Why Stephen Fry is arguing against political correctness (2018)
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Here's why, I think: because Stephen Fry is, among other things, a comedian. And comedians are highly sensitive to political correctness and its ills. They are the canaries in the coal mine of wokeness.
Do they? Do they really? How old are these kids? Have they reached the rebellious age where they start to question arbitrary rules their parents put in place?
When I was a teen, it wasn't hard to censor myself when I was around adults who had their own ideas of what was inappropriate. But when we knew we were out of earshot, we said whatever we wanted. We said things specifically because we knew we weren't supposed to. And I know I'm not alone, I know virtually everyone reading this had a similar experience as a teen. And I don't have any reason to believe this has changed. Maybe it's harder to feel safe with cameras and mics hidden everywhere, but human nature is to try to do what you're told you can't. That won't go away.
Ironically, the biggest rebellion language I see is an inordinate number of kids who opt for gender neutral pronouns (they/them). It's not really an expression of being nonbinary as much as it's a statement that they don't want to be told or expected to be a certain way and they'll pick a gender and orientation on their terms when they're good and ready.
> they enforce "political correctness" of speech without being told
but then claims that they have learned the difference
> When I was a kid "gay" was one of our go-to pejoratives for almost anything uncool. With my kid's cohort, it's not acceptable because they don't think being gay is insulting.
Obviously they are different kids growing up in different times with different political climates that have learned a different political correctness but both have learned what is considered politically correct from society.
The point "So what are your kids pejoratives?" simply points out that the kids are not born with an inherent knowledge of pejoratives being harmful but have simply learned different pejoratives from their parents and society.
There's a huge distinction you're glossing over. Past generations thought that exclusionary language was just fine and that exclusionary behavior was also just fine. The Gen X and Y kids were raised being "told" that exclusionary behavior and language were not acceptable, but it was not a native part of their culture and had to be learned, accepted, adopted through effort. That's the era that coined the phrase "political correctness" mostly as a pejorative term for the efforts to change people's behavior. Adults who were set in their ways were reluctant, but kids heard it and absorbed it. The current generation are being raised to inherently believe that exclusionary language is unacceptable and are self-policing because it's the predominant ethos. It's no longer a lesson to learn, it's a cornerstone of our society to protect. Obviously this varies a lot region by region and even child by child, but it's seemingly past a tipping point.
None of us are experts in everything and we need to try to make sense of things as we go about life. We all use examples/experiences in our lives to make general conclusions about the efficacy of policies.
You just reinvented a worse religion, all the uptightness and self-righteousness with none of the community or the forgiveness.
That's incredibly immature. You're basically admitting that your position is just spite.
And no one is telling what you can and can't say. Continue speaking however you please. The younger generation are just telling you they won't like it. And no one is obligated to like what you say. It's the same sort of generational divide that's always been around. And history says the new generation almost always wins.
Your delusions of a monolithic 'younger generation' on the 'right side of history' inevitably triumphing are pathetic. Not how history works, not how reality is; Prime counterexample include me for a start.
A free man should resist anything, whether it's a change or the status quo, if it's pushed by self-serving bullies and pathetic status seekers. The dominant religion where I live is 1400+ years old, it's a moral and intellectual disease embraced only by the scum and the naive.
I'm not being extra hard on your religion because it's good to be spiteful, this is just how I treat most religions. It's good to be spiteful to religions and their followers because that's what they deserve most.
Your religion involves far more than "treating people with respect", this is such a pathetically false and cowardly phrase that all religions try to hide behind under various formulations. Your religion involves revering a certain class of people and elevating them above the rest of us and agreeing to every bullshit they make up or risk the consequences for dissent, made abundantly clear by repeated examples. I.e, just a standard old delusion, but with new words.
I don't despise any religion for faith, I despise ideologies for authoritarianism. Your religion, just as the 1400 year old disease I was raised on before I knew any better, is the authoritarian ploy currently in fashion to destroy lives and bend free wills. You support it, you kneel to it, you are happy your kids are absorbing your delusions before they know any better, and that makes you an authoritarian. You and the rest of your religion deserves nothing but contempt and sneering.
