December 19, 2016

Word: Political correctness

From an email from a 52-year-old woman and self-described hillbilly received by columnist Robby Souve of Hit & Run

If you explain in a considered and respectful way why what I am saying is hurtful or wrong, I will take it on board and try to change. If you talk down to me and tell me what a horrible person I am in the process—maybe not so much.... Political correctness is not "being kind and having good manners". I am southern. I am always kind and I have impeccable manners. What political correctness is to me is an unreasonable expectation of your fellow man. To expect him to have arrived where you are while having completely different life experiences. Contempt is always hurtful. Bullying is always bad. It is ironic that people who bully people for being politically incorrect don't even recognize it as bullying or as just another way of demonizing people who are different than you. They are engaging in the exact same behavior they excoriate. It's OK to be different in the way they are different but not in any other way. 

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