# Political correctness is cowardice. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 2, 2014, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829 "2014-06-02T12:47:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/141 "2014-06-07T06:15:36Z")
> [@bump](#): > > There was literally some sort of set of stages that was like a “Bloom’s Taxonomy” for LGBT acceptance, and we were told to identify where we were along it, and identify what we needed to do to move farther along. > > It was as if the Student Affairs/Residence Life dept. had decided that they were the shock troops for this kind of thing, even though it really wasn’t part and parcel of our jobs. How you figure? I presume that Texas A&M in your day had the same [official policy about discrimination and inclusivity](http://student-rules.tamu.edu/statement) that it has now: > [@](#): > > Texas A&M is committed to the fundamental principles of academic freedom, equality of opportunity and human dignity. To fulfill its multiple missions as an institution of higher learning, Texas A&M encourages a climate that values and nurtures collegiality, diversity, pluralism and the uniqueness of the individual within our state, nation and world. All decisions and actions involving students and employees should be based on applicable law and individual merit. > > Texas A&M University, in accordance with applicable federal and state law, prohibits discrimination, including harassment, on the basis of race, color, national or ethnic origin, religion, sex, disability, age, sexual orientation, or veteran status. If you are unable or unwilling to endorse commitment to those values as an official representative of your university, then maybe being an RA isn’t the job for you. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/142 "2014-06-07T06:22:19Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Whoever said that political correctness at its heart is basic decency and courtesy is absolutely right. > > But the problem comes in when it goes beyond just expecting people to be decent, courteous and polite, and people are expected to conform to some standard of thinking or of speech that’s not necessarily the prevailing, mainstream way of thinking or speaking. […] > > For example (an example of what I’ve heard some people say, not my beliefs), if some church-going redneck was to say that transgender people are basically fucked up and confused because God made men and women separately, and not some ungodly hybrids, they may be perfectly right from their standpoint. But in what way is it even remotely “decent, courteous and polite” to refer to law-abiding persons who’ve never done you any harm as “fucked up and confused” and “ungodly hybrids”? I completely agree that people may hold whatever opinions they want about other people in the privacy of their own brains, for any reason or for no reason. But when they open their yaps to start expressing their opinions, that’s when the rules about decency, courtesy and politeness come into play. Decent, courteous, polite people are capable of disagreeing about their respective moral frameworks without descending to personal insults. ---
**Author:** ![Conservian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@Conservian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Conservian)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/143 "2014-06-07T13:21:10Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > So, political correctness is being willing to call out bigots, and the problem is more with how bigots might face a little rudeness than with the bigotry itself? Gotcha. If that’s what you mean by “politically correct”, then you and I agree: it’s a pejorative term for basic decency. One man’s ‘bigotry’ is another man’s “political correctness” - both fervently believing they represent “decency.” ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/144 "2014-06-07T14:44:30Z")
> [@Conservian](#): > > One man’s ‘bigotry’ is another man’s “political correctness” - both fervently believing they represent “decency.” If this is the sum total of your argument–that people who are bigoted generally don’t admit they’re bigoted–then you and I are still in agreement. (Your construction, that one man’s bigotry is another man’s political correctness, is technically gibberish, but I get what you’re trying to say anyway). This is not, however, an especially interesting point; everyone knows that bigots generally deny their bigotry. The interesting question is what comprises unacceptable behavior, and unless you’ve taken far too many shrooms, you’ve got a standard for unacceptable behavior, and unless you’re a Lacanian, you think that standard can be discussed and debated. Pointing out that people disagree over those standards is really freakin’ obvious and not really freakin’ interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/145 "2014-06-07T21:11:13Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > [Here’s](http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/05/26-protesting-commencement-speakers-lempert) a much more thoughtful take on the issue of protesting the invitation of commencement speakers: Nonsense, because if the administration chose a liberal speaker the students liked, then they wouldn’t protest. So it still comes down to “we don’t like this person’s conservative views so we’re going to protest _this person_.” ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/146 "2014-06-07T21:26:13Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Nonsense, because if the administration chose a liberal speaker the students liked, then they wouldn’t protest. So it still comes down to “we don’t like this person’s conservative views so we’re going to protest _this person_.” Not “this person” but “this person getting money from our university.” I don’t see a problem with this, any more than I’d see a procedural problem with students at a business school opposing being a commencement address by the head of the AFL-CIO. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/147 "2014-06-07T21:55:04Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > And your ignorance in thinking we “pick(ed)” our genders tells me you really do not understand, or simply don’t believe the evidence. > > I’m weary of repeating the same posts and same points on this message board. Clearly I’m not communicating the message. I don’t want to offend you in general because I respect you but you missed the core point of my message. I probably wasn’t making myself clear. People on the LGBT rainbow are whatever it is called these days are constantly subdividing themselves into separate categories that they expect other people to memorize and use. I truly believe that none of those were purposely chosen (my grad school work was in the sexual differentiation of behavioral neuroscience; I know more about how that works than the vast majority of people). Still, it isn’t that interesting to other people. My point was a very inclusive one that is far beyond anything that has been achieved so far so don’t misrepresent it. My point, and the one that I think many other people share from all sexual orientations, is that a given person’s gender and sexual preferences are less relevant to who you are than many other parts of your personality. What percentage of your life do you spend having sex? It is way less than 1% even for the biggest players in history. That shouldn’t be a core part of your identity. It isn’t for me. I don’t choose my friends based on their sexual preferences or even their biological sex. It is all about general personality match and I can find that among all of them. However, I don’t make special exceptions either just because someone purposely tries to force me to acknowledge them as a unique snowflake. Those just fall into the general category of general assholes and it has nothing to do with race, sex or orientation. I really and truly could not care less about that type of thing. I take people as they come and there are no categories either internally or externally defined that get special treatment. I always thought that was the real goal of any true equal rights movement and it is the one I try to live. It is some so-called Progressive movements that are working against that ideal and I do not support it. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/148 "2014-06-07T23:17:45Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Still, it isn’t that interesting to other people. My point was a very inclusive one that is far beyond anything that has been achieved so far so don’t misrepresent it. My point, and the one that I think many other people share from all sexual orientations, is that a given person’s gender and sexual preferences are less relevant to who you are than many other parts of your personality. What percentage of your life do you spend having sex? It is way less than 1% even for the biggest players in history. That shouldn’t be a core part of your identity. It isn’t for me. You start by patting yourself on the back for your inclusivity, then tell other people that gender should not be a core part of their identity. Fail. Gender is a pretty small part of my identity, too, actually. But part of being inclusive–in fact, pretty much the major part of being inclusive–is understanding that other people have different thoughts and desires and core features of their identity from yours. Una’s gender is clearly a core part of her identity, and where do you or anyone else get off telling her it shouldn’t be? Your claim about your grad student work is, like all your claims, convenient, but ultimately it doesn’t act as a sufficient stand-in for cogent argument, any more than any of your other convenient claims ever have. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/149 "2014-06-07T23:23:03Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Nonsense, because if the administration chose a liberal speaker the students liked, then they wouldn’t protest. So it still comes down to “we don’t like this person’s conservative views so we’re going to protest _this person_.” ‘They only protested because they disagreed with them!’ What a non-insight. > [@Shagnasty](#): > > My point, and the one that I think many other people share from all sexual orientations, is that a given person’s gender and sexual preferences are less relevant to who you are than many other parts of your personality. What percentage of your life do you spend having sex? It is way less than 1% even for the biggest players in history. That shouldn’t be a core part of your identity. It isn’t for me. You probably don’t get discriminated against based on that 1%. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/150 "2014-06-07T23:47:21Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > ‘They only protested because they disagreed with them!’ What a non-insight. You proved my point exactly. Let’s not entertain foolish side-shows about how this is about faceless administrators. Thank you for contributing to the discussion by affirming my position. I appreciate the support. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2014, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/151 "2014-06-07T23:48:35Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > You proved my point exactly. Let’s not entertain foolish side-shows about how this is about faceless administrators. > > Thank you for contributing to the discussion by affirming my position. I appreciate the support. What position did you take? You made a statement so obvious it doesn’t even really count as an observation. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/152 "2014-06-08T00:55:29Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > I don’t want to offend you in general because I respect you but you missed the core point of my message. I probably wasn’t making myself clear. People on the LGBT rainbow are whatever it is called these days are constantly subdividing themselves into separate categories that they expect other people to memorize and use. Actually, most of us in the transsexual group would be pretty happy with just two: “woman” or “man.” My co-workers and friends never introduce me as so-and-so, a transsexual lesbian with an intersex hormone disorder. > [@](#): > > Still, it isn’t that interesting to other people. It must be interesting to some - such as my friend Jen, who just today when she was at the mall was pointed at and called “tranny” by a group of belligerent teenagers. A couple of whom followed her to her car in the parking lot, continuing to call her the name and threaten her. > [@](#): > > My point was a very inclusive one that is far beyond anything that has been achieved so far so don’t misrepresent it. My point, and the one that I think many other people share from all sexual orientations, is that a given person’s gender and sexual preferences are less relevant to who you are than many other parts of your personality. What percentage of your life do you spend having sex? It is way less than 1% even for the biggest players in history. That shouldn’t be a core part of your identity. It isn’t for me. Thank you for illustrating the exact nature of your error. You haven’t read my thread, or any others or other stories elsewhere, where someone who had gender dysphoria tells of how it is a horrifying nightmare of disruption and destruction if not treated. Unless you have suffered from gender dysphoria or worked professionally with those who have (and I have done both), you cannot grasp how much of what is “you” it becomes. I hesitate to repeat what has been written by me in tens of thousands of words, but I will say that unchecked gender dysphoria makes you feel like you are trapped in an alien body which is wrong, and which often disgusts you. The way you are treated by others - based on your body gender - fills you with despair and every day you live and hear the biological clock ticking away is one less day you can live in a body which is congruent and be a person which is whole. If you are lesbian, gay, bi, and your family, spouse, kids, friends, and all society accept you, life is good. If you are transgender and your family, spouse, kids, friends, and all society accept you life still sucks, because YOU cannot accept your body. > [@](#): > > I take people as they come and there are no categories either internally or externally defined that get special treatment. I always thought that was the real goal of any true equal rights movement and it is the one I try to live. It is some so-called Progressive movements that are working against that ideal and I do not support it. When ignorance, prejudice and fear cease to focus on the differences in society, then maybe we’ll be at that point. If Joe walks into an IHOP at 1:00am dressed as a male, Joe at worst gets the wrong order handed to him by a sleepy server. If Joe is really Jen and puts on a skirt and heels and walks into an IHOP at 1:00am and doesn’t “pass” well enough, Joe faces not being served, being told to leave the establishment by the security guard, being mocked and pelted with food by rowdy 20-somethings, having little old ladies walk up to her and tell her she will burn in hell, being followed to her car and threatened the entire way, has a brick thrown into the side of her car, is punched in the side of her face by a man who objected to her presence, or even threatened with castration by a man with a box cutter. Or a co-worker sees Jen, tells her boss on Monday, and with no legal protections in an “at will” State, Jen is fired. And you know what? ALL of the things which “Jen” faced in that imaginary scenario above have happened to people I know. In the last couple of months. When people stop doing evil to us because of our gender, maybe we’ll reduce the external focus on it to your satisfaction and there will be no need for labels to help define the issues. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/153 "2014-06-08T01:05:23Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Yes, that is exactly what I am talking about. That was a popular tactic on college campuses during the early to mid-90’s. Older and younger people may not believe it but it is true. My university was only moderately liberal and we still had to go through what I would also call indoctrination from day one (the first exposure incidentally was from our freshman dorm RA’s who drew diagrams in the common areas about the ways that we needed to think if we were to fit in). Have you ever stumbled into a Wal-Mart at 8:00 a.m. to see all the little minions gathered around the team leader while they do their happy chant?