My main one is “homeless”. I almost never use it. It’s too general and often used inaccurately. All bums are now blessed with the gentle, pitiable “homeless” title, even if they aren’t really without a home. We’ve had some many other descriptive terms before: hobos, tramps, vagrants, bag-lady - why devolve language by merging them all into “the homeless”? I was really irritated by a recent episode of South Park where the town was overrun by who they called “homeless people”, but who were specifically, and exclusively beggars. A main point of the episode’s plot was that they were all asking for spare change.
Next is “gender”. What’s wrong with “sex”?
Third is “political correctness”. Example, this thread’s title. Creating new euphemisms to hide the ugliness of the subject that the original term too readily conjures in the contemporary population is nothing new (ex: water closet to toilet to bathroom to restroom). So what’s the point of wielding this politically charged term, unless it’s just to reveal your lack of imagination and general knowledge?
It isn’t exactly a new term, but I can’t stand “correctional facility.” If you’re in there for life, how exactly are you being corrected? You aren’t; you’re being imprisoned. The old term was shorter and less ambiguous. :rolleyes:
I have to beg to differ on the first one. I’t good because it’s general. They may not be bag ladies, they may not ne beggarars. They may be working. But if you see someone who looks like they’ve been sleeping rough "homeless is probably the most reasonable guess.
I thought there was a rule that gender was for nouns and sex was for people. Has that changed?
Ha, that’s the point. There is none - it’s not a well defined term. You’ll just have to use a real vocabulary to describe whatever you want to otherwise describe with the term.
I tend to avoid any spurious PC overly sensitive touchy feely corporate buzzwords as a general principle.
That being said, the words you use can influence your thought. But thinking about my sister in law as “differently abled” doesn’t change what I really think, which is that she’s got some inherent problems, but those are shadowed by how she’s been coddled about handling them.
My brother is a felon. My husband was a drug addict. I’m a college drop out. You can find new words for these and it doesn’t change a damn thing about the reality. My brother still struggles to find a job even though it’s been 25 years since he got into trouble, my husband must still be vigilant to protect himself and his family against drugs and I’m still not able to go to school.
We have a Human Resources department, unlike most workplaces we actually do have animals so I guess the distinction is necessary HERE.
Reality sucks ass, but hiding from reality is just inane. It doesn’t actually change reality.
How much PC bullcrap would we actually have to put up with if we treated other people like people and lived by the code “Don’t be a jerk.”
I tend to avoid any spurious PC overly sensitive touchy feely corporate buzzwords as a general principle.
That being said, the words you use can influence your thought. But thinking about my sister in law as “differently abled” doesn’t change what I really think, which is that she’s got some inherent problems, but those are shadowed by how she’s been coddled about handling them.
My brother is a felon. My husband was a drug addict. I’m a college drop out. You can find new words for these and it doesn’t change a damn thing about the reality. My brother still struggles to find a job even though it’s been 25 years since he got into trouble, my husband must still be vigilant to protect himself and his family against drugs and I’m still not able to go to school.
We have a Human Resources department, unlike most workplaces we actually do have animals so I guess the distinction is necessary HERE.
Reality sucks ass, but hiding from reality is just inane. It doesn’t actually change reality.
How much PC bullcrap would we actually have to put up with if we treated other people like people and lived by the code “Don’t be a jerk.”
I agree with you. It’s a pretty good general term and I don’t see anything particularly wrong with it. It’s accurate because the don’t have homes, do they? If you think it somehow elevates their status add something descriptive if you enjoy demeaning them. Call them homeless losers. :rolleyes:
The term political correctness actually has its origins as something other than just euphemism. This explanation will make more sense if you’ve studied a little Marxist theory …
Political correctness started out as the educated Communists telling the proletariat how they should feel. For example, that they should identify as the proletariat and rise up against the system. In some cases, the proletariat really didn’t have a class consciousness and the identity as “the working class” was thrust upon them to fit correctly with the political system. So political correctness started out with more of a connotation of condescension, telling people how they should feel, rather than of not wanting to offend anyone.
“Political Correctness” is in fact a term I try to avoid. By and large I’m in favor of allowing groups to define what they want to be called, rather than imposing a name on them. I hate to see that form of respect maligned as “just being PC.”
Also, “body image issues,” while a kind of annoying phrase, doesn’t seem like a euphemism for “fat.” There is the condition of the body, and there is the attitude of its inhabitant. These are not necessarily congruent to the outside observer.
A word that seems to be making a mini-comeback and that I avoid assiduously is “coed” to describe a female college student. I can’t hear or see that word without mentally prefacing it with “doe-eyed.” Don’t ask, cuz I don’t know why!
Body image doesn’t always mean fat though. Someone who is anorexic usually has body image issues. Bodybuilders who worry that their calves aren’t as defined as they like and obsess over them have body image issues. The term covers a lot of possibilities.
What I particularly like are euphamism treadmills. They clearly demonstrate that assigning new terms does absolutely nothing to change the facts of the situation, and each change (from disabled to differently-abled, for example) is a fresh reminder (to the alert) of the wool people are trying to pull over our collective eyes.
