This statement came from Cath Gunn, a "communication activist". (She was the person responsible for getting the United Nations to designate a year as International Literacy Year.)
When we demand 'political correctness' (as opposed to libel or slander) do we deny people the right to free speech and are we denying people the right to information as a result? Has debate been stifled by a demand for political correctness? Has fear of litigation and trial by media meant that robust debate no longer takes place in the media and academia?

if you figure out what free speech means, let me know.

my present understanding is: you can say what you want in public as long as it doesn't upset john howard.

Such cynicism Demos!
Free speech - I'd say the ability to say whatever one wishes provided that it does not cause others to be brought into 'hatred, ridicule or contempt' (which is pretty much the definition of slander and libel) and which should be wide enough to encompass deliberately stirring up something like ethnic or religious hatred without having to pussy foot around other issues.
Other issues? Gender, race, age, disability, religious belief, sexual orientation, marital status - or to put it more bluntly whether you are male or female, black, white, purple or yellow and from Australia, Turkey or Turkmenistan, 2 or 202, crippled, deaf or blind, Christian, Muslim or Calathumpian, gay or straight or curved, married or living in single or dual bliss with or without children, kids or the dogs.
More seriously Demos - would it help relationships with one another if we ditched some of the so-called 'politically correct' rhetoric and felt free to acknowledge some of the above sorts of information. Would we know more about each other and have less room for misunderstanding?
Why do gays have to 'come out' and why is a blind person, 'vision impaired'- especially when he might well see more clearly than I do? Comments please!

Why use the word 'gay'?

As a member of the Gordons said " Th' 'Gay Gordons' dus'na refer tae a Regement o' poofs.".

Och yes - just goes to show I am as brainwashed as the majority!
But then 'gay pride'?

Misplaced.

I agree with Cath Gunn. P.C. has just lead to a proliferation of weasel words. So we can't say e.g.children fail because they are not intelligent, somebody was fired because they stuffed up completely, the army got it badly wrong and killed 40 civilians, some soldiers are dangerous psychopaths, some teachers are totally incompetent, some nurses and doctors are sadistic, DOCS is so underfunded that it's barely worthwhile reporting child abuse to them any more, if bird flu hits we are so underresourced in our hospitals that a few million will die, Singapore is practically a police state and executes people, Australian mining companies are despoiling Africa and New Guinea, Universities are so short of funds they go on passing foreign students despite atrocious results because the Unis need their money, the US is a brutal nation which has killed a zillion times more innocent civilians than 9/11 did, Child Care Centres are understaffed and for profit ones even more so. and children get bad care in them, and whistleblowers are treated like scum. ETC.

Political Correctness was spawned from the same creatures that gave us "affirmative action" and screamed out for equal rights for minorities. What's the point of being in the majority then?
PC is the religion of the loony Left and is destroying free speech as well as our language with all the "Newspeak" words and terms. 1984 was late but it's here now.

Depends which version of political correctness you're talking about.

There was the late 80s, early 90s version where a manhole had to be called a personhole and vilification of people for a variety of reasons, some farcicle, was frowned upon. Calling short people 'vertically challenged' is clearly ridiculous, but 'visually impaired' allows that there are degrees of blindness.

The mid 90s to 2006 version of PC is the one where a manhole is a manhole and anyone who objects is a sissy. It also dictates that anyone who talks about problems with the status quo is a rabid, lunatic conspiracy theorist. It is ok to point and laugh at short people and if you have vision problems it's nobody's fault but your own.

Both kinds are extreme and unhelpful, and both kinds are about excluding the other from public debate.

Free speech is being stifled by Mr Costello's plan to give the ACCC the powers to do big businesses' dirty work for them.

He plans to have the ACCC sue activists who may publicly speak out about an industry's unethical practices.

It appears that he is sabotaging the judicial system which already has defamation laws in place for those who are simply vindictive or maliciously lying.

However, activists who speak out in a truthful manner, resulting in potential loss of profits for an industry, will soon find themselves in court having to feel the might of a government agency representing many of the big boys who are only tolerant of free speech if it's paid for.

What better way to stifle protests and information, by intimidating protesters with the threat of expensive litigation.

Activists in Australia generally can ill-afford to go to court to defend themselves. If not for these activists, whose main endeavour is to empower the public to make informed decisions, we would remain in the dark over many environmental and trade malpractices.

A recent example was the long-term, disgraceful lead contamination of the community in Esperance WA, where, had it not been for a citizen reporting the deaths of thousands of birds, this community would still be in the dark and their health would have been even more compromised from unregulated and unethical industrial practices.

