IS THE WORLD IS FULL OF POLITICALLY CORRECT NUMPTY'S?

[Jim M]

Sorry - but I can't help myself....

Before I start - what exactly is a NUMPTY?

from the Urban dictionary:
Scottish usage:
a) Someone who (sometimes unwittingly) by speech or action demonstrates a lack of knowledge or misconception of a particular subject or situation to the amusement of others.
b) A good humoured admonition, a term of endearment
c) A reckless, absent minded or unwise person
a) "No. That wisnae wit she meant, ya big numpty!"
b) i.e. "Silly billy", "You big dafty"
c) "That numpty's driving with no lights on!"

This is something I was thinking about this morning when I heard on the news about the rumpus over the recent revelations on comments made by a member of the royal family. Then I log into this forum and someone is taking about 'newbies' being offended - so I had to say it - the world is full of politically correct numpty's - and right or wrong I believe many people think exactly the same but just won't come out and say so.

People are so scared of offending anyone these days it just doesn't make sense anymore - words are just words - whilst I agree it's wrong to be offensive towards anyone - some people really need to lighten up and get on with more important things that matter in life.

If I had taken offense at some of the things I've been called over the years I'd probably be peering out from a darkened room somewhere too scared to venture out into the world....

There was even something in the papers this week that some believe name calling in the playground is a good thing for kids....na na na na na....

At every level of society people have labels, be it due to their country of birth, the job they do or just how they behave, their mannerisms etc. and somewhere along the way someone will dream up a slang term - mostly they're just harmless terminologies - some I admit can be offensive - but I do think too many have taken PC too far for too long!

oops -- its time to take the Sunday lunch out of the oven.......

[madison_avenue]

Numpty, a term reintroduced and popularised by Alan Brazil.

[kentaiwan98]

I think I first heard Billy Connolly using it.... It's not common in parts of Scotland where I'm from... a or at least it wasn't...

Kenneth

[Bev Clement]

Trademark of Kim Standerline

[Kim Standerline]

Numpty

One of my fave words

And yes I agree about the rumpus over the Royal thing

Comments made 3 years ago, pathetic.

[KirkMcD]

What does this have to do with marketing?

[Jim M]

Originally Posted by KirkMcD

What does this have to do with marketing?

I believe this has everything to do with marketing.....

The point is that the world we live in is full of people who are too scared of offending someone - anyone, that they're not prepared to say what needs to be said.

When we market ourselves and our products we need to take a stand.

In a sales letter do we spell out the truths good or bad?

Do we play on peoples fears and weaknesses to press them into buying?

Or do we nambie pambie around the subject in case we hurt someones feelings?

Going back to your question - yes - this has a lot to do with marketing as well as surviving in the world as we know it.

[BIG Mike]

I posted something similar to this in the old WF and will repeat it here, as it cracked me up when it happened to me.

I was writing something in MS Word (from Office 2007) and typed in the phrase "Man-Hours". I noticed it had the green squigly line under it and thought maybe I had spelled it wrong. So, right-click over the phrases and...

Person-Hours

MS Word is now making making us all to be more PC than ever, LOL.

Throughout my career I've always used Man-Hours, Man-Days, Man-Months, etc., to demonstrate time requirements on projects. No offense to the ladies, but it's the way I was taught and I've never seen it written differently. And I won't use person-hours, because the Man-Hour phrase has specific meaning to me.

I think you reach a point where, as long as your communication is courteous and respectful to those whom you're communicating with, PC should not be a part of it. And there's a little word I like to use called Tolerance as well, that's important in establishing relationships across political, cultural and religious borders.

In other words, be yourself and forget PC...it's one of several reasons why I gave up the corporate life to begin with.

[Ian Jackson]

Hehe, I replied to another similar thread about this ( it was about Bewbies being offended). PC is one of the biggest loads of sh** that ever hit the human, or should that be "huperson" race. Maybe I shouldn't even say "race"

Can we still say mankind?

PC brigade - sorry but I have no time for any of them (polite version)

[TLTheLiberator]

I think it was Dan Kennedy that said 90% of the population is wrong about everything 90% of the time.

I'd rather we be too politically correct than not enough.

TL

[Kim Standerline]

I don't because it goes from the sublime to the riduculous

Take the OP's reference to the Royal Family for instance. Prince Harry made an offensive racial comment. Personally I would never use a phrase or term as he did, and I believe he was an idiot to say it, especially considering his position. However it was said 3 years ago when he was even more of a numpty than he is now, and many many people are now jumping on the bandwagon over it.

Many of my Asian friends refer to themselves in this way, what makes it right that they can say it, but not a non asian person. (This a rhetorical question BTW)

I find the word n-gg-er highly offensive, (I can't even bring myself to spell it out), yet my son in law who is of Ghanian descent refers to himself and my grandson etc in these terms often. How different it would be if I was the one to call him it though I guess I'd be a racist huh

Strange world we live in.

Kim

Originally Posted by TLTheLiberator

I'd rather we be too politically correct than not enough.

TL

[peterj]

Can't stand political correctness, it is an insiduous form of social control and censorship that has been gaining ground for far to long.

Someone, anyone decides what words we can and cannot use because it may or may not offend one group or another. How silly is that. Given enough time no one will be speaking to anyone else.

Just recently there was a story in the papers over here in the UK which goes-

"THE head of a new school has banned the word “school” — in case it upsets pupils’ parents.
Watercliffe Meadow is known as a “Place for Learning” because staff say “school” has a negative impact on some mums and dads."

And there have been countless instances of this sort of thing over here.

Ridiculous!

Pete

[JohnMcCabe]

I once had a feminist (her term) call me out because all of my writing at the time used predominantly male pronouns. She insisted that I go back and use completely gender-neutral terms (like 'person-hours') or the she/he, her/him structure. She further insisted that, if there was a status difference between two people, I refer to the superior using female pronouns.

I told her that a) I wasn't going back and revising everything, b) I refused to suck the life out of my writing to honor her sensibilities, and c) to take a flying leap.

Since then, I've added a small disclaimer to some of my stuff...

"You'll notice that I tend to write using mostly male pronouns. Since I was saddled with a Y chromosome at conception, that's how I see the world. I hate the cumbersome he/she type construction, and I'm not going to waste my time making sure I alternate my pronouns to meet someone else's arbitrary standards. If you don't like it, quit reading now and have a nice life..."

[Side note: the woman who called me out later became a laughingstock relegated to the outer fringes of Numpty-dom when she insisted that marriage was a form of female enslavement (she's obviously never been married) and that all heterosexual sex was rape.]

[SteveJohnson]

Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe

[Side note: the woman who called me out later became a laughingstock relegated to the outer fringes of Numpty-dom when she insisted that marriage was a form of female enslavement (she's obviously never been married) and that all heterosexual sex was rape.]

That's funny - I've always thought that marriage was a form of male enslavement. Voluntary, to be sure, but ...

P.S. Yes, I can say that, given that 18 months from now will mark my 30th anniversary. Assuming I survive that long. I've been informed that I've become quite lippy lately.

[HeySal]

Hmmm. Jim - as you can see under my Warrior name - not everyone has gone to political correctness. But as a person degreed in Ethnolinguistics, I have a few thoughts on the matter.

People label others because 1. we think in words 2. our cognitive system stores words (i.e. ideas) catagorically. Labels are natural and there is not one damned thing anyone can do about that. If you say you don't label anyone - you are 1. lying through your teeth 2. Incapable of human thought

Language is also fluent and evolves with ethnological groupings as their society evolves. It reflects the climate of the society.

Governments are basically inept forms of control by people who think because they are at the head of things that they are smarter than everyone else. They are also power hungry idiots who will do anything they think will enhance their control over the masses.

The idea behind PC is that if people don't say something they won't think it. They think if they wipe out certain forms from our diction that our attitudes will change accordingly. This is and isn't true to some extent.

The generic "he" in itself is a discriminatory term. So is woman, she, and any other way of indicating the female(another one here) using morphemes attached to the morpheme indicating male - this construction indicates the idea that women are not half of a species - but a subclass of the species.
Politicians seem to think that neutralizing the generic "he" people will quit thinking male first and women second - however, until words for women are developed that are not subclassed from male morphemes, this is a lost cause in the days of mass printing and more standardized linguistic practice.

How about the words nigger, spick, wetback, chink, gook, honky? These are used in America but there are equivalents across the globe in all languages. I use English examples only because this is the language I am most familiar with.

Politicians, in their profound self-exposited wisdom, have the idea that if they change offensive words and make others taboo that they will change the feelings of the people. This is sheer stupidity. If people are not changing their idea of a group, they will assign the derogatory connotations to the new words that they are told to use. So if someone hates a race - it doesn't matter what they are told to call them - that word that they are told to use will eventually develop the same negative aspect as the word that was struck from the language. Only if the feelings about a certain group change will new words drop the negative connotation. If the feelings change first, negatively connotative words will either drop from the vocabulary voluntarily or they will just change toward a neutral connotation.

In other words -- all that forced word construction will do when "labeling" is to induce censorship and if a society allows this type of censorship to take place the government will soon be telling you what it is legal to think as well as what it is legal to say. It's a dangerous precedence.

As far as the tagged morphemes for female and male in english - none of the new constructions really are going to do any good as long as we are still she, female, etc. The only generic construction we have is ownership - his/her and personal him/her. The stigma of sex is going to take hell of a long time to get over so I don't see the language evolving naturally for a long time. Politicians, though, are there to "help" in any way possible.
As far as tags for groups such as "nigger" and "chink" - as long as we can SEE differences in people, there will be new tags - whether they are derogatory or not will be determined by our feelings about the group, not by politicians.

