I’m Getting Tired Of My Fellow Liberals
The political correctness thing has gone too far.
“Political correctness is America’s newest form of intolerance, and it is especially pernicious because it comes disguised as tolerance. It presents itself as fairness, yet attempts to restrict and control people’s language with strict codes and rigid rules. I’m not sure that’s the way to fight discrimination. I’m not sure silencing people or forcing them to alter their speech is the best method for solving problems that go much deeper than speech.”
-George Carlin
I’m a progressive person. I love stem cells, blasphemy, weed and gay people as much as the next guy. I also love guns, which gets me in trouble with my fellows progressives. That’s fine with me, because they’re the ones missing out. Guns are a blast, if you will. One of my most significant loves is the love of free speech, and I find it troubling that many of my liberal peers are unable to see how they’re hindering it.
Now, certainly a degree of political correctness can just be a sign someone’s trying to be a polite person. If you called me … well, I’m a white man, so the names you can call me are limited. Perhaps you call people “disabled” instead of “handicapped.” If you think that will make them feel more comfortable, then go for it. It’s when certain bleeding hearts try to dictate what people are allowed to say and attempt to shut down any speech that differs from their own that I have a problem.
My liberal peers claim to be the most open minded of the political persuasions. They grope themselves in self-congratulatory glee when they tell people they voted for gay marriage in their state before it was legalized nationwide. They shiver in ecstasy at the idea of defending someone who is being subjugated. But for the liberal, the biggest sin of all is privilege, and sometimes those who are perceived to have it must be removed from the dialog.
Do I admit I have white, male, cis, non-reptilian privilege? Yes, and I try to remember that I do. However, perceiving someone as privileged isn’t a reason to remove their voice from a conversation, and assuming someone is overly privileged or simply ignorant because they disagree with you is a supremely narcissistic perspective.
Liberals on college campuses across the country are saying they don’t feel safe when they see Trump’s name written in chalk or when someone says that maybe an offensive Halloween costume is pretty damn inconsequential.
Liberal students have tried and succeeded at banning visiting lecturers they disagree with. Instead of letting them speak and debating their ideals, they choose to silence them and maintain a homogeneous environment. Speech codes that dictate which words are acceptable and which must be banned for their conceivably offensive undertones have popped up at colleges across the country. Colleges literally have “free speech zones,” as if free speech is an animal in a zoo that must be observed from afar.
The ultimate irony of the liberal in its natural habitat, the college campus, is that it expresses a severe distaste for privilege while perfectly exemplifying it. What is more privileged than demanding college administrators protect you from frightening words and having them set up small spaces on campus where the people you don’t like can practice their First Amendment rights? I can’t imagine a greater demonstration of privilege at this time.
Does the liberal think people in third world countries are getting trigger warnings? Do they think they can cancel enough speeches to make it so everyone agrees with them? Do they expect their future employer to set up a special room in the office where free speech can take place?
And how do these artificial safe environments truly serve us? Is a controversial or offensive idea not more powerful when you attempt to conceal it? Doesn’t concealing it also prevent it from being fixed or widely identified? What kind of sanitized climate are we looking for?
Though they arrive with the best intention, which I believe is a hope to protect those who can’t protect themselves, the liberal ends up sacrificing liberties in the name of safety. Didn’t Benjamin Franklin say something about those kinds of people? I’m pretty sure he didn’t sign a Constitution that said “freedom of certain speech.”