Ignorance in communities is not bliss and free societies should be more tolerant of protesters who generally are well researched and sufficiently courageous to take on those who care only about fat profits. Many of these protesters are well-educated and sufficiently qualified to speak up.

So, be warned, those in public disagreement with Mr Costello and the big end of town, may consider that political correctness is the only safe way to go. This forcing of political correctness will encourage governments and their close associates to further wallow in their own self-interests - a result of an ill-informed and naive public.

mmm having started this thread...what about the reports in the Australian this weekend that a commissioned book for children was withdrawn from publication for fear of offending a minority group? This was reported by a member of the same minority group - who read it to her child and was offended by the poor writing rather than the subject matter....or the fact that the "Where's Bin Laden?" version of "Where's Wally?" sells well in an Islamic bookshop in Sydney but is not available in a chain bookstore for fear of offending Muslims?
There are still "Womin" and "Chairpersons" (despite the fact that "Chairman" comes from a French word that has nothing to do with men or women.
More serious still though what about those situations when we do without information we need for fear of offending or committing a PC blunder? "Would you care to go out to a meal with me so we can discuss the forthcoming conference arrangements?" "No, I may not be wearing a wedding ring but I happen to have a 'partner in life'. I just don't mention him/her because it is not relevant to my working life." "Oh I am sorry I didn't realise..." "Well it's no business of yours is it?"

Take the 2005 Australia Council fiasco over the play about the Costello Brothers. So insensed for example were some media that they hacked it to pieces. So p.o'd was the Government that they cut funding and gave the job to someone else to run it, a Liberal lady. There is a good book titled "Silencing Dissent" by C Hamilton and S Maddison out this year that details much of the way the Howard Government has stiffled debate both in the public and parliamentary arena.
hey we do not have a freedom of speech bill, the McManus and fellow journalist from the Herald-Sun (Vic)getting done in the courts is a good example. Even if they do not ever reveall their source, the Gov knows who it is and i think they got the boot pretty quick. But that is a good example in itself, you cannot even raise a concern within the Party or see-ya.
i think we are all intelligent enough to know each to their own, but also, sticks and stones...My son is bi-racial so i hate 'gook' comments at anybody, but are we not made of thicker skin? It should only be so when it invokes violence or discrimination. But where is that line now? Good point about wanting to be in the majority yet defining terms so as to further distance and discriminate? Comments.

I agree in some circles there might be too much preciousness about how things are worded. But overall, wouldn't most of us agree that it's a good thing to call people by the identities that they prefer? Isn't it just good manners? I have been out of Australia for a few years and returned recently to find the media saying "Aborigines". This might sound petty to some of you but I've been told by some friends that they prefer to be known as "Aboriginal people" or "indigenous" or better still, called by their clan/tribal grouping, which is generally more accurate, educated and respectful. Maybe some Aboriginal people don't even care but this has been my experience of discussing it with quite a few people. Another example, I might call my husband a "wog" or my favourite cousin a "poof" because I know neither of them care, but I would never dream of randomly calling someone else these names (neither to their face or behind their back) because it could be hurtful, embarrassing, or downright inappropriate. Also I would look like a redneck with no idea, and I prefer not to present myself in that way! It is really a common sense approach to call people what they want to be called, and if you don't know, you can ask them. And if you ever call someone an offensive term accidentally, a quick apology and a mental note is all that's needed. If it's a genuine apology then the other person should be able to sense that and get over it. It's not such a big deal in my opinion :) In summary: "Political correctness" is sometimes a pain in the butt but is usually just good manners! There are lots of social taboos around manners and the "labels" we give each other are no exception. These labels tend to become less important as we get to know each other as human beings and take pride in being able to get along with each other no matter what the small differences.

Communicat,

What about the other kinds of political correctness? What about not mentioning climate change in polite company? Is it ok by you if someone mentions human rights violations or the suspension of habeus corpus on a whim?

How about the economy? Is it politically correct to point out that not everyone is doing just fine at the moment? Does freedom of speech and high quality public debate extend to discussion of things the Labor party has actually got right?

Is it politically correct to argue that media freedom has been curtailed or that the senate is supposed to be more than a rubber stamp? Are we allowed to mention our convict origins and the roles women have played in our history, or do we skip straight to Gallipoli these days?

