political correctness

Political Correctness. The concept of political correctness has enveloped our country. People are almost afraid to utter anything controversial or make any statements that may be considered unkind or offensive to any one particular group of people. It seems like every five minutes some kind of public figure, be it a politician or a celebrity, is in front of their respective press corps making an apology for a comment that seemed innocuous at the time, but after hearing it over and over again, has been deemed offensive.

Now don’t get me wrong, people should watch what they say. Making broad generalizations about any particular group of people is often misguided and insulting. Labeling one particular group of people responsible for ills is irresponsible and wrong. People like Don Imus and Mel Gibson who make racially insensitive comments and blame whole races of people for the world’s ills are vilified in the court of popular public opinion, and rightly so. So in cases like this, our obsession with political correctness is a good thing.

However, political correctness is also detrimental to the solving of a problem, or even just discussion of a particular issue. Very little debate on any major issue gets anywhere in this country because everyone is always so worried about offending someone else.

I believe that was one of the problems with media coverage in this past election. Major stations were so concerned with offending someone either outside their company or higher up in their company that they avoided the real issues in favor of just covering horse race and talking about numbers in a fluid electorate.