BTW - for those still worried about word censorship - you might want to worry about the fact that it has already evolved into thought censorship - books are being banned in schools and libraries that until the last 8 years were considered classics. Lord of the Flies, 1984, and Animal Farm are no longer allowed in schools.

[Jim M]

Originally posted by HeySal

Hmmm. Jim - as you can see under my Warrior name - not everyone has gone to political correctness. But as a person degreed in Ethnolinguistics, I have a few thoughts on the matter.

People label others because 1. we think in words 2. our cognitive system stores words (i.e. ideas) catagorically. Labels are natural and there is not one damned thing anyone can do about that. If you say you don't label anyone - you are 1. lying through your teeth 2. Incapable of human thought

Phew - I thought I'd been deleted for being politically incorrect - but no - I've just been moved to a more appropriate section - I'll remember that in future

I would just like to say thanks to all contributors to this post, but particular thanks goes to HeySal for such an informative insight into the topic

I'm very glad to see that there are a few sensible people left in the world - we'll have to make sure we're all together when the world 'stops working' - we can even make up our own names for the politicians, world and business leaders who messed up.

[raydp]

I'm fascinated by the idea that parents will take their kids on a "place of learning run" in the mornings!

Ray

[Jim M]

Originally posted by Raydp

I'm fascinated by the idea that parents will take their kids on a "place of learning run" in the mornings!

I have to agree - what will the heads of kids who come out of such an establishment be full of? - I can't imagine....

[KimW]

Originally Posted by peterj

Can't stand political correctness, it is an insiduous form of social control and censorship that has been gaining ground for far to long.

Someone, anyone decides what words we can and cannot use because it may or may not offend one group or another. How silly is that. Given enough time no one will be speaking to anyone else.

Just recently there was a story in the papers over here in the UK which goes-

"THE head of a new school has banned the word “school” — in case it upsets pupils’ parents.
Watercliffe Meadow is known as a “Place for Learning” because staff say “school” has a negative impact on some mums and dads."

And there have been countless instances of this sort of thing over here.

Ridiculous!

Pete

And I thought it was just the US that was getting so f*cked up.
Sad state of affairs.

[HeySal]

we can even make up our own names for the politicians, world and business leaders who messed up.

Oh we already have. Unfortunately, politics is not as clear as race and you can't just "see" that someone is a politician. So we use more generically encompassing terms for them -- "psychotic" "sociopath" "fascist" "f***ing ____ fill in the blank yourself". The important thing to see is that most adjectives describing these self-proclaimed rulers are very negative and there is not one damned thing they can do about euphemising this state of affairs other than to completely take our freedom of speech from us.

[peterj]

Originally Posted by raydp

I'm fascinated by the idea that parents will take their kids on a "place of learning run" in the mornings!

Ray

Originally Posted by KimW

And I thought it was just the US that was getting so f*cked up.
Sad state of affairs.

Sadly not, I think the whole of western europe is infected. If this keeps up I will be heading south, or in which ever direction the nearest wild country lies!

Pete

[HeySal]

Originally Posted by raydp

I'm fascinated by the idea that parents will take their kids on a "place of learning run" in the mornings!

Ray

Yeah but if they don't fool us then they have to spend all that time and money fixing the reason the word "school" has taken on a negative conotation in the first place - there goes the tax index.

[Jim M]

Being largely restricted to the political correctness dished up on a daily basis in the UK, it's comforting to see that it's something which is happening in all corners of the world - lets face it - it would be sooo politically incorrect to leave anyone out

[Jim M]

Here's a cracker of a spin on political correctness taken from a french blog at:
SublimaCtion : Policitally Correct Wishes
Policitally Correct Wishes

Published 26 December 08 10:41 AM |
Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular traditions at all... and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset accepted calendar year 2009, but without due respect for the calendars of choice of others, and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, or sexual orientation of the wished.
By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms:
This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for him/herself or others and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a per of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or the issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.
Please consult with your attorney before responding.


should bring a smile to a few faces

[jbpico]

I was thinking about how PC everything is after seeing all the complaining about the Royal Family & that video of the son in the military. I thought most of it was good for a few laughs...especially the bit about ginger pubes heheh

[Jim M]

Originally Posted by jbpico

I was thinking about how PC everything is after seeing all the complaining about the Royal Family & that video of the son in the military. I thought most of it was good for a few laughs...

Not sure I heard that anywhere- or if your post is 'politically correct'

[Kay King]

I think the increase in P.C. is a direct result of the current tendency to focus on personal needs (what's in it for me - what do I want - what do I deserve - what am I owed) - along with a parallel tendency to label others according to whether they meet our personal "standard".

I read something in the paper today that makes sense:

Leo Rosten wrote that the purpose of life is to matter, to be productive, to have it make a difference that you lived at all.

To do that requires more than a focus on the details of "who I am, what I need, what I look like, what I own" - and the concept makes many of the P.C. police look petty and small, at least to me.

kay