Food for thought

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277009 by OB1Shinobi
Replied by OB1Shinobi on topic Food for thought
are we talking about general customs of polite socialization or official legal policy on the restriction of public speech?

i do not support legal restriction of speech: it is the UNpopular opinions which need the most protection because if they are stupid and untrue then fine, they will die out eventually if you let them be discussed openly, but if they ARE true then people need to be allowed to say them, even if it offends others or makes others uncomfortable

if this person over here believes that black people have smaller brains than white people, and this other person over there believes that white people are immoral because they lack the sufficient amounts of melanin required for spiritual clarity, then i completely support each of their rights to promote their ideas publicly and openly

first of all what if they actually are correct?
if the truth of a subject is unpleasant or unfair, its still the truth, and knowing the truth is way more important than liking the truth

secondly, when one person or group of people make their position public, it opens the opportunity for another person or group with an opposing view to step forward and refute the original ideas, also publicly and openly, using the various tools of debate such as basic logic, research, and intelligent interpretation and presentation of data

this is how a culture advances the sophistication (accuracy, intricacy, and functionality) of its ideas and its values

the biggest problems that i see in USA today (in regards to this topic) are that the citizenry is generally ignorant: poorly educated in terms of history, science, and philosophy, and by and large not only untrained in the use of logic and critical thinking skills, but actually encouraged (mostly as a result of the over-commercialization of media) to rely primarily on their/our own personal feelings and immediate emotional responses in order to make decisions and draw conclusions about topics

enforcing too broadly the rule of "dont say things that might hurt peoples feelings" creates a "padded wall" and "echo chamber" atmosphere where individuals expect to be protected from discomfort (aka reality) and are allowed to shrink -in fact where the inevitable outcome is that they/we will shrink into emotional frailty and intellectual mediocrity

i consider the layman PC advocate to be something like a sheltering mother who is willing to let her children become fat and weak in the desire to protect them from danger or discomfort

i consider the active political arm of the PC movement to be a coordinated attack on the basic process by which culture itself develops and matures

i dont really care that much about the issue of general social politeness because i think it kind of sorts itself out over time: learn to stand up for yourself and people will respect you and be polite to you for the simple fact that it wont be worth the trouble you cause them if they arent

learn to be polite and respectful to people or else you will eventually get your ass kicked, and you mostly wont have very many people who want to get close to you or see you succeed

People are complicated.
Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by OB1Shinobi.
The following user(s) said Thank You:

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277036 by OB1Shinobi
Replied by OB1Shinobi on topic Food for thought
pt 2

Political correctness is mental slavery.


political correctness is not simply an expectation of basic civility, it is the demand for censorship of ideas which are contrary to the established party line

as such, it presents a new face with the changing political landscape, it cuts in all directions, and it works to suppress the free expression of unpopular ideas within all groups

accusations of treachery and admonitions to "support our troops" were the means that the PC crowd used to silent dissent during the beginning of the iraq and afghanistan invasions -what if your country is using OBVIOUSLY false information to justify illegally invading another sovereign nation and creating a "war" that can never actually end, that is clearly not well considered and will undoubtedly cause far more problems than it solves?

well you better keep your mouth shut because it is very offensive to all of the brave men and women who sacrifice their lives to protect our nation when you speak out against their cause, and by criticizing the war you are being totally insensitive to the feelings of all those who "serve their country" (as if voicing an unpopular opinion in a time of national crisis is NOT itself a service to ones country)

its just as politically incorrect for a conservative to acknowledge global warming or the need for tougher restrictions on firearms, as it is for a liberal to challenge the idea that gender may have biological foundations or that men and women are actually different in significant ways

It creates the very bigotry it means to suppress.


people who have been silenced tend to resent those who do the silencing, and often we judge a cause less on its own intellectual merits and more on how we perceive its most public proponents

if someone shuts me down in the name of their social agenda, i tend to judge the agenda itself by the interaction with its representative, and this type of judgement by association is simple human nature.

