The Politics of Control (P.C.)

I was browsing the web today and happened upon the Media Matters website. Curious to see if I've made their hate-list yet (my measure of true success), I stopped in to look around. Their current campaign-du-jour is against Bill O'Reilly of the Fox News Channel. My interest piqued, I decided to humor them and look at what they're bashing him with today. Apparently, Bill is a racist. I watch his show at least every other day and I've never heard him say a single racist thing aside from mocking representations of people who actually do hold racist views.

Of course, Media Matters and other left-wing sites know that mockery doesn't translate well from speech to print, so they use it to color people as racists. In fact, if they read this, they'll probably accuse me of some sort of racist innuendo for using the word "color" in this context. I'm not kidding. They literally used O'Reilly's use of the term "white-bread" as evidence of his alleged racism.

In any case, I was so disgusted by how far they were trying to stretch my imagination, I clicked the little "x" box, my savior from the evil wiles of liberal politics, at least online.

But why are they even concerned with whether or not Bill O'Reilly is a racist? Why should anyone care? It's not like people can't think for themselves and see blatant racism (if it actually existed on The Factor). Why do sites like Media Matters feel the need to force their own silly interpretations down our throat? Do they think the public is too stupid to think for themselves? Wait, don't answer that.

Furthermore, are we supposed to take some action on their account that we wouldn't take on our own?

Here are my assertions on this issue: If America saw Bill O'Reilly as racist, he would be finished. "That's the idea," you might say. It's the reason Media Matters is doing this in the first place. But don't you think that, if he were racist, we'd already know? Of course we would!

So why are they doing this? It all comes down to one word: "Control." If they can't win in the arena of ideas, they can try to control the public image of the person who has the winning ideas. One of the ways that they do this is by trying to control what one may and may not say. This is a very alien idea in a land which takes absolute pride in it's right to, and spirit of, free speech.

You can't say, "Secretary." You have to say, "Administrative Assistant."
You can't say, "Stewardess." You have to say, "Flight Attendant."
You can't say, "Negro," "colored," or sometimes even "Black." You have to say, "African American."
You can't say, "Oriental." You have to say, "Asian."

That any of these terms would somehow be offensive is first off ridiculous. The left simply likes to tell you what words are offensive. But I believe that there are no offensive words. I also believe that you cannot "offend" someone. Taking offense is a choice that you make, as is what you do about it.

But attention can be diverted from the issues and onto the words, which is an absolute favorite tactic of the left.

They call this, "Political Correctness," or, "P.C." To me, P.C. stands for, "Politics of Control." The left has convinced people in stunning numbers, even some unsuspecting common-sense conservatives, that certain words are now offensive and must not be uttered. This entire concept should be offensive to anyone living in the Land of the Free.

From 2001 through 2004, I lived in the beautiful, friendly nation of Thailand. Thailand is predominantly a Buddhist country, and this philosophy can be seen in every aspect of Thai life. Thailand is known as "The Land of Smiles," and for good reason. The people there are happy, friendly, and very eager to please. They are also extremely non-confrontational. The thought of anyone taking offense to something they say is an extremely unpleasant one for them. Politeness is the order of the day.

Now, if I were to tell you that, if you said anything disparaging about the monarchy there, you could very well be spending several years in prison, you'd be horrified, right? It goes against everything we stand for in America. Or does it?

Let me also tell you that this is probably the only thing anyone would ever tell you you could not say there. There are no words, other than blatant profanity, that people would tell you that you cannot say. People don't challenge you because you used a word like "secretary" or "Oriental." They wouldn't care. If you did happen to muster up the type of vocabulary that would go against the sensibilities of a Thai, a miraculous and beautiful thing would happen: He would walk away.

A Thai friend of mine told me once that there are two kinds of people: those worth listening to, and those not worth listening to. What a concept. How incredible it is, in a land without guaranteed free speech, that you can say almost anything, and if they don't like it, they will simply stop listening? Doesn't that sound more like how we think we are? But here, in the land of the First Amendment, you can't use words now that you most likely grew up using.

In America, entire wars of words are waged over the words themselves instead of the real issues that confront our society. If you're a public figure and use the wrong word or worse, say something with seemingly innocuous words which together can be construed as not P.C., hoards of the likes of Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, the NAACP, the ACLU, feminists, Muslim leaders, or any number of other special-interest groups will leap upon you and attempt to destroy your career.

What do they get? They get a fight. Look at Imus. Stupid move? Maybe. Forgivable, why not? So there's a big public brew-haha, a man loses his job (but gets a lot of money anyway), and then there's nothing.

How far did it them?

You have Jesse and Al, the regular drum-beaters whom no one really cares about anyway, and you have some black female basketball players who lower themselves leagues below the level of pathetic trying to get paid for their "mental anguish" at having been called, though not individually or personally, "nappy-headed hoes."

If these people really had a beef with the words and/or thoughts they attack, then the most effective way to deal would be to simply stop listening. Think about it. How much power would Hitler have had if Germany simply stopped listening? If you live in America, you have the right to say anything you want. You do not have the right to be heard. If Americans simply walked away from anything they don't want to hear, there would be no such thing as P.C.