going to call a "Trowel a Trowel" .....LOL

Answer 1

Its not the majority of people that care about P.C. It is the academics and the elite that are trying to brainwash everybody - to control us.
It is the "chattering classes" as my father used to call them, those that dont do an awful lot of work but think about the big ideas and get paid more than they deserve.
I have never stopped calling a Trowel a Trowel and there are a great many like us!
They are complete toss pots!
They keep bringing out laws so fast now, that u blink and another one has been passed. We will all be breaking laws we dont even know about especially race relation laws.

Answer 2

Political correctness has become a negative term for two reasons. One is that it has been used by the 'chattering' classes to make absurdly liberal points...and secondly it has been usurped by the far right racist elements in the country to use as an attack on ethnic minorities.

In fact, the term was first coined as a matter of politeness towards ethnic minorities because of unintended discriminatory comments that the majority might not be aware of. One popular myth was the blackboard in the classroom. This never was a racist term and its removal from every day use was ridiculous. It carried no negative inference. Terms like blacklist and blackmail do however have negative connotations and political correctness was simply a reminder that if an alternative phrase could be found, it would be polite to employ it. There is no law concerning the use of political correctness.

There are however laws concerning libel and slander and treason and sacrilege and discrimination and incitement.
The idea of freedom of speech is a myth and it always has been. Britain has executed thousands of it citizens throughout history for speaking against the laws of the state.

You or anybody else can say whatever you like and call people whatever you like. In that sense you have freedom of speech, but you must be prepared to face the consequences.

Answer 3

I agree that initially it had good intentions, outlawing offensive and abusive terminology but it has gone way beyond that. The thought police have now taken over, we have to examine what we want to say before we can open our mouths for fear offending anyone. Encouraged by legislation we humans have become over sensitive to the smallest of things. A good example is the flourishing nuisance of "hoodie" kids, this would simply never have happened in my youth because the people (adults) in my community would have jumped on me like a ton of bricks. Today we adults are so afraid of the police coming to our door because we may have upset the little darlings, or a solicitors letter arriving telling us we are being sued for infringing said little darlings civil liberties So we do nothing and "hoodies" rule, great idea NOT. PC gone mad, country gone mad.... We are all dooooooomed!

Answer 4

Sarah Palin, case in point, objected to using the word "retard" on the grounds of political correctness, without specially using that factor era. you are able to say what you like yet people who would sense themselves adversely affected will merchandise. there is not any board even though it quite is purely elementary decency and politeness to confer with human beings contained in the words that they desire particularly if selection terminology could be seen disparaging. purely as you does not confer with a guy or woman of your acquaintance by potential of a attractiveness that they did no longer like or found offensive, you do no longer confer with finished communities in this style of way. this is fairly basic elementary experience. in case you sense that a particular utilization has been taken to the extreme then you definately can of direction sign in your objection to that particular utilization. Railing against "political correctness" frequently although seems somewhat stupid. in case you hit upon those practices of well mannered society complicated to maintain on with, then that seems to be greater like a guy or woman problem with which you are able to attempt against.

Answer 5

What about disability terms though?
Isn't it an improvement that we don't use words like 'spastic' and 'handicapped' now?
Would you accuse disabled people of being over-sensitive?
Note also the usage 'disabled people' rather then 'the disabled'.
As to the other business, I think we just have to accept it as something that YA does as there's so many very young people on the site, and too much bad language out there in the world anyway.
I agree though it's a bit annoying when you don't know what word is going next and your long-thought out answer comes out as a meaningless ****** ***** **** *** ***** etc.
that has to be gone back over.

Answer 6

It's straight, middle class, white, christian English liberals (not as in the political party) who decide what's politically correct. Unfortunately these people are in positions of power that allow them to thrust their ideas on others. These are the same people who tried to stop school sports days because the children shouldn't compete in case they are disappointed when they lose, and decided that "deferred success" should be sued instead of "failed" - Loonies, every single one of them.
What other country would tolerate them? None! The minorities they try to "protect from offence" must wonder what they're trying to do.

Answer 7

The Human Rights Act has been taken and abused by groups like Liberty, their leader Shami Chakrabarti can often be seen on BBC`s Question Time and heard on the radio, she has made a pretty penny speaking out for the rights of terrorists and the like. These people may be educated but they are seriously lacking in common sense.

Answer 8

I don't know but is fast becoming a pain in the neck...This is the land of the free.. and of free speech.. Yeah right.. free speech as long as you check who or what you are unknowingly going to offend.. and God help you if you do, because then you will be slapped with some kind of lawsuit, handled nicely of course by all of our lawyers who now run the country.

Answer 9

Here in the USA politcal correctness reared it's ugly head in the 1990's as far as I can remember. I believe it was a product of the early Clinton administration. I believe it has not done much except set back racial relations. In my opinion a person is not African-American, Asian-American, or Hispanic-American unless they were BORN in their respective continent/country and then legally emmigrated here. I sure don't see anyone calling white people European-American. NO!! We are all just "Americans". I'm white, your black, your hispanic, your asian and there is nothing wrong or racist with that. If we can't ever discuss race without being branded a racist, how are we ever going to make any progress?

Answer 10

we live in a country where everyone is out to make money by suing anyone and everyone for anything they know they can. and because we have these pc terms enforced people automatically think that they should be offended by things that are not pc. i heard on the news that some antivity play or something had the word 'f a g g o t' written out of the script through fear of causing offence. if the word hadn't been twisted in the first place it wouldn't be offensive. people need to stop twisting words and being verbally abussive, then there wouldn't be a problem. who made these words offensive in the first place????