You're wanting to promote public debate, but silence parts of the public you don't agree with. Perhaps you would be better off thinking about what you mean by the word 'public'. If 'public' means all of us then you're pulling the rug out from under your own argument if you want to silence your understanding of the politically correct in the interests of free speech.

chainsmoker, I think you are spot on with that last post, people often moan about political correctness but maybe what they really mean is they feel uncomfortable being forced to face other valid perspectives than the status quo or whatever they believe in. It is threatening for them if they can't just trivialise it or dismiss it as on the fringe.

Emmaa, you wrote '"Political correctness" is sometimes a pain in the butt but is usually just good manners'. So how did we survive thousands of years without PC? Good manners is different from PC and always existed, so why replace that with a standardised substitute that puts the minority before the majority? This fad of PC will eventually fade as its followers grow out of it.

What's wrong with the word "Aborigines"? It comes from the Latin 'Ab origine' and means 'from the beginning'. Do you think it's an insult to be acknowledged as the original inhabitants? Or did were you just blinded (oops, I meant visually impaired) by the PC Newspeak doctrine?

Actually, Aborigines are happy to be called "black fellas." That's how they describe themselves.

Most whites mistakenly regard the term "black fellas" as politically incorrect. Black fellas also call whites "white fellas."

Yes you could say that "political correctness" as we know it now was not historically a requirement for survival, but trust and mutual cooperation always is. And as various groups of people live among or near each other they increasingly need to find ways of interacting and co-existing peacefully. In a modern context this involves at least some political correctness because we don't want to hurt and offend each other, we want to be honest with each other and have fun together but get off to a good start by not insulting each other, what is the problem with that? Also, how is a minority group less important than a majority, group, just because they are less in numbers doesn't mean they are less of a people or have less of a right to decide what they should be "named". The majority group has had the best seat in the house for so long they sometimes forget that there opinion is not the only and exclusinve truth.

It's true of course, often people call themselves blackfellas, and sometimes "blacks", especially when I lived up north I noticed that, although some people where I live now don't use either term much, or only in certain contexts, eg. when in the company of other Aboriginal people. Also the question, "What's wrong with the word Aborigines?" I'm not saying there is anything wrong with any word of the English/Latin language, except that if you get an understanding that someone doesn't want to be called that word, why persist with calling them that? I understand that for some people it has a slightly distasteful "specimin under the microscope" vibe about it, which is a feeling not a fact, but feelings are important, why can't we honour them? Anyway, I think there are more important things to debate, but that is just some food for thought. My last post for tonight, see yas

Chainsmoker I am a bit puzzled by your post. I was not aware that I had said any topic of conversation was out of bounds. Did I?
I think it is your own post which suggests that you believe that only those with your views should be able to hold the floor and that these topics, with your slant of course, should be given preference in the media.
That was not the point of suggesting this thread at all. However you may just have given an excellent example of the need to be politically (left) correct about all issues so as to avoid genuine debate. Thankyou.
By the way, you need not be concerned - the media is doing an outstanding job of supporting your views.

Emmaa asks "how is a minority group less important than a majority, group, just because they are less in numbers doesn't mean they are less of a people". Not less of a people but definetly less in numbers. It's called democracy, where the majority calls the shots (at least in theory). How else could we live together without each and every minority group screaming out to enact their various agendae at the expense of the vast majority?

Going by Emmaa's logic "The majority group has had the best seat in the house for so long", but that's life. Otherwise, no matter the election results, our last two PMs would have been Beasley and Latham if the minority vote was favoured.

I took the title of this piece to be a proposed topic for debate, rather than a statement of (perceived) fact. The assumption seemed reasonable given your concerns were free speech, freedom of information and public debate.

The litigation/media/debate/academia question was unclear until your later comment about leftwing media dominance. Some big media names: Bolt, Blair, Ackerman, Albrechtson, the Parrott, Sheridan, Trioli, Thornton, Flint. As you would know, having sourced one of your examples from the ever-reliable Australian, these are some of the biggest in the business. Hardly lefties.

I note you didn't respond to my comment that both versions of PC are extreme and unhelpful.

I don't understand how a woman knocking you back on a dinner date interferes with free speech, free information or public debate.

"I was not aware that I had said any topic of conversation was out of bounds"

Not suggesting you did, just that you've limited your focus to issues about minorities.

"However you may just have given an excellent example of the need to be politically (left) correct about all issues so as to avoid genuine debate"

See my previous point. I raised some issues worthy of public debate which, admittedly, I knew wouldn't interest you. Rather than debate them you accuse me of avoiding debate.

