PC = Orwellian Newspeak?

I am SO hoping that someone will channel Mark Twain to get his opinions on the latest round of ”Political Correctness” going around. I would pay to hear his thoughts on this...

I was so saddened to hear that there is soon to be a “sanitized” version of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” available for the general public. Twain scholar Judith Lee believes that you, the general public, are too stupid to handle Twain's use of certain words that by the standards of today may offend.

She [Judith Lee] argued that Twain's use of racial epithets was meant to be read ironically but that an appreciation of irony was an “advanced interpretive skill.” For a “general audience,” Lee said, a bowdlerized version will do.

Op-Ed: 'Huck' and 'Rent' done wrong
Tim Rutten
LA Times 01/08/2011
Also in the piece was a mention that at Monrovia High, an already “sanitized-for-high-schools version” of “Rent”, basically a retelling of “La Boheme”, was being cancelled with the District Superintendent, Linda Wagner, giving the reason of:

“We need to consider all our constituents” and from now on, the school only will be allowed to put on plays that “every child and every parent find to be acceptable.” She told another reporter this week that this play “is not family friendly” because it depicts “characters who have some dark issues they're dealing with”…

Where Monrovia's new standards leave its drama program is anybody's guess. You could, one supposes, go back to the classics, say, Sophocles' “Oedipus the King,” which Aristotle singled out for praise in his “Poetics.” No, that won't do — there's incest. Shakespeare's a problem — witchcraft in “Macbeth,” teenage sexuality in “Romeo and Juliet” and ageism in “King Lear.” Let's not even talk about “Othello” or “The Merchant of Venice.” No Ibsen — syphilis in “Ghosts” and disrespect for authorities in “An Enemy of the People.” Maybe something American: “Long Day's Journey Into Night” is out — drug and alcohol addiction there; “Death of a Salesman” undermines capitalism, and “Inherit the Wind” denigrates biblical inerrancy.

Tim Rutten
LA Times 01/08/2011
Political Correctness is nothing more than a socially acceptable lie that is based upon a completely false premise, you have the right and society has an obligation to make sure that you are not adversely affected by anything you may see or hear. In other words, if it might upset you, or potentially shatter some illusion you may carry, you should be shielded from it.

It is one thing to be aware of your audience and not to offend them without intent or cause or just being rude for rudeness' sake, but the idea that it is all well and good to ban the usage of words, ideas or such because “someone” may be put off is described so beautifully by Patrick Buchanan in his book, “The Death of the West.”

Political Correctness is Cultural Marxism, a regime to punish dissent and to stigmatize social heresy as the Inquisition punished religious heresy. Its trademark is intolerance.

I can tell you from personal experience that Political Correctness will not help you in any way, in fact I can nearly guarantee you that it will impede you in the long run because it is most often by having your cage rattled that you begin to learn from your experience.

As a Life Coach and Counselor I am practically in the business of being “Politically Incorrect” since I HAVE to tell you things you most likely have spent a lifetime avoiding, I am in the tree rattling business a lot of the time.

People often ask me why a benevolent God would allow pain into the world, is it really the punishment that we interpret it to be? Simply put, it is a blessing that most of us do not recognize. It is through pain in all its forms that we are motivated to grow, to change, it is our number one motivator. Without pain, we are happy to stay exactly where we are.

When I think about Political Correctness, I cannot help but think of George Orwell's Newspeak in “1984” which he described as; “It was intended that when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words.”

So remember the three great truths that in many ways embody the thought process of Newspeak and it's current incarnation as Political Correctness:

War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength.