Jaakko- As previously stated, it takes a lot more than that to offend me.
Trion- I asked politely for people to enlighten me with their definitions first. Diogenes said it was “my fucking job”, so I did so. I’m sorry you didn’t find it helpful.
Diane- My opinions are valid, they are not an act, and I don’t find them particularly rebellious. You are free to disagree and think I’m an asshole.
If you think what SpazCat’s dad said was offensive…
On the radio today, I heard someone gleefully “theorize” that Wellstone was killed because it was God’s way of making sure he fulfilled his campaign promise of not running again.
All the airport landing lights on the planet wouldn’t be bright enough to penetrate the darkness of your ignorance.
Good that we got that cleared up.
You know that SpazCat’s dad is way off the beam when “Faux” News’s own (conservative) Tony Snow had only sweet and glowing things to say about Wellstone. And I could tell that Snow meant every word of them, too.
I can’t imagine that many of the mainstream conservative pundits actually were disparaging of Wellstone. He sounded like a great guy, all around. But then again, I don’t listen to all of the mainstream conservative pundits, so I don’t know what they are saying. But by damn, they’d better not say anything shitty about this guy’s passing. It’s so ungracious, to say the least.
As far as “P.C.”, we all know that there’s “P.C.”, and then there’s “P.C.” “P.C.” usually is the stuff that we agree with (the things that fall under “common courtesy”, etc.). “P.C.” is the super-control-freak stuff that some people dream up to try to micromanage how other people think and behave. And when some people have the audacity to not tow the line and keep step with the current list of “P.C.”-think, they are called “assholes” and much worse.
The only problem between “P.C.” and “P.C.” is that none of us can all universally agree on which is which, or where the line is drawn. But there is a distinction. And that’s really the topic for another thread.
yosemitebabe, it just so happens that I spent this afternoon listening to the conservative pundits on their talk-sho circuit (Liddy, followed by Hannity, followed by Ron Smith), and as right-wing as they all are, none of them said anything bad about Wellstone, and they certainly shouldn’t have. It doesn’t matter if they agreed with his politics, or even if they liked the guy. They have a responsibility to be respectful here, and they did a fine job.
Rilchiam-
If you think that is what I’m saying, then my remark was by no means superfluous. I doubt that’s even what j_kat_259 was saying. I’t’s not that SpazCat was “insensitive for not letting dad’s insensitive remark slide”, but that maybe she “spazzed” over something that, while insensitive, should not warrant the given response. I’m sorry, but I call it overreacting.
Thank you. While this may be true, C3 posted that DJs have already done it (not that they are a standard for morality), and I personally don’t doubt one bit that Letterman, Leno, or Conan will make a joke about it within 10 days (if they haven’t already) granted they will probably disguise it as a spoof of Republicans.
Thank you. You’re right, it’s a topic for another thead, but I’ve been attacked here on this issue so I’m sorry I have to quote and thank you in a thread where my opinions are less than popular.
PC does not have a concrete definition. It’s funny that the people who called me out for using the term, and challenged me to define it, have yet to offer their own definitions. But they can most assuredly tell me what it is not.
And finally, Cervaise, since you have taken upon yourself to address me exactly twice, but each time you can do nothing but insult me personally, I’ve given you your own platform to tell the world why you think your petty insults are warranted.
How old are you, Eleusis? I’m getting the impression that you’re in college, or maybe not even that old.
You cannot set precise parameters for appropriate actions, reactions, thoughts, beliefs or speech. In this regard, SpazCat’s dad displayed more sense than you’ve been doing in this thread: at least he said what was on his mind. But SpazCat said what was on her mind too, both at the time and in the OP. Why should she have measured her dad’s remark against a scale of “kinda insensitive…really pretty insensitive…way insensitive…unbelievably insensitive” to determine how she should react? It doesn’t appear as if he thought before he spoke.
SpazCat said in the OP that she had “a smattering of dialogue” with her dad before concluding that he “doesn’t realize why what he said was so mind-bogglingly rude, stupid, and inconsiderate”. It doesn’t sound as if she confronted him, but merely questioned, or at most, challenged his remark. Knowing that there was no hope of enlightening him, she came to the Pit to vent.
You can save yourself a lot of time and frustration, eleusis, by similiarly refraining from trying to micromanage other people’s behavior.
I’m sorry, but I’m going to point out that you don’t know exactly how much conservative crap I’ve had to put up with over the last few years from him. This has been a long time in coming and it’s not over yet. Judge not where ye have no knowledge Eleu.
[Hijack] Hey, SpazCat, are you in Charlotte? I grew up there. (West Charlotte, class of '96) [end hijack]
Nope. South Rowan, '98. I work just north of Charlotte though.
Not to turn this into a PC debate, since obviously the term PC has been so mangled and practically unrecognizable these days, but let me offer a definition. From when I remember the term PC used a decade ago, it conformed to this idea:
“'marked by or adhering to a typically progressive orthodoxy on issues involving especially race, gender, sexual affinity, or ecology”
(More in-depth info here)
I would hardly call being sensitive at someone’s death “progressive orthodoxy,” but hey, it depends what hole one crawled out of. Typically, PC would be used when refering to, well, POLITICAL and social issues. For example, including more female and minority literature in school curricula, affirmative action, care towards the way one refers to marginalized groups, etc… The context always included issues of race, gender, sexual lifestyle or the environment (see above definition.) Political correctness almost always seemed to involve the tension of competing -isms.
For me PC has always meant this, and it pisses me off when people confuse it with common courtesy, since PC carries such negative linguistic baggage. Although I do think a lot of PC is good manners, good manners is not PC. Is punching your best friend in the face un-PC? Is not farting at the dinner table an example of liberal PC brainwashing? The prescript against being rude at someone’s death, as in the OP, is not a PC construct. Try Little Miss Manners, or just Plain Human Decency.
That said, I don’t think what her father said is that big of a deal. Yeah, it’s rude, it’s crass, it’s yadda yadda yadda, but, hell, this is how most people are. OK, from my subjective experience, that’s how most people are. It’s just a cynical statement, and leave it at that.
Wow pulykamell, that was an incredibly articulate, intelligent, and, well, beautiful post.
I like your definition better than mine, and I wish I could back in time and never have said PC in the first place.
Your last paragraph sums up my current attitude eloquently.
Well, thanks, Eleusis, you’re making me blush. Out of 1,416 attempts, you eventually hit one post in which the synapses are firing in the right sequence. 
Though language is constantly changing, and shift in meaning is part of every language’s evolution, PC has become so many things to so many different people, that it’s almost a useless concept these days, and only used in a critical sense. You never hear anyone say, “Wow, what a nice guy. He’s so PC!” PC is equated with Orwellian social engineering, while courtesy, a form of social control itself, doesn’t carry the same insidious connotations. When I went to university, PC always seemed a media-fabricated practical joke to me. Nobody I knew, be they liberal or conservative, supported the common perception of “PC.” Yet whatever newspapers you read, or tv programs you watched, you got the impression that The Big Bad Liberals were trying to control your mind through PC. Yet where were the same critisicms for all the euphemisms involved in military (“collateral damage,” “friendly fire”) business (“made redundant,” “corporate restructuring”) and the such? If anything, PC is less insidious (IMHO) than these sort of euphemisms, yet everyone went on (and still goes on) harping on about goddamn PC-this and goddamn PC-that.
Anyhow, back to our regularly scheduled thread…
Well thank goodness we have The Pit in which we may vent our feelings, be they Socially Relevant or Not.
Eh?
Esprix