Political correctness gone sane

Political correctness gone mad is where it is no longer possible to debate any issue freely. If you have to tread on eggshells in trying to present an argument, only to have it shot down because you have gone about it in the "wrong" way, that is not a mark of achievement or progress or tolerance: it is precisely the opposite.

Many of the comments on these boards are nothing more than crude mud slinging - references to "idiots", "scum" and the like are "answered" by people accusing them of being "bigots", "racists" or whatever. When are we going to learn to debate without this kind of automatic exchange of insults about the other person's point of view?

Whether we were born here or abroad, whatever our religion, cultural background, skin colour, nationality, we are all trying to make the best sense we can of our human condition. Yes, some of the practices of other cultures appall us and we are right to express our disapproval (such as of female circumcision and forced marriage). But then we also have to look at rampant drug and alcohol abuse (and ask why people turn to these things - are they really so unhappy?) as well as young people just sleeping around, creating a situation where young girls, who should be enhancing their education are having to cope with babies and/or where young people as a whole are spreading STDs and entering into unsatisfactory and unstable relationships. And no-one seems to be happy with all this. Jeremy Kyle Shows and the like just illustrate this point graphically.

This unhappy situation has not come about because of any laws - or lack of them - but seem to stem from a general rejection of the homely values that we used to encourage in this country. Now we replace these with the P/C "values" of carping at tradition, questioning everything and letting everyone just "be". Result? No sense of direction, purpose or hope. It's no wonder some of them are in so much despair that they hate one another and ride round on bikes with guns and knives, killing one another.

I am not suggesting that there are any simple answers to any of this - too often, the policy makers in this country have just acted against the "fringe effects" without taking time really to think out where our society has gone so wrong.

The answer, of course, has got NOTHING to do with benefits, skin colour, the EU, the Labour Party (or any other party), crucifixes, burkhas gays, catholics, protestants, muslims or any of the usual scapegoats targeted by the political left or the right ; it has much to do with being obsessed with "quick fixes" that, actually, fix nothing, as they do not begin to look at the fundamental causes of the malaise.

We just need an honest and open debate, where we do not attack one another but instead, listen respectfully, and continue the debate in that manner. Otherwise, all we do is polarize, retreat into our "comfortable" positions and shoot at each other in vain, making no progress at all.

Bellowing at each other, just to show that our point of view is "superior" just achieves the opposite and suggests paucity of our argument; we are intelligent beings and should apply our intelligence intelligently.

I believe we are confusing political correctness with discrimination here which can be two very different animals.

Celebrate tolerance? It has given rise to violent crime, anti social behaviour,no discipline in schools,hate preachers,gun crime,binge drinking,knife crime,animal cruelty, lenient sentences for criminals and an influx of unwanted imigrants from all over the world,is that something to celebrate?

Political Correctness is a cultural and social cancer, corrupting and eating away at everything that has made us British. Tolerance and forbearance are not the same thing. Tolerance implies acceptance and, at worst, a benign indifference to something. Forbearance, on the other hand, is 'putting up with something'. There is a big difference.
When we put up with something, we are enduring or refraining from confronting something that we don't particularly like or want. All sorts of trivial examples come to mind -- trivial, but neatly summarising the emotions involved. For example, it's your neighbour's noisy kids in the back garden in the early afternoon when you really want a quiet nap. Or it's their yapping Jack Russell. Or it's your own kids, upstairs, playing their damned heavy-metal music far too loudly. Etc etc. You put up with it. You forbear to interfere and do what you really want to do/say what you really want to. You do this for a variety of reasons: not wanting to be perceived as bad-tempered or, God help us, intolerant. You might think that if you leave it for a while, the problem will somehow solve itself and go away. Until. Until your patience wears out. You finally realise that you have had enough and somehow, something has got to be done and you no longer care about how you are perceived or received or treated as a consequence of what happens next. In other words, you snap and finally get to do what it dawns on you you should have done much, much earlier. And that, it seems to me, is where this country -- and other European countries too -- are heading. It won't be nice when it happens. But happen it will.

Anyone else hate the word "tolerance" and how it's been hijacked these days?

Tolerance is one of the main reasons why britain is as messed up as it is, there are things we should not tolerate at all, behaviours and attitudes that should never be tolerated, and that includes ones born of religious beliefs.