while i typically advocate judging an issue on its intellectual merits, it is also true that people do all sorts of nasty things under the banner of noble causes, and sometimes the words they say and the goals they claim are little more than smoke and mirrors to cover the mischief that they are really about

often it is the behavior of the people themselves and NOT the ideas and goals they claim to be serving which give the greatest insight into what the movement is really after: the nasty behavior itself is the goal, and the ideas are merely the intellectual justification for it

and this sort of thing is true all across the political spectrum

next, who gets to choose what is correct and what isnt?
who investigates, who mediates, and who enforces?

giving people the power to shut others down because "FEELINGS" is exactly the same as allowing people to inform on their neighbors for witchcraft; it allows resentful or superstitious individuals to incite persecution of other individuals pretty much anonymously from within the safety of their own group, and creates attack dog situations (try "sjw doxing") where people who are not in any way held accountable for their deeds are allowed (and encouraged) to cause (sometimes irreparable) harm to those who are deemed offensive or who have stepped out of line

But when you break the shackles of political correctness you have to replace it with something of value; you must take care. Otherwise you utterly fail.


well this is a great example of how we can use the same words and yet have different meanings

to me, there is no "good" aspect of political correctness, because i dont consider basic courtesy to be PC

i consider PC to be censorship just as many consider gender to be a social construct

gender IS a social construct, when you accept the definition of gender as "the state of being male or female (typically used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones"

when i say PC i dont mean being respectful to other people,, i mean forcing people into silence because you dont liek what they say

my usual response to people when i dont like what they say is to either stop listening to them or to prove them wrong, and i expect that anyone who lacks the maturity to do the first and the intellect to do the second is not fit to set public policy

we "utterly fail" imo when we refuse to update our own positions, and when we fail to examine ideas thoroughly and openly, regardless of where the idea comes from or where we fall in the political compass

an argument that rests on prejudices and assumptions is always going to be a relatively easy argument to defeat, because at its very heart it is nothing more than an emotional outburst-its not a well reasoned position supported by a preponderance of credible evidence, its just a blowhard shooting off at the mouth

neo nazis will never be able to develop a convincing argument for racial supremacy and the need for racial purity because their entire position rests on a set of assumptions which are easily demonstrated to be inaccurate

its totally unnecessary (and completely stupid) to attempt to defeat nazi ideology with censorship when all we have to do is let them talk and address each of their claims logically

if we as a culture place a premium on the ability to analyze data and draw logical conclusions, then we wont have to appeal to kindness or courtesy to deicde the nature of our public discussions

the better a person gets at critical thinking, the less they have to rely on personal attacks, and the better our general culture gets at such, the more self evident the immaturity (and more importantly, the irrelevance) of personal attacks becomes

so, we can replace PC with "not being an idiot" lol - but the prerequisite for that is that we arent a nation of idiots to begin with and i am frankly very skeptical of seeing that day in the near future

People are complicated.
Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by OB1Shinobi.

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago #277043 by JamesSand
Replied by JamesSand on topic Food for thought

“But when you break the shackles of political correctness you have to replace it with something of value; you must take care. Otherwise you utterly fail.” Exactly! Political correctness was started, I like to believe, with good intentions. To protect those that can not protect themselves. And if we remove political correctness then we have to replace it with something else, something of value. Guess what, we already have that mysterious thing. Compassion. Compassion is one of the things that is central to the path of Jedi.



Being the glorious [strike]bottom feeder[/strike] frontline manager that I am, I have to give the odd spiel on [strike]not peeking up girls skirts[/strike] workplace ethics - I'll be stealing your spin about Compassion vs Mandatory Workplace Enforced Behaviour

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277051 by Adder
Replied by Adder on topic Food for thought
I like the idea of expression being constituted of two main types; personality and character. Such that character is an emission of core essence, and personality more a reflective interaction (nature). So politically correct seems to fit more in the domain of personality and therefore need not be associated to ones values so much - where ones values might sit better within that domain of ones character. Then politically correct could be seen as just polite action of personality, and not much else. The problem might be in when someone exerts authority to enforce some standard of communication along the lines of being politically correct. Some authority is established and legitimate and falls within a body of laws or rules, but outside of those the concept of politically correct does not in itself have any enduring 'moral authority' beyond representing individuals personality AFAIK, in terms of expression. Boundaries, and all that. I guess that is how I see it... and perhaps need to learn what 'epistemic authority' is lol errr.