Free speech, freedom of information and informed public debate are important institutions of democracy, not the playthings of either left or right. I mistakenly thought this was the bigger picture of your post, which is why I made my first comment.

isn't it ironic that those who inhabit the dominant social classes always declare it PC that they are not able to freely villify those in minority classes...ie, the term "political correctness" is a straw man invented by the New Right to discredit what they consider progressive social change, especially around issues of race and gender

in other words white people should be able to freely declare their hate of people of colour on racial grounds

Women should not be offended by any terms that demean their sexuality or intelligence

and anyone who the dominant thinks should be 'put in the place'...

IS expressing free speech...

Yeah sure...

Emmaa wrote: "people often moan about political correctness but maybe what they really mean is they feel uncomfortable being forced to face other valid perspectives than the status quo or whatever they believe in. It is threatening for them if they can't just trivialise it or dismiss it as on the fringe."

This comment should be isolated in a lab as a symptom of viral PC. Maybe then we could produce a vaccine.

It is my fervent prayer that this woman is a checkout chick in Coles. Please God she is not a social worker (or any like professional) with the power to interfere in vulnerable people's lives.

one thing not yet really discussed is the information part of the statement. Does PC stop information? PC is not just about not offendeing eachother or getting off on the right foot, after al if we cannot say hi to someone and strike up a conversation without first asking or wondering if we will offensive, then you must have offensive views and thought to begin with. I say that because everyday we meet people and get along just fine, PC has brought about a change in information being available because we are no longer held back in our freedom of speech or information, ie: the Aboriginal (original inhabitants) people which i think they colloctively call themselves Koori and Torres Strait Islander, and the early contact history that Windshuttle can say is untrue but sorry mate, where did they go?just vanished into thin air? the Museum and ABC have suffered the consequences of PC because they spoke the truth. toi be politically correct is to acknowledge the truth of history and whether you agree with it or not, it is the principal that the truth matters and not whether you can call someone a name. In Howards era it can be used as a cover for his agenda that it is all so because of those darn 'noisy minorities'he likes to refer to. that we have lost our freedoms to criticise or question life itself and it's beliefs and people because of misplaced fear.

Yet in reality it is the politicians who determine exactly what PC can do for them and to us. by saying bias against government and such then they are currently using it as a means to seperate us further, to care about the PC fad more than we need to, to divide us in thoughts and ideals but not allow the tolerance of opinions when it harms them. You can't have it both ways.

Here's a thought. Political Correctness is a disease only suffered by the White race. Is China PC? Japan? Are the black African countries PC (think Mugabe)? How about the muslims? The jews? All the aforementioned can make any statements about Whites and no-one complains - in fact the leftists (especially White ones) trip over each other to agree and say what valid points are being made against the evil Whites. Only race traitors could act this way. Ever since 1945 with the invention of White Guilt and the gradual re-writing of history, it has become fashionable to denigrate White history and achievements while elevating the "achievements" of non-Whites. Does no-one else see this?

Political correctness destroyed Pauline Hanson. Whatever one's opinion of her, most objective pundits would agree in hindsight that the politically correct hysteria whipped up against Ms. Hanson made her message seem as if it were the voice of Satan.

Since the rise and fall of Hanson/One Nation, immigration and multiculturalism have become taboo subjects in Australia. The notion that such existential issues are too politically incorrect to be publicly debated has made a mockery of democracy.

"Our immigration policy is increasingly based on an appeal to international [politically correct] precepts that our neighbours sensibly refuse to practice. We are surrendering much of our own independence to a phantom opinion that floats vaguely in the air and rarely exists on this earth. We should think very carefully about the perils of converting Australia into a giant multicultural laboratory for the assumed benefit of the peoples of the world." - Geoffrey Blainey, All for Australia

http://www.immigrationwatchcanada.org/index.php?module=pagemaster&PAGE_user_op=view_page&PAGE_id=1667

I think PC is probably a way of saying no matter how long the history or how long since, Anglo's are not racist scum that feel a dominance over all other peoples. Alomost a way of acknowledging the wrongs of history (as the Muslim are doing and will have to do in the far future to justify a section of their communities , whole countries that espouse treating everyone else as less than human, real Muslim's are paying for the actions of a deadly few in comparrison to the whole world population of Islam followers) It does seem though that white people cop it as being racist when there are prime examples elsewhere. And no it is not reverse-racism, that implies that only white people can be racist and everyone else is just reversing it.

Being PC has probably strained many relationships where before when my mate said hey 'skip' and i said hey 'leb', it meant nothing, now I wouldn't dare unless they said it first! Not out of a have to be 'PC' thing so much as what others may react like. It's weird but whilst the politicians have created is more divisive than the way people handled it before.