Having said that, I have to admit I don't actually know what do you actually hope to accomplish by replying to me? Knowing why I despise your kind of believers? I made that very clear. What else?
I remember it, and it was basically a warning of all the things that have happened in America. Thankfully we're always a little behind America here in Europe.
Or are you suggesting his motivations are something else? More to the point, who cares for the sake of the argument? Are you trolling?
> it's po-faced, sanctimonious, self-righteous occasionally ... it's not effective.
> I've always been on the side of these things and I've been very happy to see the end to the national conversation in saner and saner ways. But I do not believe for a second that political correctness has hastened those advances, at all.
> And my only problem with politically correctness really, apart from the fact that it's po-faced, sanctimonious, self-righteous occasionally, is that it's not effective.
> I want people to be effective.
> I want, yes, gay people and transgender people and people of all kinds of races and, you know, marginal identities as they may see themselves — I want them to feel comfortable in the world and not hated and not afraid. But I don't think political correctness is the way to achieve that.
> Stewart Lee: "What is political correctness? It's an often clumsy negotiation towards a kind of formally inclusive language. And there's all sorts of problems with it. But it's better than what we had before."[1]
One side says: "We need more inclusive language" where the other side says "we need free speech". Pretty much any and every conversation or article I read has boiled down to these two points.
The reason it gets discussed so much is that it's easy for both sides to point to "violations" on the other side. One side keeps ranting and raving that that the other side is being homophobic/transphobic/racist/classist/etc, the other side looks at that outrage, and responds in kind with it's own outrage going "look how wild this is". But every conversation just ends up with each side presenting examples of what they consider to be strange behavior by the other side.
The real interesting part is not what the talking points are, but who is pushing then and the distribution of those talking points. My theory is the number of people that actually care about political correctness is vanishingly small. But because their ideas are so over the top to the other side, their opponents amplify their talking point. This amplification on social media results in the issue being perceived as a much bigger issue than what it actually is.
And as a result of that amplification, people outside of that "culture war" start looking at the signals and assume the issue is much bigger than it really is and respond accordingly. Your HR manager might browse twitter every morning and gets the impression that racism in the workplace is a massive problem because "everyone on twitter is talking about it". So they institute a new diversity training policy to respond to that.
TL;DR: The political correctness crowd is very small, but through amplification on social media, their ideas are being falsely perceived as being a much bigger issue than they really are.
Which is usually the case.
https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.htm...
There are actually three sides. Not two. Three.
The first side is those who support political correctness. This side is singular. Simple.
The other two sides are those who don't. This is where it gets interesting. One side that doesn't support it actually has hatred for marginalized groups. They aren't politically correct because of actual raw hatred. These people include racists, nazis, the KKK, etc. This group is a huge minority of the population.
The third group are those that are not racist. They are normal people who respect other races, genders, sexual orientations but do not support political correctness. The argument here is more interesting.
Why should I have to refer to a male with a penis as a "she" when objective reality and scientific truth defines this person as a biological "he"? Why do I have to redefine and complexify well established and obvious vocabulary, to make it fit someone else's perception or reality as we know it? That is the core of the argument. Which is more important? Emotional well being and social harmony Or Objective Reality/Truth?
The answer is not clear. Scientific studies show that well-being is associated with lying to oneself. People who are happier are less aware of the objective truth and people who are brutally honest with themselves tend to meet the clinical definitions of depression. The majority of people you meet lie to themselves.
Do we construct a reality that allows us to be happy or do we face the horror of objective reality? It's too late for me already. I've chosen the later and I can't go back. But the question is still interesting to me; given some aspect of the knowledge I have now and the ability to go back to the cross roads before I made that choice.... Would I be better off going down the other path? What is more important? Happiness? Or Truth?
That to me is a profound question, and the core central question that's being asked by this culture war. We'd all be happier if everyone was politically correct. But of course we'd also be, in a way, lying to ourselves.
