Wednesday 24 November 2010

PC gone mad is PC gone mad

A bit more from Mr Sunstein:
[T]he very phrase 'political correctness', as used by some conservative critics, has an impressive and somewhat pernicious ingenuity. The phrase suggests that certain political commitments are not a product of serious reflection but instead are a form of unthinking dogmatism - just a matter of following the crowd. The phenomenon of left-wing political correctness is real, and it is a real problem. But the use of the phrase to discredit certain thoughts and ideals can be a clever way of imposing informational and reputational pressures. Ironically, many of those who refer to political correctness, and deplore its presence on university campuses, are themselves participants in an insidious form of political correctness. They participate in group polarisation as well, stirring one another into extreme caricatures of contemporary university life; and they do so while congratulating themselves on their independence and bravery.
Spot on.

1 comment:

skillz said...

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/its-a-pc-world-by-edward-stourton-1017123.html