# Has American culture become or is it becoming too PC **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 20, 2015, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992 "2015-09-20T19:39:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/61 "2015-09-21T22:58:31Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > You can lose your job for using the word “niggardly” in a contextually-valid manner. [And get it back ten days later.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_about_the_word_%22niggardly%22#David_Howard_incident) ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/62 "2015-09-21T23:04:30Z")
And Ahmed Mohamed is back at his school. All is well that ends well? ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/63 "2015-09-21T23:08:13Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > You can lose your job for using the word “niggardly” in a contextually-valid manner. One person can, apparently. And, as noted, not for long. Any evidence that this is a widespread thing, or is it a single, decontextualized anecdote masquerading as data? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/64 "2015-09-21T23:16:33Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > You can lose your job for using the word “niggardly” in a contextually-valid manner. > > Deny this absurdity and you are part of the problem, not the solution. American culture has far bigger problems than that, in how minorities, women and homosexuals are treated. Do you deny it? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/65 "2015-09-21T23:39:43Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > And Ahmed Mohamed is back at his school. > > All is well that ends well? Let’s recap the comparison, here. Fifteen years ago, David Howard was fired after someone complained about him using the word “niggardly.” When the story hit the press, widespread hue and cry over the obvious injustice convinced his boss to offer him his job back. No one was ever fired for using the word “niggardly” at work again. So, yeah, if, fifteen years from now, no other Arab kid is arrested for making a bomb when he very clearly did not make anything that looks remotely like a bomb, then yes indeed, all is well that ends well. An injustice was uncovered, and public reaction ensured that the injustice would not be repeated. Now, if, a decade and a half from now, people are still bringing up Mohamed as evidence of ongoing bias against Arabs - or, for that matter, ongoing stupidity of school administrators - _despite the fact that Mohamed’s situation was never repeated anywhere else_ - then not only is the comparison apt, but you’ll have actually made an insightful and valuable contribution to this thread. But we won’t know for sure until 2030. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/66 "2015-09-21T23:41:45Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > But we won’t know for sure until 2030. American society will have long collapsed by then because of gay marriage. I read that somewhere. It might have been here. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2015, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/67 "2015-09-21T23:48:13Z")
Yes. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/68 "2015-09-22T00:33:27Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > American culture has far bigger problems than that, in how minorities, women and homosexuals are treated. Do you deny it? I can probably agree as long as we are talking about certain specifics rather than just making blanket statements that don’t highlight specific problems. I don’t support indirect and vague solutions for such problems. PC language, behavior and attempted thought control falls firmly into that category. Again, PC to me requires that the proposed solution be at the far margins of political and sociological thought. Simple courtesies and good manners are just good practice and do not fall under the term. Mechanic: Sir, I looked at your vehicle and you blew both the engine and the transmission. It is going to cost $7500 and two weeks to fix both of them. Customer: I don’t have the money or the time. I demand you do something, SOMETHING! today. Mechanic: Well, we can wash it for you for $20. It is a little dirty. Customer: That is more like it. When can I pick it up? Mechanic: You can’t because it won’t run and washing it isn’t going to do anything about that but at least you can come back and show your friends your really clean car. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/69 "2015-09-22T02:43:39Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > I can probably agree as long as we are talking about certain specifics rather than just making blanket statements that don’t highlight specific problems. How specific do we have to be? Blacks face significant economic disadvatage, but this one time somebody got fired for saying “niggardly”. The “America is too PC” argument runs solely on anecdote. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/70 "2015-09-22T03:26:21Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > How specific do we have to be? Blacks face significant economic disadvatage, but this one time somebody got fired for saying “niggardly”. The “America is too PC” argument runs solely on anecdote. Some blacks still do but you listed other groups as well. There is a great argument to be made that women (at least younger white women) aren’t disadvantaged at all in current day America unless you cherry-pick examples. They are the ones going to college, getting the good jobs and advancing at a faster rate than any other group. Are they truly disadvantaged (I think we have already debunked the 77 cents on the dollar myth)? The U.S. is a huge country that has a large number of problems but that also means that you can’t simplify the problem as simply white males versus all others. Some Asian groups are kicking ass economically and even many blacks aren’t poor anymore but some white groups are in places like Appalachia. It takes very specific arguments about well-defined circumstances to make the case of oppression for any particular group because there are thousands of different ones. That is one of the main problems with PC rhetoric. It presumes an oppressor versus oppressed relationship based on arbitrary and often faulty criteria when that may not be true at all or may only be true for a limited subset of the populations involved. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/71 "2015-09-22T03:37:12Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Some blacks still do but you listed other groups as well. There is a great argument to be made that women (at least younger white women) aren’t disadvantaged at all in current day America unless you cherry-pick examples. They are the ones going to college, getting the good jobs and advancing at a faster rate than any other group. Are they truly disadvantaged (I think we have already debunked the 77 cents on the dollar myth)? And that’s an argument that could probably be plausibly engaged in, as long as it doesn’t slide into Anecdotia like claiming Zoe Quinn lied about something or Crystal Mangum lied about something, therefore all women are liars or potential liars and men’s rights count, too! > [@](#): > > The U.S. is a huge country that has a large number of problems but that also means that you can’t simplify the problem as simply white males versus all others. Oh, I wouldn’t do that. My preferred formula is that it’s religious Americans against all others. Get rid of _them_ and you’ll be better off. They’re not really oppressors (though I’m sure they’d like to be), but mostly nuisances and hindrances. If a segment of the U.S. population _must_ be disadvantaged, they’d be my pick. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/72 "2015-09-22T05:06:04Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Have you ever encountered this for real? It’s a real thing in both Canada and the U.S. > **[No-Score Youth Sports Policies Gaining Popularity](https://www.athleticbusiness.com/operations/programming/article/15142780/no-score-youth-sports-policies-gaining-popularity)** > > This summer, a growing number of youth soccer teams in Ontario will be playing games without keeping track of goals scored, at least not officially. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/73 "2015-09-22T11:00:10Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > It’s a real thing in both Canada and the U.S. > > [http://www.athleticbusiness.com/no-score-youth-sports-policies-gaining-popularity.html](http://www.athleticbusiness.com/no-score-youth-sports-policies-gaining-popularity.html) That’s not an answer to the question I asked, though. Of course in all honesty, I do not have (and indeed never had) any intention of taking the OP’s question seriously. My response in post #26 succinctly and accurately reflects my feelings on the issue. Heck, encountering some PC bullshit at school could be a useful lesson for a kid - learning that authority is occasionally prone to nonsense - and a good parent would be able to point this out, even at the potential risk of undermining his or her own authority. That, and introducing the kid to _MAD Magazine_. Subversion = freedom. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/74 "2015-09-22T13:24:11Z")
I can’t answer your question without “PC” being defined, as I’m sure other posters have already pointed out. If by “PC” you mean “concerned with the situation of marginalized people”, hell no, we’ve still got a long ways to go. If by “PC” you mean “a set of attitudes you’re required to have and display, including the minutiae of precisely how they are expressed”, hell yeah, that mindless-sheep insistence on conformity to the output of someone else’s socially progressive thinking (rather than doing your own damn socially progressive thinking and communicating with people as an equal participant) drives me batshit. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/75 "2015-09-22T14:07:08Z")
Whenever we talk about sexism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, racism, lookism, abelism, etc.–people come out of the woodwork with personal, first-hand experiences with these things. Either as a victim or as a witness. But when the subject turns to “PC crimes”, the only incidents that get cited are the same stories we always hear about whenever this topic comes up. Like the “niggardly” guy. Still, it doesn’t stop people like the OP from fearing the “PC police.” And we’re supposed to believe that minorities have a monopoly on “victim culture”? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/76 "2015-09-22T14:24:55Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > What is PC is trying to call people out for innocent expressions of thought that somehow run afoul of current leftist ideals. Those are often transient and completely arbitrary. Two examples are the terms Black versus African-American and Native American versus Indian. At certain points in the recent past leftist types decided that these historically oppressed groups needed new names and tried to enforce that usage on everyone. People that didn’t comply weren’t considered as enlightened as they were. It didn’t work. Most American blacks still prefer that term over African-American just as many Native Americans prefer the term Indian over the former. > > \ > > Luckily I am old and established enough now where it is just an academic concern. I can just watch the bullshit fly from the stands and then do whatever I was going to do before I got subjected to yet another lecture from an overprivileged know-nothing blowhard. It’s hugely amusing to see somebody complaining about “know-nothing blowhards” while making a mistake as elementary as equating black and African-American. They are not synonyms and nobody has ever been considered “less enlightened” for saying black anyway. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/77 "2015-09-22T14:55:14Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Whenever we talk about sexism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, racism, lookism, abelism, etc.