That's objectively false. I would not be happier if everyone were politically correct, because I'm a strong believer in free speech, even if it's offensive. You can say whatever heinous, horrendous things you want about me and my loved ones as long as I'm able to walk away and disengage (if you pursue and target me, it changes from free speech to harassment/assault IMO). I'm also a strong believer in the ideal of objectivity, so I hate the idea of white lies or convenient falsehoods.
No. If you bought into the new age pro noun thing the SAME way you already buy into the pointless formalities we use like "please" and "thank you" there would be no argument. Everyone would be happier. This is objectively true. You just misinterpreted what I mean here.
>I'm a strong believer in free speech, even if it's offensive.
This is off topic. Free speech is part of the battle but it's not what I'm referring to. I'm referring to something much deeper then that. Proponents of political correctness are attempting to redefine reality. They want to change the concept of gender as "fluid" and non-binary and they are trying to change this from a scientific aka "objective" standpoint. Compelled speech is just a tool to push this agenda, and while I don't support it, the arguments behind free speech aren't interesting to me.
It's this entire idea of attempting to categorize this new interpretation of gender as the objective truth that interests me.
"If you met the conditions that proved me right, then I'd be right". Well I don't, hence you're wrong, as I said
Which is saying if you "met the conditions" of being politically correct.
I did not say if you were forced to act politically correct. Two different things.
So literally I did say: "If you met the conditions that proved me right, then I'd be right" and you responded by completely ignoring that and introducing your own conditions.
You misunderstood. We're on the same page here.
Me 'being' politically correct doesn't mean me 'supporting' or 'enjoying' being politically correct. I don't, and 'being' politically correct makes me unhappy. I don't know how I can simplify further, but it does seem to be a semantic point.
You are already being "politically correct" in your own way. You don't refer to me as an idiot, that's a rule you follow. Thus you are already obeying your own "political rules." If your rules were identical to everyone else's, they they wouldn't be be pissed off and neither would you.
That is what I mean when I'm saying "everyone is politically correct" that's it.
But as a believer in free speech, you must support peoples' freedom to engage in lies, no?
Free speech advocates aren't the ones screaming hysterically about "dead naming" and 3rd person pronouns.
That's not really clear. Language is for communication. Political correctness makes language a constantly shifting landscape, far more so than it is now, which I think is the primary reason why there's resistance to it.
If everyone bought into that project, then any marginalized group, no matter how small, would be able to dictate a global shift in language. This would dramatically impede effective communication.
I'm sure there's something you believe, and that is the accepted 'politically correct' consensus, that someone else is arguing the 'but it's just facts' about.
Possibilities are, for example, the people who say they're not 'racists', they don't hate anyone, they call themselves 'race realists' because they just simply believe that a) multiple human races exist, b) some are inferior to others.
To them it's just objective facts. They're not happy about it, but can't stand by and pretend it's not true. They've done their own research and decided that the politically correct poindexters might want to pretend that there's no scientific basis for race, and it's a social construct, but they they can't fool them. So they'll happily talk at great length about this pseudoscientific belief they have, all the time railing against the consensus. And they'll sadly have to side with the racists, not because they're racist, but just because well, some races are inferior, so you have to treat them in a way that might appear 'racist' if you thought they were equally human.
Here's another example, guess what their big focus is:
> ...there will be an accounting for this fraud. People are very very angry, and while the skeptics whose darkest doubts have been vindicated don't pull the levers of organized science (the frauds do that), there are some financial and political resources available to the skeptics who have been demanding integrity in science, and they understand now that this is war.
> A cabal of leading scientists, politicians, and media concubines have conspired to lie about global warming. The reasons are obvious: power and money. The illusion of planetary crisis serves as vehicle for 'emergency measures to save the planet', which are merely measures to empower and enrich an elite few. Al Gore, carbon-credit entrepreneur who puts his 'mouth where his money is', had it figured out a decade ago. The fraudulent scientists who suckle off the 7 billion dollars spent this year alone on the global warming scam (more than the U.S. spends annually on cancer research and AIDS research) are merely using science, rather than hedge funds, to enrich themselves...