What has PC done for us? It has at least given minority goups of race and religion and sexuality more acceptance and publicity. I'm not saying that in a bad way, it is a good thing that what govnm's have not recognised policy wise they at least have helped publicity wise. But are the party's really for minorities or are they just a tool to get elected? If we are engineered to think that being PC is racist or prejudice, etc then we would not want to be that way, so speak the speak but match it with policy, (ie: rights for same-sex couples as de-facto's not just life partners and the ability to become married, which in itself hold not just legal bindings but social one's also. It is still slightly frowned upon to 'live-in-sin' (male-female) now, so why slow the process down by ecluding marriage?)

What's wrong with saying, "Hey Leb", "Hey Wog" etc? The Equal Opportunities Commision doesn't view the word "Pomm" as racist, neither does the media. So, to keep all things equal, no other terms, except really offensive ones, can be racist either. To claim otherwise proves the existence of "reverse racism".

Oligarch: "Political correctness destroyed Pauline Hanson. Whatever one's opinion of her, most objective pundits would agree in hindsight that the politically correct hysteria whipped up against Ms. Hanson made her message seem as if it were the voice of Satan."

I suppose it would be politically incorrect to disagree by saying that what destroyed Pauline Hanson and her band of boofheaded followers was the fact that she is an ignorant, racist cow who was an embarrassment to the nation?

Or would it instead be better regarded as impolite - like, for example calling someone a 'Leb', 'Wog', or 'Pom'?

I think many people confuse "PC" with what used to be common courtesy. It seems to me that the rise of 'political correctness' coincided with the decline of good manners in this country. Unfortunately, it seems that now we have little of either.

Yes, CJ, the decline of good manners in this country is an important part of the issue. Not many people in the past would refer to someone as "an ignorant, racist cow who was an embarrassment to the nation" just because he disagreed with her views.

As for it being regarded as impolite to use the words 'Leb', 'Wog', or 'Pom', I think that you'll find that this doesn't apply to labels for Whites. The label "Pomm", is used all the time here, especially by the media. It's almost compulsory. Maybe it's due to our post-colonial inferiority complex, but we use the term daily. You would never hear a sports reporter saying that we had beat the Pakis/darkies/wogs/ragheads at some sport or other.

CJ Morgan said: "I suppose it would be politically incorrect to disagree by saying that what destroyed Pauline Hanson and her band of boofheaded followers was the fact that she is an ignorant, racist cow who was an embarrassment to the nation?"

Speaking of political correctness, do you find "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep" to be racist also?

In regards to Pauline Hanson and her views on immigration, please consider the following. If you can find any Asian leader in any Asian country of whatever political persuasion who doesn't subscribe to the immigration views of Ms. Hanson in relation to their own country, then please name that leader now. To save you the time, you won't find a single one.

So then, one must ask the question - why is it considered acceptable for Asian countries to use immigration controls to preserve their own ethnic and cultural compositions, but not Australia?

To quote Blainey again: "A family of Australians, of European descent, would now have faint chance of emigrating, if it so wished, to any Asian land."

http://www.immigrationwatchcanada.org/index.php?module=pagemaster&PAGE_user_op=view_page&PAGE_id=1667

Smells like 24-carat hypocrisy to me.

On the way home from school and at the height of
Hanson hysteria in 1998 my 12 year old son and his same age cousin [girl ]were surrounded by a bunch of white boys who circled them and called them everything that they had learnt from their parents. 'abo', coon' black-'c's', spat on them, wanted to provoke them. They did not react; they knew what to do and simply walked away.

I with to this day I was there to protect and defend them.

This was a form of racist violence I know only too well. My kids knew they were disempowered, vulnerable and could not call on the adults who silently stood nearby and looked on and did nothing.

But to many posters, [many of them no dounbt think they are decent Australians], this was simply an incident of white Australians practicing their free speech and not being politically correct.

Go figure!

Hey Rainier

During 1982, at a private school, my daughter was methodically bashed every day by your mob - 5 girls to one.

I suggested placing her in the state school, however, your mob were on rampage there and my daughter refused to go.

I went to the college every day for a week, recess and lunch times and hung around the playground to discourage these girls from bashing mine. Those girls knew who I was since I worked in the boys' college next door and I chose not to "dob" on them. These bullies then picked on someone else who was more vulnerable.

Funny thing, I was paying fees for my daughter's tuition and your mob weren't.

Do what I did, Rainier - get over it - move on and dissolve your hatred of the white race!

Go figure!

The politically incorrect Dickie