Illustration by Sara Haas.
Certain celebrities, comedians, and basically every other person that has a few insulting comments to say to an oppressive group always has something negative to say about “PC Culture,” and how it is going against the 1st Amendment. Basically, if you ever defended yourself or some else against any form of sexism, racism, ableism, etc., you’ve probably been accused of being “too PC.” The definition of the widely used term is as shown. Political correctness (adjectivally: politically correct), commonly abbreviated to PC, is a term which, in modern usage, is used to describe language, policies, or measures which are intended not to offend or disadvantage any particular group of people in society.
That doesn’t sound so bad, right? Making sure to not offend anyone by thinking about the terms wisely while addressing a beleaguered group of people is simply human decency. But studies have shown that sixty-eight percent of Americans eighty-one percent of Republicans, and sixty two percent of democrats think that political correctness is a problem and is getting out of hand. This is most likely because being politically correct is often associated with being weak or overly-sensitive. It’s a way to shut down a conversation about inequality easily. The group of people that often claim the term to insult others are usually conservatives, when all “social justice warriors” are trying to do is call out lazy and offensive language that rarely gets confronted. Usually, the people that try to defend themselves and discuss discrimination never got their chance to speak in the past. This correlates to the fact that the people that frequently try to shut down these discussions have always had a position of power.
For example, let’s say someone was addressing a transgender woman, and used the incorrect pronouns purposely in order to offend the woman they are discussing. In the conversation, there is someone else who thinks that the other person was being extremely rude, and calls he/she out on it. The person who was being transphobic says, “I can say whatever I want, we live in America, and I have freedom of speech!” Of course they do, but so does the other person. By telling someone they can’t be offended or retort on your statements is trying to control their freedom of speech. It is true that you can say any homophobic, racist, or sexist term you would like, but don’t be surprised when you receive backlash by some pretty upset people, because it’s their right just as much as yours.
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