> I'm not sure that the scientific community can or will respond to this debacle in a courageous or ethical way. The [redacted] debate clearly demonstrates that venality and shameless self-interest, as well as a toxic leftist-atheist ideology, runs very deep in the scientific community.
> 'Consensus science' isn't science. 'Consensus' is an attribute of politics, not science. Science inherently involves utter transparency and rigorous and respectful open debate. Real scientists welcome scrutiny and critique; the hallmark of a good scientist is that a good scientist reserves his most rigorous scrutiny for his own work. Censorship, invocation of 'consensus science' to elide scrutiny, real or threatened use of judicial coercion, and professional destruction of skeptics- which are characteristic tactics of global warming alarmists and of Darwinists- are tactics used to circumvent the scientific process.
I redacted it above, at first mention but you probably gathered from the last line that this guy doesn't believe in evolution.
He's not anti-science though, not in his mind, he's only against those Darwinist frauds.
The biases of binary thinking pervades even those that believe themselves to be beyond it.
In the context of a discussion about the motivations for and arguments against political correctness it seems to me that we should try to create a safe space for folks (like deltasevennine) to express their perspectives evidently offered in good faith. (Even, and especially, if they seem wrong. You can't have a constructive discussion slinging mud.)
- - - -
> That to me is a profound question, and the core central question that's being asked by this culture war. We'd all be happier if everyone was politically correct. But of course we'd also be, in a way, lying to ourselves.
To me too this is a profound and fascinating question. It cuts to the epistemological root of the matter. "How do you know?"
I think a lot of what we're seeing as culture war actually boils down to an axis of Cosmopolitan vs. Provincial. With the advent of globalism and the Internet everyone has to confront everyone else in a giant distributed city. Things that seemed like bedrock (i.e. "There are only two genders") crash up against reality where that "rule" is just not applicable (i.e. there are human cultures with more than two genders, and biologically there are e.g. hermaphrodites, etc.)
Have you heard of BIID?
The term body integrity identity disorder (BIID) describes the extremely rare phenomenon of persons who desire the amputation of one or more healthy limbs or who desire a paralysis. Some of these persons mutilate themselves; others ask surgeons for an amputation or for the transection of their spinal cord. Psychologists and physicians explain this phenomenon in quite different ways; but a successful psychotherapeutic or pharmaceutical therapy is not known. Lobbies of persons suffering from BIID explain the desire for amputation in analogy to the desire of transsexuals for surgical sex reassignment. Medical ethicists discuss the controversy about elective amputations of healthy limbs: on the one hand the principle of autonomy is used to deduce the right for body modifications; on the other hand the autonomy of BIID patients is doubted. Neurological results suggest that BIID is a brain disorder producing a disruption of the body image, for which parallels for stroke patients are known. If BIID were a neuropsychological disturbance, which includes missing insight into the illness and a specific lack of autonomy, then amputations would be contraindicated and must be evaluated as bodily injuries of mentally disordered patients. Instead of only curing the symptom, a causal therapy should be developed to integrate the alien limb into the body image.
Transexual sex reassignment involves the usage of chemicals and surgery that twists the flesh of their genitals to look like the opposite sex. The parallel with BIID is uncanny. Yet one is considered truth and normal, while the other is considered to be a disease.
How do I know? I don't. But I get your point. Things that seem like a Bedrock truth can change. But did it change for the better? Is the new truth... the actual truth... or not? The existence of BIID and it's almost identical parallel to transexualism confuses me.
BIID feels wrong. That's about as far as I can get. But if someone truly desires to amputate a limb... who are we to stop him? What right do we have to call what they feel a disease?
I bring up BIID because I have a strong feeling that it's wrong... That what they feel is universally agreed to NOT be the objective truth. But I cannot grasp the logic behind it. If I examine BIID long enough I feel eventually the logic behind this controversy can be crystallized.