–people come out of the woodwork with personal, first-hand experiences with these things. Either as a victim or as a witness. > > But when the subject turns to “PC crimes”, the only incidents that get cited are the same stories we always hear about whenever this topic comes up. Like the “niggardly” guy. > > Still, it doesn’t stop people like the OP from fearing the “PC police.” > > And we’re supposed to believe that minorities have a monopoly on “victim culture”? I’m one of the minorities with isms and phobias to deal with and I’ve had problems with the PC police within the very activist organizations that I’ve been a direct part of. There’s a bit of an attitude within the overall LGBTQ community that “we are born this way, it is all biological neurological genetic etc, and _to ever give creedence_ to the notion that socialization or experiential adaptation could in any fashion be the cause of gender identity or sexual orientation _is oppressive to us_”. I don’t know that my peculiar sense of gender identity is all hardwired. Some of it might be. My own _understanding_ of it most likely isn’t, though, I think I identified myself against a backdrop of other humans, recognizing the patterns and where I fit within them. Do I really need to be told that I can’t talk about that, that those very ideas are bad for us collectively, that I need to STFU or be tsked at for voicing reactionary sentiments? Is that necessary? I am a minority within the “big umbrella” definition of _transgender_, the definition that says that if your gender identity is other than the one assigned to / assumed of you when you were born, you’re transgender. But whereas the typical transgender person is someone who considers themself to have been born in a body that is a mismatch for their gender and which therefore ideally needs changing (hence male-to-female or female-to-male), I’m OK with my physiological maleness and with being perceived (accurately) as a physiological male, and I’m about trying to create head-space in people’s minds for the idea that there are male girls and female boys as well as the more conventional & more typical female girls and male boys, and that we should be accepted as we are, with no pressure to change behavior, presentation, or morphology. Which is fine, _THAT_ isn’t considered un-PC in and of itself. But there’s a strong current within the trans community that it is creepy and disgusting for someone to want to be with a transperson specifically — transwomen want to meet people who are attracted to women, not people who are attracted to transwomen, transmen want to meet people who wish to be with men, not people who have a thing for transmen, in other words — and out of this there has grown a bit of a “PC” attitude that it is no one’s business what you’ve got down there, that the morphology you currently have is irrelevant and that people should _only_ be concerned with what your gender is. Well, fine for some, but not so fine for me. I am not in the same place as transwomen and transmen who don’t want to be reminded of biological equipment that they consider unfortunate and problematic. For me, it’s rather important to find people who specifically wish a male-bodied person with the personalty & behavioral characteristics and nuances and etc of a woman. Meanwhile, the anti-psychiatric / mental patients’ rights / psych services consumers’ rights organizations have grown a few problematic PC attitudes too. I’ve been criticized for daring to use words like “crazy” “lunatics” and “insane”. Yeesh, didn’t you get the flier, marginalized people are allowed to reclaim such terms as our own, remember? But then there’s the disabilities thing. Disabilities rights is a more powerful and more successful social movement and with the “least restrictive setting” and the move towards maximum available opportunity to participate socially and so forth, yeah it does make sense to position ourselves as a subset of that. But it still tends to involve a self-labeling as, well, disabled. I’m not disabled except in the specific instances where other people are doing things to disable me. When I say “differently minded”, I damn well mean it, and I don’t approach these issues as someone with incapacities that need accommodation. I really am only different, not less. I model my thinking of my difference more on the way gay people do and I’m entitled to define my situation politically, and I don’t appreciate being told that I need to get with the program to avoid interfering with other lunatics’ campaign for social justice. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/78 "2015-09-22T15:22:41Z")
Thanks for that post, **AHunter3**. Enlightening. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/79 "2015-09-22T17:16:31Z")
The problem is that a mass of individual micro agressions can lead to societal attitudes that have macro consequences. Take for example the term illegal. This term automatically sparks off the following train of thought. That they are illegal means they are criminal. That they are criminals means they are like rapists and murders. Therefore illegals are bad people with evil intentions. Who deserve punishment rather than compassion. So you end up with the likes of Donald Trump, and Sheriff Arapaio. If we called them say, economic refugees, then suddenly they become disadvantaged desperate people trying to make it in a harsh world as well as they can. Which is a far more realistic picture of the situation, allowing you to have a more reasonable immigration policy, that assume that people hanging around the Home Depot trying to get enough to feed their families are inherently evil. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2015, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992/80 "2015-09-22T18:43:49Z")
**AHunter** , you’ve given examples of how PCness has affected your ability to engage with certain people in a social context. That doesn’t strike me as any different than you catching flak here on the SDMB for unpopular views and opinions. Has your livelihood been put in danger because of your unPC views? Have you ever been disciplined at work? Have you been thrown in jail? Have you been publicly humiliated? Discriminated against? I mean, I’ve caught flak for my views on race and racism. Not just here but on “pro-black” social media. That doesn’t make me a “victim” of anything, though. That just means that people disagree with me. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-american-culture-become-or-is-it-becoming-too-pc/731992.md?page=5)