Pros And Cons Of Being Politically Correct

People far too often tell others something that they say is not politically correct and that it offends them, even though they will refuse to give a rational explanation to why what the person stated is so offensive. It is to a point where people seem to be offended by virtually everything. Being too politically correct is hindering societies’ ability to rationally solve problems.
Being politically correct is essential to society, because the majority of it is just refraining from offending other people. The term politically correct originated from Communists and Socialists in the mid 20th century to keep people in line in Russian so there would be no rebellion from the communist society. At the start of the 1990’s being politically correct became a massive deal to people in America and the UK, it was kind of showing the rejection of racism, homophobia and

everything else offensive(It’s Time to Get Real About). Regardless of what political correctness was coined for in America it seems that it has just caused more problems than anything else. From the start of America’s existence, freedom has been a gargantuan factor in the country’s overall success(Bindewald). “However, in recent decades we have witnessed a not insignificant decline in the effectiveness of virtually all of our institutions – governmental, financial, educational, religious, etc.(Bindewald).” Now this means that if political correctness becomes far too extreme then the American society will not function as it should.
Take religion, for example, some Christians highly dislike Atheists because they do not believe in the same higher being as them and just insult them for refusing to see their beliefs, and vice versa, therefore, problems between them are not being solved rationally. Everything they say to each other just offends the other because they completely and totally refuse to see the others point of view. This is the problem with being too politically correct because if somebody were say a slightly offensive joke that they do not find offensive, the other person would just be offended by it even if it is a joke. People take things too seriously on occasion but the same principle would apply in a serious debate over a problem. Due to this if somebody makes a remark that could be deemed even slightly racist then, the other person would just attack them and the real problem would never be solved.
People are being absolutely absurd about being politically correct because they are incapable of separating their emotions from what this so called ‘correctness’ is actually provoking(It’s Time to Get Real About).

However humans naturally put emotions into what they say if they did not put emotion into their word then that would just make people robots. Which is a lot of the reason why political correctness matter to an extent. “What’s mad here is the willingness of people to spout such ideologically vacant and socially dangerous statements without pausing to consider a) the meaning, b) the rationale or c) the consequences of their words. In short, people are being idiots about political correctness(It’s Time to Get Real About).” Political correctness is just a way of providing labels to other people. If somebody were to call somebody from Ireland a Scotsman they would be offended because that is not politically correct. The exact same principle applies to every other label. From calling somebody a racist to calling somebody homophobic it is just a label made due to political

correctness.
There was an incident widely reported at Harvard in the spring of 1991. A young woman chose to put a Confederate flag outside her dormitory window to show her political views. She was then attacked as insensitive to the opinions and feelings of others, although she was defended because it was deemed self expression. Harvard did absolutely nothing to prevent this young woman from hanging out the flag because the college chose to accept the reason why she hung the flag(Mansfield). This is very much an example of people not approving of somebody else’s actions and using political correctness as an excuse to attack somebody.
Now the question here is at what point does self-expression stop and downright offensiveness start. The young lady at Harvard had hung up the flag to celebrate George Washington’s birthday and understandably enough the colored students at Harvard were offended. So as a retort directed towards the young lady another student put out a Nazi flag(Mansfield). Mansfield said that “You take offense by giving offense.” This incident is a fantastic example of how freedom of expression may just be racism and why political correctness matters to an extent. Free speech is absolutely crucial in order to solve problems at all. Although because people are taking political correctness to such an extreme it is as if a person were to say “there’s a black man standing.” they would be deemed as a racist when in all reality all they did was state a fact.
Homophobia, racism, and sexism are learned traits, not things people are born
knowing. Political correctness is necessary to prevent those things(Bennett). Although, on the other hand, if people are too politically correct, then it hinders society’s ability to solve the problems that desperately need to be solved. Political correctness just ends up creating racism, homophobia, and sexism when it is disproportionated by some liberal extremists because it just establishes labels despite liberals being opposed to labels and believing everybody should be equal.