I was brought up with the general idea that what consenting adults get up to is pretty much their own business. E.g. if a guy wants to wear a dress or two women want to get married or Tilda Swinton is just over the whole gender thing or whatever, it ain't no skin off my nose, eh?
But in practice "there are limits", for me I get uncomfortable with autophagy and cannibalism. There have been a few cases of voluntary cannibalism!? That's where I draw the line personally. To each his own, but you can't eat each other, or yourself. BIID too for that matter falls into the "beyond the pale" category for me. (But even then, if the otherwise healthy limb is causing serious distress somehow? And we can't operate on the brain to fix the cause? Maybe you do remove the limb? What if you take it off and the problem remains!? Phantom BIID?)
Really, though, this is between the person and their doctor. It's none of our business. That should be emphasized IMO: if this is a medical condition we're talking about then it's just deeply inappropriate for other people to meddle, IMO.
Next, the thought occurs that there's at least one very obvious difference between BIID and gender change: having a limb off is generally bad, whereas being a woman (or man) is generally A-Ok.
It's fine to be a man, it's fine to be a woman, but changing from one to the other is not fine? "Where's the fun in that?" as John Cleese often says.
Also, people don't typically beat up or murder folks for having BIID. When we're discussing things like societal acceptance of transgender folks, you have to keep in mind the historical (and in many places still current) violence that they have had to put up with. It's not an armchair discussion for these folks. They are fighting for their lives. (E.g. talking in code: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polari )
I grew up reading sci-fi stories where e.g. a man might take a pill before bed and wake up a woman. To me the future would obviously and naturally have gender change as a normal thing (though perhaps uncommon) along with things like new synthetic genders, or body changes like fur or tails, or even becoming "transhuman" entirely though mutation or "uploading". What gender is a disembodied consciousness in a cybernetic matrix anyway, eh?
Last but not least, speaking as someone who has dedicated much of his life to logic, the world is trans-logical. You're talking about "grasping the logic" or crystallizing the logic, which is a good thing to do: logic is better than illogic. I'm pointing out that the real world is not fully covered by logic, in fact only a tiny minuscule portion of the real world is susceptible to logical comprehension. This doesn't mean a descent into irrationality, rather it leads to a new higher-order rationality that can take into account contradictory models and yet still function.
Well met! Cheers
This is a separate discussion and it often conflates with the the discussion of truth and fiction. Yes we should accept both people with BIID and transgender people into our society with respect and empathy. But the main question is how should we interpret their place in society? Do we interpret BIID as normal or a disorder? Do we interpret transgenderism as a disorder or totally and completely normal?
>Next, the thought occurs that there's at least one very obvious difference between BIID and gender change: having a limb off is generally bad, whereas being a woman (or man) is generally A-Ok.
It's debatable whether it's ok. The line is blurry here. A genital sex change does involve mutilation of genitals and re-sculpting of flesh in the genitalia area and breast area. It also involves experimental treatment with certain hormones that were previously used to chemically castrate male sex offenders. Some of these treatments are being recommended to kids before puberty and before 18. It is borderline similar to BIID as it is involves desires to physically carve into flesh and make irreversible modifications.
It's even arguable that BIID involves similar brain chemistry mechanisms as transgenderism as it is arguably an abnormal/ interpretation of "self", meaning that if BIID is classified as a disease it's not to far off to call transgenderism a disease as well. The big question here is, if cures for BIID existed in pill form, is it moral to offer them to BIID patients? If so if the same pills existed for transgenderism... is it moral to offer them too? Maybe given no cures for either the best path is to acknowledge both people with BIID or transgenderism as completely normal.
>BIID too for that matter falls into the "beyond the pale" category for me.
Me too. And for many... transgenderism also falls beyond the pale. It's understandable why. Both BIID and transgender people exist in nature. But for both they are statistical anomalies. Fewer then 1% of the population across occupy a gender category other then the traditional binary roles they were born with.
So what is beyond the pale? If personally, for yo,u Gender isn't beyond the pale But BIID is... why is your opinion more valid then someone else who thinks that Gender is beyond the pale?
