By Steve Rensberry
Opinion / Analysis
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EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. - (RP NEWS) - 9/25/2020 - The term political
correctness has become thoroughly weaponized in today's
socio-political climate. It's a cheap shot meant to tar, knock down,
and delegitimize an entire framework of thought and reasoning, but it
works.
Most often it is
used as a pejorative term against liberals -- denoting an intolerance
toward certain types of speech and offensive behavior -- but a chorus
of writers has made the case in recent years that the far bigger and
more pervasive threat to the country is
right-wing political correctness, also dubbed
conservative correctness, or
patriotic correctness.
It is, as they
say, all relative -- especially in terms of linguistics, with the
meaning of words dependent almost entirely on the context.
If your world view
dominates and is reinforced by social institutions, if your norms and
values seem favored in educational, government, and business
environments, then to you it is likely going to feel like
justified normalcy, something good and right,
the way things ought to be, and no more a political matter
than the fact that the earth revolves around the sun. If you're the
outsider, on the other hand, of course it's going to feel to you like
this dominant value system is politically constructed,
something false and alien in contrast to your own presumed genuine
values. And consequently, the words one uses to describe what's going
on are going to reflect that.
Summarizing how
those on the right have used the term politically, Moira Weigel
writes in a story for The Guardian: “PC was a useful
invention for the Republican right because it helped the movement to
drive a wedge between working-class people and the Democrats who
claimed to speak for them. 'Political correctness' became a term used
to drum into the public imagination the idea that there was a deep
divide between the 'ordinary people' and the 'liberal elite,' who
sought to control the speech and thoughts of regular folk. Opposition
to political correctness also became a way to rebrand racism in ways
that were politically acceptable in the post-civil-rights era.”
The
term has been framed as a contest over civil rights,
as a battle between the establishment of social norms, as an exercise
in the definition of reality,
as a measure of offense
sensitivity levels,
as a manifestation of cultural Marxism,
as Capitalist realism,
as a struggle over social framing,
and as typical human behavior meant to establish acceptable in-group
and out-group behavior.
All of these analyses have some merit, I think. The problem is that
the phrase has shifted in meaning over the years, and continues to be
used and weaponized in novel ways.
In a piece published in the CS Monitor, Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg claims that the person critical of modern PC culture is
largely arguing for a license simply to say whatever they want to
say, regardless of the repercussions. “It’s a license to say
things that at one time would have branded you as a boor or a bigot.
Whenever you’re charged with those things, now you can respond by
invoking political correctness. That invests the criticisms with a
political meaning, and suggests they’re merely the self-indulgent
concerns of an elite that’s out of touch.”
U.S.
President George H.W. Bush made an interesting assertion in a 1991 commencement speech he gave in Michigan, tacitly acknowledging the
country's long-standing prejudices while joining the trend of anti-PC
criticism. "The notion of political correctness has
ignited controversy across the land,” Bush said. “And although
the movement arises from the laudable desire to sweep away the debris
of racism and sexism and hatred, it replaces old prejudice with new
ones. It declares certain topics off-limits, certain expression
off-limits, even certain gestures off-limits."
There is a deeper story to all this, as you might expect, given a
term that has meant different things to different people at different
times in history, but three of the most disturbing and recent
connections are to William Lind, Theodore Kaczynski
(a.k.a. the Unabomber), and to President Donald Trump, all of whom
appear to view political correctness solely in terms of a
liberal-leftist existential type of threat, and an idea and set of
beliefs worthy only of complete destruction.
Lind, a paleoconservative, conspiracy thinker and author, is one of
the first to have weaponized the term. Working with others, Lind helped develop the theory of fourth-generation war theory (4GW) in the late 1980s, war which would be fundamentally decentralized and mainly psychological in nature. It's clear from
reading Lind's writings that he lives in a conspiratorial world
aligned with the alt-right, far-right, and the president's own words,
a world where the media have conspired with academia and leftist
politicians to destroy traditional culture and traditional orthodox
values, and therefore must be destroyed. Lind's work can be found here.
Salon staff writer Chauncey Devega notes: “A sub-component
of 4GW is William Lind’s conspiracy theory of the internal war for
supremacy between what he called 'cultural Marxists' and their
ideology of 'Political Correctness' or 'multiculturalism' and the
'traditional American culture' or 'Judeo-Christian culture.' Lind
argued that 'cultural Marxists' hate America’s 'Judeo-Christian
culture' and were seeking to destroy it. The losers were to be rich,
white, conservative, Christian, heterosexual men.”
Trump's core
policies, Devega says, are consistent with Lind's writings from 2005,
citing his call for a “Berlin-style wall on the U.S.-Mexican
border,” support for the Minutemen militia, and likening Latino and
Muslim immigrants to invaders. “Lind’s ideas have circulated
throughout the right-wing for just over a decade. Trump is just
telling the Republican base what they have already heard or read.”