\* Have you ever attended a management trainee seminar? There, they spend three to five days watching videos and listening to motivational speakers, every spiel consisting of the advice that profit is the greatest good and that this company is devoted to procuring that profit, with a number of questions, generally unanswered, the asking of which indicates that a person who did not fight through eleven foot snowdrifts while running a 105° F fever while his nine-month pregnant wife went into labor to serve the company was clearly a slackard unsuited to taking up space on “the team.” Companies always try to indoctrinate new employees. As a new, minor addition to the school’s management team, why would you expect it to be any different? Colleges are populated by thousands of hormone rattled adolescents with weird ideas about people they haven’t met. Many of them carry enormous chips on their shoulders, having been told that those “other” people already hate them. Pushing an agenda that tells the first line keepers of order to make everyone make nice seems an intelligent thing to do. And, of course, I suspect that most of the people directing those training exercises were probably little more than second or third year RAs, themselves, with no life experiences to temper their world views. > [@Shagnasty](#): > > Second exposure was an intensive writing seminar worth 6 credits that was required for all freshmen. That sounds like a great idea but only part of it was about college level writing. We had a broad range of things we had to write about including gay rights, the cons of the first Gulf War, oppression of minorities and subtle sexism in the media. It was almost like the bar in the Blues Brothers. They have both kinds of music, country and western :). I still got an A in the class because even I can fake interest in topics I care very little about in general but I didn’t like it. It wasn’t just my professor either. They were all like that and it was absolutely mandatory. Those are just two examples of many. Any evidence that students taking a more right-wing view of those topics were flunked? Or did everyone just assume that they had to echo the far left to get a decent grade, regardless how well they wrote? I am not claiming that complaints against PC do not address a real problem. I just note that things are blamed on PC–always with fingers pointed at the Left–that are pretty standard human issues that occur across the societal spectrum. We just don’t currently have a cute name for those actions when they arise on the Right: Freedom Fries, anyone? Calling opposition to the Iraq invasion “treasonous”? Dixie Chicks losing contracts and being dropped from play lists? GWB era FCC jumping “indecency” fines to astronomical levels, then coyly refusing to say what the actual rules were, (pretending that they did not want to engage in “prior restraint”), so that broadcasters who lacked sufficient money had to censor themselves to avoid tripping over hidden rules? Then there was the woman in Florida who tried to get language inserted into the school curriculum calling for the schools to explicitly teach that the U.S. is the “best” country in the world. For that matter, any number of people have confused Left wing politics with Right wing advertising, blaming the shift such as from “used car” to “previously owned vehicle” on Political Correctness. Whatever PC might exist, it is a game that a whole spectrum of people play and it is no more likely to bring down the republic than all the anti-red censorship from the 1920s through the 1960s, (an effort that is seeing a bit of a resurrection, recently, with idiotic claims that Obama’s policies are socialism). = = = - Look quick. It will probably be the last time you see an actual sales clerk on the floor for the rest of the day. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/154 "2014-06-08T01:24:45Z")
Tom, how about the term “Patriotically Correct” for the above mentioned examples? Can’t remember who invented the term but it works. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/155 "2014-06-08T01:24:51Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > What position did you take? You made a statement so obvious it doesn’t even really count as an observation. > [@kintsu](#): > > With rare exceptions the protests we are quick to condemn neither target commencement speakers for their speech nor are they motivated by the goal of stifling what the speakers have to say. The speech targeted is seldom that of the invitees. Rather it is the symbolic speech of university administrators. > [@Stringbean](#): > > Nonsense, because if the administration chose a liberal speaker the students liked, then they wouldn’t protest. So it still comes down to “we don’t like this person’s conservative views so we’re going to protest _this person_.” > [@Marley23](#): > > ‘They only protested because they disagreed with them!’ > [@Stringbean](#): > > You proved my point exactly. Let’s not entertain foolish side-shows about how this is about faceless administrators. Obviously, my position was against the idea that these protests are about faceless administrators, when they are obviously directly about the invitee’s viewpoints. I think you agree with me, but are being belligerent because you don’t like me? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/156 "2014-06-08T01:30:54Z")
