I’m not politically correct. I think maybe I’ve considered it from time to time, after all, I’m respectful, I like people, and I’m a big fan of human rights. The problem is that any time I think about becoming an apparently respectful adult and buying into a life absent of shock horror and full of rampant conservatism, I sort of want to beat myself across the head with my keyboard. Because sometimes, trying to say the right thing, ends up making you sound stupid instead.

 

While studying at university I met a lot of people who were always looking for some kind of political confrontation, or who were otherwise perpetual apologists for everything from a joke, to an offhand comment or even a legitimate opinion. Jokes had to be taken literally, opinions needed to be bashed (especially if they were part of the popular consensus), and a great deal of time was dedicated to feeling bad for being, in any small way, intentionally or not, part of a ‘privileged’ class of people. The thing that bothers me about political correctness in general is that it seems to miss the point.

 

Intentions behind the words matter more than the words.

 

That is to say, when somebody is making a politically incorrect joke, it doesn’t automatically make them a bad person. I think that people who are uptight about political correctness make a lot of unfair assumptions. They assume that everything a person says is a reflection of their deep seated beliefs. They don’t look for context or discourse, just something they can challenge. I find this troubling, because I talk a reasonable amount of bullshit sometimes. For example, if I make a joke about gay men being better at fashion than straight men, I probably don't think it's true in 100% of cases. I probably don't think it's a bad quality in either heterosexual or homosexual men AND, in my experience; my less than straight friends are the first to find my comment entertaining. This is ironic, because I have actually been called a homophobe for such a comment.

 

I can argue with that logic, but it's fairly tiring to have to do so!

 

The other thing about living in a PC world is that it sometimes places too much emphasis on people’s rights to not be offended and not enough on accepting that not everything in life is going to turn out the way we like. Stephen Fry has an excellent quote regarding this idea. Now I'm not saying that I won't call someone out on being openly hateful, offensive or abusive, just that sometimes in life we need to put on our big boy and girl pants and try to work out whether we are rightfully offended, or overly sensitive. 

 

People are free to have opinions that you don’t agree with and even to make jokes which you don't find funny! I heard a quote once that was to the effect of ‘either everything is fair game for comedy or nothing is’, because everything offends somebody.  You might not like it when people say or do things that don’t jar with your worldview, but you do have to accept it if you want to make it in the real world. You'll waste a lot of time and energy feeling angry and hurt if you're too easily offended.

 

To sum it up, here is a short clip that pretty much perfectly describes my feelings towards political correctness.