The Politics Behind Political Correctness

Political correctness. It’s a term we hear everywhere around us – on social media sites, in political speeches and debates, and even during everyday conversation. It’s also a term that divides our society into two categories - those who abide by it, and those who scoff at it.

But before you write something off as being “too PC”, ask yourself the following questions: What exactly do I mean when I use the words “political correctness”? Does my understanding of the expression match its actual meaning? What is it about the expression that invites so much contention? And finally, is it important for me, as an individual, to be politically correct today?

First, let’s learn what the term political correctness means, and when and why it came about. According to Britannica, the term first appeared in “Marxist-Leninist vocabulary following the Russian Revolution of 1917”. Back then, it was used to describe “adherence to the policies and principles of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union”. The phrase was linked to traditionalism, conformity and right-wing ideology.

This continued into the 1960s, when the term was applied by leftists in the USA to mock the right’s extreme orthodoxy. It was not only used to criticise the conservatives, however - the Left also used the term to call out rigidity within their own party. According to Ruth Perry, a professor of literature at Massachusetts Institute of Technology who participated in several feminist and civil rights movements, the expression “was always used as a joke”, when “calling attention to possible dogmatism” within leftist groups.

Until the late 1980s, this expression was used exclusively by the Left. But around 1990, the term was adopted and altered by the Right. Conservatives began to claim that political correctness was the Left’s device to promote their curriculum and teaching methods on university and college campuses through “liberal fascism”. For example, during a 1991 commencement speech at the University of Michigan, Republican (right wing) president George H.W. Bush said the following:

"The notion of political correctness has ignited controversy across the land. 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."

Thus, “political correctness”, which came to mean speech that caused the least amount of offence, particularly when speaking of groups who are socially disadvantaged or discriminated against, was portrayed in an extremely negative light. Right propaganda stated that political correctness was censorship, and a restriction on freedom of speech. Meanwhile, leftists believed that the Right had villainized the idea of “political correctness”, to get away with hate speech and other similar discrimination.

Recently, movements like MeToo and Black Lives Matter have prompted more anti-political-correctness sentiments, mainly from the people these movements are calling out. One prominent anti-PC crusader is ex-president Donald Trump. Trump, a Republican politician, frequently states that he refuses to be politically correct, as he sees political correctness as yet another conspiracy (just like global warming and the Coronavirus), that neither he nor America has time for. Trump has used this philosophy to account for several outrageous actions, such as referring to Mexicans as rapists, calling women he dislikes “fat pigs” and “disgusting animals”, and openly mocking a victim of sexual assault.

image source: https://www.weeklystorybook.com/

I think this is the essence of why an anti-PC stand is problematic. You can use it to justify any number of statements, and subsequently actions, against victimised groups. I believe that the moment you state that you “don’t believe in political correctness”, you also state that you don’t believe in treating people of persecuted races, religions, classes, genders, and sexual orientations with respect. You state that you are a narrow-minded, bigoted human being.

This translates into our everyday lives, too! For example, every time you use the pronoun “he” instead of “they”, you are erasing people of more than fifty different gender groups. You are indirectly saying that the people who fall into these categories matter less than males. You are becoming another droplet in the bottomless well of misogyny.

One common complaint about political correctness is that it has been taken to an extreme, with “the PC police” correcting you ever time you use a term they deem incorrect. While I agree that we have taken political correctness to an extreme, I also think these extreme measures are necessary. Picture a pendulum that has swung all the way to one end. Before it can return to its equilibrium, it must reach its maximum height on the opposite end. Similarly, women, people of colour, and those in the LGBTQ community have been oppressed for so long that to reach a state of total equality, we must start by taking drastic levels of affirmative action. If at first we make an effort to be overly politically correct in everything we say or do, this common decency will someday become the norm.