> [@Stringbean](#): > > Obviously, my position was against the idea that these protests are about faceless administrators, when they are obviously directly about the invitee’s viewpoints. I think you agree with me, but are being belligerent because you don’t like me? 😕 I don’t think you understand what **Kimstu** was saying. I believe **Kimstu** was saying the administrators are the intended audience of the protest: they’re the ones who are supposed to get the message about who to invite and include in these kinds of ceremonies. ---
**Author:** ![Conservian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@Conservian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Conservian)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/157 "2014-06-08T12:06:34Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [shrug] As Alexis de Tocqueville observed, the most liberal democracy still leaves room for the tyranny of social pressure, which, indeed, is the more pervasive when government is less so. If the tyranny of social pressure will always be with us, better it should be used for good purposes, and PCness qualifies. Any form of government on the face of this earth leaves room for some form of “tyranny.” Tyranny lies within the hearts of men, not governments. “men are not angels.” “Tyranny of social pressure?” That’s more commonly known as ‘the will of the people.’ I don’t believe the genesis of “Political Correctness” can be traced to America’s working class. Tocqueville said of Americans - “less independence of mind and true freedom of discussion” As for Tocqueville’s work, Democracy In America, sheer brilliance, IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/158 "2014-06-09T19:05:05Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > I don’t think you understand what **Kimstu** was saying. I believe **Kimstu** was saying the administrators are the intended audience of the protest: they’re the ones who are supposed to get the message about who to invite and include in these kinds of ceremonies. Exactly. It’s not as though the event being protested is a general political debate with the goal being merely a free exchange of viewpoints from many differing positions. If that were the case, I’d agree that it would be wrong for protestors to try to exclude from that debate certain speakers whose views they happened to disagree with. But what a commencement-speaker invitation is fundamentally about is _ **an institution singling out one or more individuals to honor with a prestigious academic distinction signaling its approbation and admiration for them** _. In the name of all its members, the institution is saying to Individual X, “We consider you illustrious and admirable and we wish to extend to you honorary membership in our community as a mark of our admiration”. In such a situation, hell yes, the _actual_ members of the institution’s community should express their disapproval of that gesture if they don’t believe that Individual X is worthy of the proposed honor. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/159 "2014-06-09T19:17:51Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > People on the LGBT rainbow are whatever it is called these days are constantly subdividing themselves into separate categories that they expect other people to memorize and use. […] > > My point, and the one that I think many other people share from all sexual orientations, is that a given person’s gender and sexual preferences are less relevant to who you are than many other parts of your personality. What percentage of your life do you spend having sex? It is way less than 1% even for the biggest players in history. That shouldn’t be a core part of your identity. It isn’t for me. […] > > I really and truly could not care less about that type of thing. I take people as they come and there are no categories either internally or externally defined that get special treatment. This would be an admirably ethical (if still somewhat quixotic) viewpoint **IF** you were advocating in favor of discarding or disregarding **ALL** conversational markers of gender and orientation, not just some of them. If you were saying _“Hi, I’m **Shagnasty** and I don’t think gender should be a core part of people’s identity, so I refer to all individuals as ‘it’ and to all couples/unions as ‘partners’ irrespective of their gender, orientation or number”_, that would be principled. Pretty weird, rather arrogant, and certain to be offensive to some people whatever their gender, but essentially principled. But what you’re saying is _“Hi, I’m **Shagnasty** and I don’t think gender should be a core part of people’s identity, so I acknowledge only the two traditional major gender categories and ignore all the others”_. That is merely arrogant and offensive **without** being principled. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829/160 "2014-06-09T19:42:36Z")
I think **Shagnasty** provides a great example of why the concept of “privilege” is useful, especially the idea of unexamined privilege. He appears quite content in his own moral enlightenment, even as he professes vaguely contemptuous bafflement at “being told” about all these other gender issues. They’re issues he’s lucky enough not to have to deal with in his life. Convinced of his own enlightenment, he sees no reason why he ought to pay attention to what others, not as lucky as him, should say about gender issues. It’s one thing to be privileged. It’s another thing not to realize it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/political-correctness-is-cowardice/689829.md?page=9)