Freedom of speech /fri:dəmɒvspi:ʧ/ 1. The myth that you can speak freely without the fear of prejudice. 2. The idea that you can speak freely as long as it does not harm others.

The creation of political correctness has its roots in 1920s Germany, German thinkers sought to explain how Communism in Russia could further influence its people by making one universal language everyone followed, right down from the language itself to the lexical choices made by the individual speaker. Some 25 years later Germany would be defeated by the allied forces and held responsible for some of the greatest atrocities and oppression ever recorded in history, the USSR would go onto become the oppressive superpower that would dominate world affairs for nearly half a century. PC seemed to have faded or at least, been overshadowed.

 

Now we come to today, where PC runs riot over the ordinary man, or should I say, sentient human terrestrial life form of mixed gender that can procreate or fornicate with whomever they please. The truth is, PC is a wonderful idea, in theory, it protects minorities and as a result makes everyone's life better, and someone of African descent shouldn't have to tolerate being called 'nigger', it's a harmful and in itself created as a tool of oppression, a prime example of a fight for which PC should tackle and solve. However like many good theories they don't work so well in practise, the tool of equality later becomes that of oppression, and turns the victim into the victimiser.

 

A good example of the negative effects of PC is in education, the fundamental backbone of any forward society; it creates future generations who can lead a nation to prosperity. However education is being strangled by PC, where equality is favoured over excellence. Where the teacher is made to fear choices they make for they might not be politically correct. If a teacher believes a pupil may have a 'disability' or if because of a disability the pupil is acting disruptive and bringing down the quality of a class the teacher in today's world would have great trouble communicating that worry, they can't simply say what's wrong as they might choose the 'wrong' word to use and be persecuted as a result. If a student is being extremely disruptive the teacher would not be able to call them 'stupid' or yell at them as it wouldn't be politically correct and could be used against the teacher. The point is with today's 'PC' progressing it is getting more difficult to truly speak your mind; the very essence of cultural society is becoming more and more censored.

 

On the other side of the spectrum, where you might find the people who support political correctness are the feminist community, many of who actually disregard political correctness as harmful to them. In the 70s feminists started using political correctness as a way to assert themselves and their views in the male dominated US where sexism was a major issue. However leading feminist Julia Kristeva actually calls PC 'totalitarian' and believes it is doing more harm than good by creating a language censorship and breeding hate amongst communities towards those groups who are supposedly in favor of PC.

The bottom line is PC is dividing communities and creating resentment not only to the government, but to communities. While I do not advocate racism or any form of derogatory language, you can't help but feel our basic freedoms of speech are being denied to us.