The way "tolerance" is used these days by the multiculturalists is to basically tell people to shut up and put up with what they don't agree with..... Why must I tolerate a persons beliefs when I find their beliefs, such as the institutional sexism of Islam for example intolerable, why must I tolerate the idea that people can come here and willfully flout british customs and social morals, laws even?

Yet if you say anything you are being "intolerant"

It's friggin @#$% is what it is!

Come on, some one tell me why I should tolerate that, why anyone should tolerate that, because that is exactly what the multiculturalists are saying, all the time!

I believe in equality, but it must be that, what is going on here is going beyond equality, you can't pretend to believe in equality and not say that the sexism inherant to Islam is wrong, and yes you are saying that if you avoid saying anything!

Congrats multiculturalists, you have destroyed a nation, not are going to, but have!

This is a story about homosexual rights as far as I can see with 5 paragraphs about homophobic Uganda and 1 paragraph about everything else.

Yes politcal correctness can be a good thing but patriotism should be allowed out of its dark corner where laws have pushed it. When you look at the excessive laws other countries have enforced you can understand why so many immigrants flock to the UK for asylum. What is really annoying is they then enforce their countries idealisms on us!
We, as a country, have had our rights chipped away by gradual government ruling to a point where we Brits have no rights and any immigrant who comes here can effectively `get away with` unpatriotic acts (they came her to be British)

Dont get me wrong I am not a racist or a purist and I have known immigrants who have joined the british community and you would never know which country they came from! A good portion provide better service than the british counterparts.

We should weed out the laws and delete the ones that are counter productive. Such as the law stating you cant play conkers without goggles! What about America, They cant say Happy Christmas as it may offend other religions so they have to say happy holidays! (I know, its about UK political correctness)

So while a little bit of political correctness can go a long way some one should take away the crayons before the politicians loose control!

Define tolerance. In British government language it means 'Get used to it because there's nothing you can do about it so tough luck'. Tolerance is something that is down to the individual. I tolerate anyone who respects my culture, my way of life, pay their fair share to supprt our society, someone who lives within the boundaries of common decency. I'm afraid my tolerance was over stretched a long time ago.

why is it assumed that only white people can be racist or are the only ones who discriminate?? we're not even allowed to class ourselves as english anymore, we have to be british. I watched that programme where scott mills was in africa that was disgusting, gay people should be killed - but the african people are still angels and take gay people's charity money though! Why are people so naive to think other ethnic groups are all angelic humans with the minds of a saint??? i was called red neck, piglet and strawberry milkshake at my school - but that was fine, the teachers just laughed it off. Call any other ethnic group a racist name are you are eternally ruined.

What's to be proud of. Thirty years ago children were not stabbing other children in the streets. It was safe to walk round your town after dark and window shop. It was safe to open your door after dark even if you didn't know who was there.As a child I roamed freely alone or with friends and my parents had no worries about our safety. There was Freedom of Speech. I could go on and on about the good things destroyed by Tolerance, Political Correctness etc. but I won't. The good things of this country are gone and I doubt that they will ever return. I am just glad that I knew the lovely Britain and I'm sorry my children have to live with the mess that is todays Britain with no memories of the good times.

The flaw in the article is not that Political Correctness is a good thing because it isn't. It is because Britain is fundamentally a tolerant and generally decent country and it passes these laws because .put simply it's the right thing to do. Unfortunately our hospitality to outsiders is frequently abused.

The author of this article undermines his own argument in the last paragraph with the observation - 'Political correctness is a good thing, it motivates legislation that makes the world a more fair and tolerant place,'. You cannot use laws to make a more equitable world, all that does is build anger, dissatisfaction and subversion, what you need to do is deal with attitudes and promote the values that make us great - tolerance, understanding, respect, love and common sense.

As a small example, when in a pub I personally don't want to see two men kissing, or two women kissing, a man and a woman kissing or even someone kissing their dog. Beyond a simple peck on the cheek when meeting and departing (if people so wish) then constantly kissing and canoodling is (to my mind) unacceptable. Here is the crux of the matter though, if I don't like it but the pub's landlord is happy for it to go on then I can decide whether to stay or go, however if the landlord doesn't like this behaviour and asks people to stop and they don't, surely it is right that he be able to ask them to leave. Same goes for nearly every activity, including smoking in pubs - as an ex-smoker I dislike the smell of smoke, however it should be the right of each landlord to decide what to do in their pub and the right of consumers to decide whether we stay in that environment or not.