> I'm pointing out that the real world is not fully covered by logic, in fact only a tiny minuscule portion of the real world is susceptible to logical comprehension.
I don't. Logic is the domain of mathematics. Interpretation of the world is based off of opinion, not logic.
However, such interpretations of the world should remain logically consistent. Meaning if you should believe racism is wrong but black people are all criminals then something is wrong with your belief system. Everyone agrees that things should remain consistent.
That is the problem here with transgenderism. There is an inconsistency within it. It fits every criteria of what we would classify as a psychological disorder no different then BIID. But what is more important here? The correct categorization of BIID or transgenderism? Or respecting peoples rights to cut off their own limbs/genitalia? Our biased emotions pull us in 3 directions here. Transgender people deserve respect, limbs/genitalia should not be cut off, truth and correct categorization of things should be followed. You cannot follow all 3 tenets at the same time even if you feel they are all right because they are contradictory.
>I grew up reading sci-fi stories where e.g. a man might take a pill before bed and wake up a woman. To me the future would obviously and naturally have gender change as a normal thing (though perhaps uncommon) along with things like new synthetic genders, or body changes like fur or tails, or even becoming "transhuman" entirely though mutation or "uploading". What gender is a disembodied consciousness in a cybernetic matrix anyway, eh?
I mean sure. What if the sci if story talked about a future where people can painlessly cut off their limbs and feed them to other people? We also have technology where people can eat a pill and instantly regrow the lost limb. So people regularly cut off their limbs and feed each other for fun? This might seem cool to someone with BIID. And logically there's nothing wrong with this future as well. But as you said logic doesn't fully cover the real world.
Why is it that you and I feel that my sci fi universe is strange, while your sci-description of the future is more normal? And what right do we have to enforce our belief that your sci-fi world is more normal then the one I describe? It's totally understandable that many will find the first story just as weird, especially if that person lived in a culture that hasn't been bombarded with media imagery that normalizes transgenderism.
To be clear, the bit where they mention biology exists, or the bit where they say they won't conform to other people's preferred language?
If gender is a social construct then it doesn't really exist except as a cultural artifact. If your identity is based on any kind of social construct, I don't see how it follows that anyone has to agree with or affirm that such claims ought to be a cultural norm.
Furthermore, disagreeing with such claims are cultural disagreements rather than moral disagreements. Cultural disagreements are not innately hateful. Therefore it doesn't seem to follow that affirming gender identity has any moral force, or that not affirming it is innately hateful.
That said, this obviously doesn't justify harassing trans people in any way, shape or form because of such disagreements.
Using another analogy, I have vegetarian friends and acquaintances, and when they come visit, I serve us all veg-friendly food because... I'm not an asshole! Doing this small act does not require me to adopt their religion or become vegetarian myself.
It's not just about respect anymore; it's about truth.
https://www.newyorker.com/sports/sporting-scene/how-one-swim...
Because we didn't want to her feelings Mia, a biological male with a female gender was allowed to compete in women sports. She's dominating that sport now; and it's starting to display a comical mismatch between the old reality and a new reality.
The argument is more complex then simply truth and etiquette. Because proponents of etiquette are literally redefining objective truth. So when you talk to both sides, they literally think they're side is the objective truth. Truth is as fluid as gender and it's literally hard to know which one is real.
There is as much validity to say most humans are male or female as there is to say that gender is a gradient, a small minority of people are neither male or female. These are just arbitrary categorizations that are being redefined.
In order to have my respect and niceness, you have to ask for it with respect and niceness. Otherwise you're just begging for abuse, and you have nobody to blame but yourself when it comes. I suspect I'm far from the only one who see it this way.
That's the problem. Shaming and shunning is an ancient technique for punishing transgressors, but social media enables it to be applied too broadly. All transgressions are put on full blast. If I were a full on Nazi I would get the same treatment as I would if expressed that I'm glad my son doesn't want to be a girl. It gets tiresome, shuts down free speech and punishes people who don't deserve it. It allows otherwise powerless people to become powerful in their faux outrage and hurt others that don't deserve it in the process.