Say all you want
about the idea of 4GW, but one thing that plays heavy is the use of
deception and propaganda, enacted through a prolonged conflict
involving embedded enemies and a deliberate blurring of the lines
between ordinary citizens, activists and combatants.
I would encourage
you to read Devega's article in full, given that it was
written in 2016 before Trump was first elected, and about as
relevant today as it was then. “Trump is reaping what the Christian Right, Fox
News, conservative talk radio, Christian radio and television, and
the blogosphere has sown,” Devega says.
And that brings us
to Kaczynski. It doesn't take long to
realize that he was a nut -- a former mathematics professor and
certified right wing extremist who railed in a lengthy manifesto
against political correctness, cultural relativism, identity
politics, class warfare, and leftism in general. Kaczynski, born in
1942, is currently serving eight life sentences without the
possibility of parole, incarcerated in the supermax prison in
Florence, Colorado.
Kaczynski feared
an all-powerful government, hated the modern technological world, and
idolized primitive, historical civilizations where people were free
from “non-productive” work (meaning work that doesn't contribute
to the basic necessities of life). If this brings to mind a life of
perpetual slavery with no time to actually live and enjoy the fruits
of one's labor, or to create and invent, you can be forgiven. You can
also be forgiven if this raises a red flag with respect to actual
human history and the brutality and bloodshed that has taken place,
not to mention the fact that half the world likely would die if
industrial and agricultural-based systems were destroyed.
“A return to
primitive society would soon entail a return to primitive, tyrannical
forms of governance as a result, not a new age of liberty,” this entry on Wikipedia states.
I know there have
been some who have praised Kaczynski's manifesto as ingenious and
actually rational, but to me it is nothing but a delusional,
conspiratorial, anti-liberal hack job, providing plenty of fodder for
both critics and extremists, but not really saying much of anything
except to show Kaczynski's incredible ignorance of human history.
Although there were early attempts to describe Kaczynski as a
left-wing “ecoterrorist,” his manifesto makes it clear what his
real target is: leftism and all of the “politically correct”
thinking that goes along with it.
Consider this
(delusional) excerpt: “Leftism is collectivist; it seeks to bind
together the entire world (both nature and the human race) into a
unified whole. But this implies management of nature and of human
life by organized society, and it requires advanced technology. You
can’t have a united world without rapid transportation and
communication, you can’t make all people love one another without
sophisticated psychological techniques, you can’t have a “planned
society” without the necessary technological base.
After alleging, in
so many words, that “leftists” (and only leftists) are ruled by
weak emotions and a lust for power, Kaczynski states: “We use the
term 'leftism' because we don't know any better words to designate
the spectrum of related creeds that includes the feminist, gay
rights, political correctness, etc., movements, and because these
movement have a strong affinity with the old left.”
Equality is another
one of his targets, as well as a target of Lind's and Trump's,
suggesting the push for equal opportunity for minorities is merely a
political power grab, and a dire threat to the entire country.
Another telling
excerpt: “The leftist wants equal opportunities for minorities.
When that is attained he insists on statistical equality of
achievement by minorities. And as long as anyone harbors in some
corner of his mind a negative attitude toward some minority, the
leftist has to re-educate him. And ethnic minorities are not enough;
no one can be allowed to have a negative attitude toward homosexuals,
disabled people, fat people, old people, ugly people, and on and on
and on. It’s not enough that the public should be informed about
the hazards of smoking; a warning has to be stamped on every package
of cigarettes. Then cigarette advertising has to be restricted if not
banned.”
Why Kaczynski
should be offended having to treat “disabled people, fat people,
old people, and ugly people” with respect, and not spit on them or
insult them, or to treat other people in society in a humane fashion,
says a lot about his level of disdain for other human beings, as well
as about his deep-rooted bigotry. He rails against identity politics,
but plays the game himself even more intensely. He rails against the
left as being totalitarian and petty, but advocates for a system and
culture that would turn out to be even more so. He attempts to
discredit entire groups and cultures as being a threat to the very
existence of the nation and western civilization, but wants to
destroy those groups himself in order to dominate and control every
aspect of society with his own all-embracing, totalitarian mandates.
He paints the left as dehumanizing and violent, then goes on to kill
three people and seriously wound 23 others through a terrorizing
mail-bombing campaign that lasted from 1978-1995.
Where does Donald
Trump and those he surrounds himself with get their ideas? From the
very same poisoned well of ideological bigotry and ignorance.
For Further Reading:
A Phrase in Flux: The History of Political Correctness
Anti-PC is 'Political Correctness' for the Right
Right-Wing Political Correctness, Censorship, and Silencing
Political Correctness is Rampant on the Right
Conservative Political Correctness and Colin Kaepernick