I don't want to be told what to think feel and believe, however the political correct lobby want the right to be able to do this - surely this is a form of emotional fascism. Let's get to a calm and reasoned position where just because I don't believe as you do doesn't mean either of us is wrong, it just means we believe diferent things.

By the way, the Ugandan situation is exactly the same in reverse - you can't legislate to outlaw homosexuality any more than you could legislate to make it compulsory - it up to our governments and polititians to help them understand how things should be and the acceptable way to behave with your peoples.

Britain become a more tolerant nation than most, an achievement of which we should be proud. I think not! Its a case of there not being freedom of speech and if we say anything. Now its either not PC or its Racist.

Im English not British, anyone can be British, it means nothing!

Unfortunately, the journalist Richard Littlejohn has almost patented the phrase :

"You could'nt make it up"!

We live in this 'lovely' so called PC world of our own making, blissfully ignoring the fact that the rest of the world views us as a 'soft-touch' precisely BECAUSE of our correctness! Anyone and everyone can settle here, secure in the knowledge that, no matter how repulsive, undemocratic or unacceptable their beliefs; we will not only protect them, but will provide them with the platform to propogate those ideas and beliefs. We will house them, finance them, turn a blind-eye when, for 'cultural' reasons their actions break our (PC) laws. Even people who publically state their intention is to overthrow the government and scrap our (PC) legal system are 'protected' by, that very (PC) system!

Truly, you could'nt make it up!

Political correctness? The social engineering in this country via children's television is nothing short of enforced government brainwashing.

How can we be tolerant when if you are proud to be English u are branded as racist, I love my country and am tolerant of other people beliefs, lifestyle and culture. Its a shame some other cultures aren't as tolerant towards the English.

I support freedom / human rights, and I deeply dislike political correctness. Those who muddle the two, presumably to try and rustle up support for the discredited PC Brigade, are (in my view) morally bankrupt.

P.C has limited freedom of expression and the average Brit would consider this article to be out of touch with reality. For too long we have had change forced upon us without any say ( Europe, immigration, multiculturism,) and PC is used to stifle dissent and debate on these matters which are so important . The longer the lid is screwed down the greater will the explosion be when it comes, as it surely will. Those that wish to destroy this country are using PC ro great advantage and citing racism, sex discrimination, etc as an excuse to dismantle our institutions, clubs, regiments and all those parts of society that were once the glue that kept us together. Throw 'elf and safety in to the mix and we can';t even play conkers. Tolerant? I'd say hugely oppressed. My late Uncle, a tank commander in WW2 said recently that he would be ashamed if the troops he had lost were to come back now and see what they had died for. As they say, those whom the Gods wish to destroy they first make mad, and Britain is fast becoming a madhouse.Tolerant? More like Lemmings, hell bent on self destruction

I am all for human rights and equality, but the state of this Country drives me to a teeth grinding rage most of the time. Under the guise of being a "Tolerant Britain", the real truth is we live in a fearful "Democracy". Now we can`t blame the wishy washy liberal PC voters for this. It was happening since Labour came into power. The truth is the present Goverment, just like the last one, is too @#$% scared to stand up and say "enough" on Immmigration and real threats like the Islamic Extremist groups, who contiue to preach their hate in our Country.
The truth is we live in a Country, where most nationals are too @#$% scared to say how fed up they are with our system. We have had masses of immigrants over the years coming over with their families, straight on to benefits, renting houses courtesy of Social Security, claiming everything under the sun. The Authorities are too scared to even say words such as "Muslim" or "Asian" as they know these communities will be straight up in arms and the media will jump on the bandwagon as it`s a sure fire story.
Welcome to UKstan - a place where extremists can preach hatred of this country and still live here courtesy of Goverment benefits.
PC? it`s whats leading this country straight down the toilet. When you can`t even talk about certain cultures or religions in this country without being classed as a EDL or BNP thug. We need a bloody revolution.

Wade is deliberately confusing tolerance and respect for human and civil rights with political correctness. PC is wrong precisely because it frequently goes against the principle of tolerance.

I have to say; I find the article irritating and highly selective - trying to portray PC as being oh, so tolerant - so long as you're not Christian and / or with differing views! If you're on the right side of PC, it might seem very tolerant. If you step one inch over the wrong side - making a joke etc, you might conclude the PC brigade are even more intolerant!!