It became a liability, because of just how mercurial the outrage mob is. They will dig up something you said 15 years ago, or something your father said, and you'll lose your job because of it.
The only exception is HN, which I use under an assumed name, because I can't bring myself to leave you all :-)
Nevertheless, I believe there are deeper cultural reasons at its root. For many reasons, people today have less resilience than they did half century ago and even less than the prewar generation.
These reasons are many and diverse and it's hardly possible to detail them here in any comprehensive way but some are very obvious.
First, there's not the same emphasis on teaching manners and self-restraint as there was, say, five decades ago. Nor is the same level of emphasis placed on listening to others and making an effort to understand and accommodate their views as there once was.
Similarly, there's a righteous sense of self-entitlement that once wasn't there to the extent it is today.
And then there's the overprotection bubble that kids have been brought up in over the past forty or so years - for instance, kids being driven to school, and or not being allowed to discover the 'bad' world for themselves. This breeds timidity and an over sensitivity to worldly knocks and thus people now overreact at the slightest provocation - even when they experience the mildest indignation or upset.
Couple these issues with the ever-increasing number of groups of people who consider themselves disadvantaged in comparison to others and we've a recipe for trouble. Having to make 'allowances' and or special rules for so many subgroups of people - whether or not these groups have legitimate or reasonable claims - is wearying society. (Here, I'm not suggesting these groups don't have a legitimate cause, rather it's the effort that society has to expend in adjusting to and accommodating them that's a major source of problem.)
Then there's other factors such as inequality which is growing so fast that people haven't time to adjust. Same goes for racism, mix too many different ethnic groups too quickly and or that the population growth rises too quickly so people don't have time to adjust and the discontent manifests as resentment towards others.
Put all this together with a media that squawks loudly at the slightest provocation and you've conflict for sure.
It seems from the evidence that Fry does have a valid point, how relevant it is remains to be seen.
Incidentally, decades ago when I was growing up and copped abuse from others, I was taught to consider the old ditty 'sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me'.
From my experience, there's a modicum of truth in that saying.
I don't know, an I'm an enormous fan of both men.
Both are academic types, Peterson has a love for the natural world, Fry for history.
They both believe in values - Peterson focusing on self-discipline, Fry on kindness.
The only thing I can work out that's different is that some people have decided that Peterson is evil for not supporting compelled speech, or acknowledging humans are animals, or some other nonsense - Fry could absolutely be in Peterson's position if the cards had fallen differently.
If that were true, either no one would be on social media except perfectly politically correct people, or everyone would be desperately trying to be perfectly politically correct. But instead, social media is filled with racist, homophobic, sexist jerks who constantly say things that hurt other people and reinforce stereotypes. So...
Thats all politically correct its just the oppositions political parties idea of politically correct.
Tautological by definition, for 'politeness' to exist, you must have impoliteness. If you have a culture whose population has shifted more polite, like Canada, then democratically you end up going down this road of lawfully mandated politeness. Canada is jailing impolite people: https://thepostmillennial.com/rob-hoogland-canada-prisoner-o...
This is in essence what Jordan Peterson warned about and why he came to fame.
This wasn't the first law to jail/punish impolite people in Canada; but also why Canada has a reputation of politeness. You in return get an intentional shift in the zeitgeist of Canada. If you were given the option in front of you to actively boost the politeness of your fellow countrypeople, you probably would do it.
However, the consequence was political prisoners and the abolishment of free speech.
I consider it impolite to misgender. Do you not?
When you have to cite trash like this, it weakens your argument considerably. Maybe cite a better source?
If you know a media outlet is biased (like 90% of them are) - then you know you have to be careful when trying to extract the facts and general sentiment of the writer.
I don't know where this was lost in the collective consciousness of society or if we had it in the first place.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-appeal-c...
I don’t think anyone should be allowed to undergo medical procedures or treatments to change genders until they are an adult, and I don’t think our school system should recommend kids change genders either. The advice should be wait until you are older and have had more time to think about it and life experience.
