With the upcoming presidential election right around the corner, the demand for political correctness is at an all time high. According to a recent study conducted by Time Magazine, 39% of all Americans believe that we need to be more careful with our language. Growing up a fairly moderate individual, I believe that political correctness has been taken to another level of sensitivity. This nation’s obsession with political correctness is taking away from our governments time to deal with other more critical issues such as the Middle East crisis and our country’s inability to take care of its poor.
Political correctness seems to be the main conversation in the political campaign, college campuses, and private organizations. For example, the University of New Hampshire sent out a list of words to its students in an effort to avoid potentially offensive language. These words included “America”, suggesting that it was the only country in the Americas.
Our own school removed the Native American Chieftain from its mascot as being offensive to this culture. It seems as if today you can not say anything without offending someone. No matter how much you show your love and acceptance for everyone, there will always be that one person who will get offended by anything you say. Focusing on this is self-centered and deviates attention from the issues that could truly make a difference in the life of our citizens. With the Lansing Food Bank feeding a record number of Lansing’s homeless, does the removal of one Native American mascot make any positive difference?
Political correctness is deviating our nation’s focus on the critical issues that face our world. Looking outside of one’s self and not losing perspective of what is really important would make for a better world.
I agree completely with what you are saying. Specifically in regards to the mascot, I think so long as we are not using the Chieftan in an offensive manner, it is acceptable to continue using this mascot. I would say it is even a compliment that it is being chosen as a mascot because it means we value this tribe as a symbol of strength. Today, we must respect each other to the best of our abilities, but also not fret too much about the political correctness of everything we say. There is a fine balance that we must achieve.
In blunt honesty, I agree with you. My father is Native American, my mother is Polish. I’ve grown up surrounded by mascots and jokes about my race. But I haven’t taken offense to it. I believe that political correctness has created such a bubble for our society, that people are unable to function in the reality of the world we live in. Racism is real, yet political correctness has us all bearing around the bush in fear of saying something of offense.
Natalie,
I definitely agree that many people take “being PC” way too far. I think the chieftain head is a great example of that. The reality of our world is that we have much greater issues present than someone being offended by something someone said that wasn’t intended to harm. There are much better things out there that we should be focusing on, like you said, the main focus of so many organizations shouldn’t be political correctness. They should be working towards equality in practice, because in reality, words don’t mean much.
Andrew
Natalie, I also agree that political correctness has deeply impacted our society in politics. I think that it has become quite absurd how political correctness has become so focused upon.