Michigan Debate On Black Lives Matter Shut Down By Protesters
Michigan was a hotbed of paleo-PC craziness, and it's getting hit hard again this time.
Note also the use of the neo-PC pseudo-argument template My x is not a topic for discussion/debate. This is commonly used by transgender activists to shut down any discussion of transgenderism ("my gender is not a topic for debate"), and we see it used in this story to shut down a debate about BLM.
Political correctness is an irrationalist movement. This is not news. Its association with postmodernism...or postpostmodernism...is no accident. Your desire to understand and discuss and seek rational consensus is your modernist/ enlightenment/ rationalist/ liberal hangup. PC wants no part of that. They'll occasionally offer arguments...but the arguments are not to be questioned, and not to be analyzed, and counter-arguments will not be tolerated. Their arguments are window-dressing. The real point is: accept the conclusion or else.
Liberals protected and colluded with the illiberal left last time PC reared its ugly head in the '80s and '90s. Some of the damage (e.g. anti-free-speech codes) was eventually undone. Some of it wasn't. And some of it just festered in the depths of universities until it emerged again, more dangerous and less rational than ever. Perhaps the craziest expression of paleo-PC was the "the Antioch rules" requiring "affirmative consent" at every point of...what? escalation?...during sex. Back then, this was absurd enough to constitute one of the straws that broke the camel's back. Today, it is mandated at all public universities by the Department of Justice. What was once the craziest idea of the craziest college on the craziest fringe of the crazy left is today the law of the land. Liberals went along with all this last time. Some were too cowardly to stand up to the illiberal left. Some found that they had never been liberals at all; they were illiberal-leftists-in-waiting, and that finally had an opportunity to come out. Same thing this time, obviously.
I suppose a lot of people are waiting for this all to blow over. I think that's the wrong attitude. The longer this kind of totalitarian bullshit is allowed to triumph, the more change it effects, the stronger it gets, and the more long-term consequences it has. People need to start standing up to this insanity now. You will be called a racist, because anyone who opposes PC is called a racist. You'll be called a misogynist ('sexist' is passe because it leaves open the possibility of sexism against men). You might even be called some words that aren't even actually words ("transphobic," "misogynoirist"). But: they're just words...or...non-words, as the case may be... People stood up against the Brown Shirts. We ought to be able to find it in ourselves to stand up to a bit of shrieking and name-calling. Being called a bigot by bigots ought to be a badge of honor. It's certainly no blot on your character. If you're still afraid to do it, maybe this will stiffen your spine a bit: you're probably going to be called those things by the regressive left anyway--so you might as well be called them for doing the right thing rather than sitting on the sidelines hoping that nobody says something mean to you.
Note also the use of the neo-PC pseudo-argument template My x is not a topic for discussion/debate. This is commonly used by transgender activists to shut down any discussion of transgenderism ("my gender is not a topic for debate"), and we see it used in this story to shut down a debate about BLM.
Political correctness is an irrationalist movement. This is not news. Its association with postmodernism...or postpostmodernism...is no accident. Your desire to understand and discuss and seek rational consensus is your modernist/ enlightenment/ rationalist/ liberal hangup. PC wants no part of that. They'll occasionally offer arguments...but the arguments are not to be questioned, and not to be analyzed, and counter-arguments will not be tolerated. Their arguments are window-dressing. The real point is: accept the conclusion or else.
Liberals protected and colluded with the illiberal left last time PC reared its ugly head in the '80s and '90s. Some of the damage (e.g. anti-free-speech codes) was eventually undone. Some of it wasn't. And some of it just festered in the depths of universities until it emerged again, more dangerous and less rational than ever. Perhaps the craziest expression of paleo-PC was the "the Antioch rules" requiring "affirmative consent" at every point of...what? escalation?...during sex. Back then, this was absurd enough to constitute one of the straws that broke the camel's back. Today, it is mandated at all public universities by the Department of Justice. What was once the craziest idea of the craziest college on the craziest fringe of the crazy left is today the law of the land. Liberals went along with all this last time. Some were too cowardly to stand up to the illiberal left. Some found that they had never been liberals at all; they were illiberal-leftists-in-waiting, and that finally had an opportunity to come out. Same thing this time, obviously.
I suppose a lot of people are waiting for this all to blow over. I think that's the wrong attitude. The longer this kind of totalitarian bullshit is allowed to triumph, the more change it effects, the stronger it gets, and the more long-term consequences it has. People need to start standing up to this insanity now. You will be called a racist, because anyone who opposes PC is called a racist. You'll be called a misogynist ('sexist' is passe because it leaves open the possibility of sexism against men). You might even be called some words that aren't even actually words ("transphobic," "misogynoirist"). But: they're just words...or...non-words, as the case may be... People stood up against the Brown Shirts. We ought to be able to find it in ourselves to stand up to a bit of shrieking and name-calling. Being called a bigot by bigots ought to be a badge of honor. It's certainly no blot on your character. If you're still afraid to do it, maybe this will stiffen your spine a bit: you're probably going to be called those things by the regressive left anyway--so you might as well be called them for doing the right thing rather than sitting on the sidelines hoping that nobody says something mean to you.
posted by Winston Smith at
6:33 AM
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