I suppose you didn’t ask for my opinion on trans procedures but this is a discussion forum and a topic of political correctness and sub thread on trans procedures so I didn’t think offering my thoughts on the content of the link I provided in response to your request would generate such ire!
https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/ca/20/00/2020BCCA0011.htm
You never attempted to rebut the actual content because it is legitimate. I suspect you even followed the sourcing and read for yourself. Instead you're here just to attack the source?
I'm not invested in post millennial, why are you actively going after them?
I don't think anyone is disputing that this happened; it's more the egregious right-wing spin that you get from - what seem to be - the only sites to carry the story.
The framing of "Canada are jailing impolite people" is kinda disingenuous - Canada are actually jailing people who repeatedly disobey court orders and that is perfectly valid and sane, no?
Also the link you gave shows the "jailing impolite people" court specifically giving him latitude to make his appeal when they could just have tossed it - "[...] CD has on sundry occasions (including in his factum on appeal) failed to honour the court’s direction [...] CD has breached the confidentiality orders of the court [...] This court may, in its discretion, refuse to allow a party who has disregarded court orders to pursue or participate in an appeal: [...] However, given the importance of the issues raised in this appeal [...] we would not decline to hear from CD on the appeal."
If something has happened and hasn't fabricated anything. Then you get to analyze the situation aka the spin. You report on it. There are spins for exactly the same story. Some far left news might right on the justice being served for this impolite guy going to prison. Whatever, doesn't matter.
>The framing of "Canada are jailing impolite people" is kinda disingenuous
I don't think so. I'm not saying 50% of society has been identified as below average politeness and is now in prison.
>Canada are actually jailing people who repeatedly disobey court orders and that is perfectly valid and sane, no?
The ruling was appealed and overturned. He has(d) a charter right to express his opinions in private. You absolutely can ignore unlawful rights violating court orders.
Hmm, I'm not sure this is the best advice.
The NY Post was the least bad, if you can believe it.
It seems as though the facts of the situation have some legitimacy; that there is scant coverage is probably an indication of something awry in the media system itself.
There is no meaningful debate on the issue because nobody (or rather very few) is willing to dump their career to challenge the orthodoxy. Therefore only voices challenging the system are far-right wingnuts like Matt Gaetz, the Trump sons etc.
I order for the issue to be taken serious, people need to be a few notches above 'Joe Rogan' and there just not that many.
Also, if they are reasonable, neither Fox nor CNN/MSNBC want to carry them.
Ya I guess his wife was dying and he had mental breakdown because that plus all the fame etc.
I think there's an interesting breakdown though. There will never be a homogeneous politeness in a society. There will always be the Goody Two-Shoes who will never ever do anything bad. Those people actively work toward being superior. I would say they are superior.
However, it means anyone in the way of their virtuousness is an enemy. It's about taking them down, look how much better I am than thee.
>There is no meaningful debate on the issue because nobody (or rather very few) is willing to dump their career to challenge the orthodoxy. Therefore only voices challenging the system are far-right wingnuts like Matt Gaetz, the Trump sons etc.
What is there to be as a POLITician. It's about being polite. Impolite people will always exist, and I am sure you consider those names as impolite people.
>I order for the issue to be taken serious, people need to be a few notches above 'Joe Rogan' and there just not that many.
It's all a consequence. If the 'polite' go too far, like they have in Canada. Then the suppressed impolite grow in power.
>Also, if they are reasonable, neither Fox nor CNN/MSNBC want to carry them.
I think what you're touching on is another cycle. We kind of saw it happen during financial crisis and now again. Something we suspected but didnt measure during various other events especially the great depression. In your real life, is everyone as jolly as you? Or does everyone you know seem to be anxious, depressed, numb, unhappy, suicidal?
It also seems like: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_American_Civil_War
Might be something there.
Imagine you are FOX/CNN/MSNBC. You see all this happening. Years of racial unrest, violence, destruction. Pulitizer the guy learnt the hard way and these news agencies haven't learnt yet.