Knight ~ introverted extropian, mechatronic neurothealogizing, technogaian buddhist. Likes integration, visualization, elucidation and transformation.
Jou ~ Deg ~ Vlo ~ Sem ~ Mod ~ Med ~ Dis
TM: Grand Master Mark Anjuu
Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by Adder.

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277074 by Brick
Replied by Brick on topic Food for thought
If you're a good person then you don't need to be politically correct IMO. Political Correctness was created to effectively encourage people to self censor their words so as not to cause offence (which is, arguably, what a normal person does anyway). A Jedi IMO has no need for political correctness as a Jedi knows what is and isnt appropriate in the given context and so would never unintentionally cause offence (emphasis on unintentionally)

However it also enables people to hide their bigotry. Many are PC in public and racist/misogynistic/homophobic etc. behind closed doors. It doesn't solve social problems, it simply masks the symptoms.

Because PC does not allow for context, it causes people to be offended the moment anything non PC is said, even if meant in humour.

As a result of this, we have a large percentage of a generation (my generation, sadly) that cannot accept a world that exists outside of political correctness. And so SJW and the 'professionally offended', therefore are able to encourage such ridiculous things as 'safe-spaces' and, far worse, 'non-platforming'. They deny anyone that does not conform to their worldview the right to free speech and lable them as racists and bigots.

The problem that arises with getting rid of PC is that you're effectively saying its ok to go back to the discriminatory hate speech of yesteryear. And so the Author is right, we need to replace it with something else, the question is 'with what?'

What would i do to solve it? To quote Blair (NOT something I do very often) 'Education, education, education!'

Apprentice to Maitre Chevalier Jedi Alexandre Orion

Moderator | Welcome Team | IP Team

IP Journal | IP Journal 2 | AP Journal | Open Journal

'The only contest any of us should be engaged in is with ourselves, to be better than yesterday'

- Knight Senan
Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by Brick.
The following user(s) said Thank You: Proteus, Alexandre Orion, Zenchi,

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277083 by Locksley
Replied by Locksley on topic Food for thought
:(

Here's an interesting article


Here's a very simple notion of what people are campaigning for (though, note, the people usually trying to end discrimination aren't really focusing on the term "politically correct", while people demonizing them refer to them as "SJW" and the like.

lAnd here's a breakdown of some recent discussions on the topic, specifically some stuff 45's said.

Of course this discussion is very much U.S. and Internet-centered, but still valid overall. What I find surprising is how many people react so negatively toward other people who are just trying to work against bigotry and oppression. There will always be fundamentalists who make the whole look bad (this is perfectly true for Jedi as well), but perhaps there are other people who are just unable to think critically, or who feel the subject emotionally because it is close to their everyday lives and inspires fear for their safety. I guess that last is the most important point. When does a joke become less than a joke? If something is funny for me, will it be funny for everyone else? Perhaps it would be hurtful, or even harmful to perpetrate certain types of humor -- and as an act of compassion and understanding, maybe it's really not that big a concession to try and see how people might feel when confronted with a joke that I may find funny, but which they find painful or degrading.

One point was made here, that Jedi shouldn't need to be specifically "politically correct", but rather simply by following the Jedi path and code they will be capable of avoiding doing harm. Perhaps. And perhaps part of that is a requirement to try and think about the ways in which words and actions have power over people's lives -- and how those situations may be subtle to your personal worldview, even if they are overt to someone else. Perhaps, instead of demonizing people who are asking to be referred to in a certain way, or who are asking for some sense of security that their identity and livelihood will not be attacked (at least within specific spaces), we can work to understand their position -- and while working, simply make the small concession they're asking. It's not hugely harmful. You can still be critical, once you've had time to digest things.

As Jedi though, we do hold ourselves to a higher standard. We must be willing to rail in our personal beliefs a little, in order to adhere to the Jedi principles of protecting human rights. We definitely need to look deep within ourselves when it comes to seemingly black and white issues, and dissect the shades of grey (not so we can stand apart and isolated on our proverbial soap-box, but so we can work within the communities we live to foster the greatest possible good). As Jedi we should also be seeking out as many diverse opinions as possible, and if we lack certain types of diversity within the Temple, we should go out and seek it in the rest of our lives. Maybe there are some good essays by black folk, or trans folk, that deal with this sort of thing. While researching we are certain to come across angry and hurtful language, but maybe there are grains of important truth even there.

We are all the sum of our tears. Too little and the ground is not fertile, and nothing can grow there. Too much, the best of us is washed away. -- J. Michael Straczynski, Babylon 5

Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by Locksley.
The following user(s) said Thank You: OB1Shinobi

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago - 7 years 1 month ago #277085 by OB1Shinobi
Replied by OB1Shinobi on topic Food for thought
the right to never be offended is not a human right - im actually offended at the idea that anyone would suggest it to be so

you have the right to choose who you listen to, not to silence those whose words you dislike

when i was a kid one of the earliest lessons my mother attempted to teach me was that people words actually DONT have power over my life

in fact this is one of the most basic childhood lessons that there is, like not talking to strangers and looking both ways before crossing the road

if you want to be under the power of every jackamole with an opinion, go ahead

my opinion is that thats a very bad idea and youre going to pay terrible consequences for it

if we're doing links, I rather appreciate the way Steve Hughes explains it

People are complicated.
Last edit: 7 years 1 month ago by OB1Shinobi. Reason: so as not to offend
The following user(s) said Thank You: , Brick

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago #277094 by Brick
Replied by Brick on topic Food for thought

OB1Shinobi wrote: when i was a kid one of the earliest lessons my mother attempted to teach me was that people words actually DONT have power over my life

in fact this is one of the most basic childhood lessons that there is, like not talking to strangers and looking both ways before crossing the road


'sticks and stones may break my bones but words shall never hurt me', right?

Apprentice to Maitre Chevalier Jedi Alexandre Orion

Moderator | Welcome Team | IP Team

IP Journal | IP Journal 2 | AP Journal | Open Journal

'The only contest any of us should be engaged in is with ourselves, to be better than yesterday'

- Knight Senan
The following user(s) said Thank You: OB1Shinobi

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 1 month ago #277095 by JamesSand
Replied by JamesSand on topic Food for thought

when i was a kid one of the earliest lessons my mother attempted to teach me was that people words actually DONT have power over my life


And yet so many of us make our livings influencing people with our words. :unsure:

Please Log in to join the conversation.

More
7 years 3 weeks ago - 7 years 3 weeks ago #277316 by OB1Shinobi
Replied by OB1Shinobi on topic Food for thought
@Locksley
the article you posted "the benefits of PC" was good, and i do agree with the ideas that it appeals to

but again,i see a huge difference between what we should consider the general standards of good taste, vs what we should demand as the official, legal limits of freedom of speech

its one thing not to go to a comedy show if you are offended by the jokes and another thing altogether to have the comedian arrested

lets use trump as as example; far as i can tell he is a total buffoon
by that, i mean to say that he is an ego-maniacal and moronic demagogue; an insecure ignoramus who, between his impulsive, self aggrandizing dishonesty and his general intellectual incompetence, i wouldnt trust to tell me the time while staring directly at his rolex

now, im 99% sure that all of those things i just said are true, (the part about not trusting him to tell the time was definitely true, he could totally screw that up if someone had just made fun of how small his hands are or something) but its not at all in good taste to say them, and if the PC crowd gets their way, it would actually be against the law to say them

while i agree with the sentiment that we ought to be basically civil towards one another, i completely disagree with the idea that it should be enforced by the state - i just dont think its a good idea to use the law to regulate good taste

the bulk of the power of the PC movement comes from average, decent people who just want to see common courtesy be a little more common

but i believe that the ultimate aim of the P.C. movement is legal in nature, with specific goals of enacting official restrictions on public speech, and i consider that dangerous

especially when we use feelings as the measure of what is appropriate, as this allows the most insecure, paranoid and neurotic people to be in charge of the conversation

People are complicated.
Last edit: 7 years 3 weeks ago by OB1Shinobi.

Please Log in to join the conversation.

Moderators: ZerokevlarVerheilenChaotishRabeRiniTavi