Political Correctness Gone Mad! You couldn't make it up!

Are two phrases on the banned list for contributors to this blog. For the simple reason that the former is shorthand for poorly thought-out opinion, which is being reinforced by a perception of oppression. The latter because you can make it up, and if the story is coming from a newspaper report, someone probably has.

So I have some sympathy for Don Paskini's contribution to Liberal Conspiracy today. He is right, one can talk about immigration or the family without suffering punishment for doing so. And he's right that anyone committing the two weasel phrases (PCGM and YCMIU) to the page can almost immediately be described as an idiot, and any subsequent opinion ignored. Debate is no longer stifled.

The problem with Paskini's charge is that the the coalition of left-wing opinion formers which form the idealogical core of the New Labour project have attempted to do just that for most of the last decade: the 2001 and 2005 elections for example were fought with the Conservatives saying that "there are too many immigrants" and the Labour party saying "look at the nasty racists". Likewise anyone suggesting that the Nuclear family containing a man, woman and a brace of sprogs is 'an ideal' will be described as homophobic, or not reflective of 'modern' Britain. Out of touch. And if the speaker has dipped his wick in anything other than his wife, there will be the inevitable charge of Hypocrisy.

What has happened is opinions which were off limits - immigration sucks for those of us already here; or marriage should be supported by the tax and benefits system - are now no longer off limits. Indeed as Don Paskini points out

For example, I have read or seen these opinions argued for, and claims made about how they have been suppressed, in the Sun, the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, the Daily Telegraph, the Times, the Evening Standard, by religious leaders of all the major faiths, by the Conservative Party, the UK Independence Party, the British National Party, in bookshops, in reports produced by think tanks, on the telly, on the radio, and, of course, on the internet (this is not an exhaustive list).

I therefore conclude that us lefties are obviously doing a pretty hopeless job of using political correctness to stifle freedom of speech...

The fact is that the left, on these issues anyway, lost. The people don't like immigration. They're wrong not to, It's the welfare state they should hate instead. Most people still exist in, or aspire to exist in a nuclear family. Personally, I think a nuclear gay family is certain to be better than what is laughably called 'care', and homosexuals should therefore be allowed (encouraged?) to adopt children. People should be free to marry, and it is none of the state's damn business whom. But a plurality of people disagree, and despite new labour's best efforts, we do still live in a democracy.

So we can rightly dismiss claims of a suppression of free speech, but we mustn't get upset when the left disagrees. Commenter Neil:

Basically, they’re allowed to call a spade a spade. But we’re not allowed to call an idiot an idiot.

We must instead seek to persuade. Commenter cjcjc:

In other words there hasn’t really been much of a “debate” - rather both the proponents and opponents of immigration have been talking pretty much to themselves, but not to each other.

And they are absolutely right. Which is why I rarely comment on blogs I agree with, and instead make a nuisance of myself over at Bob Piper, Stumbling and Mumbling or Lib Con. So if someone thinks my opinions are as vile as I think a lefty's are, I should not get upset when they point out their disagreement in robust Anglo-Saxon. It is after all what I do all the time.

If I can make one complaint though, it is left-wing bloggers lumping libertarians who really, really care about freedom in general and freedom of speech in particular, with authoritarian petty bourgeois ignoramuses who read the Daily Hate, who all get put in an amorphous lump as 'the right'*. Mail readers, it should be noted are the constituency which delivered three general election victories to the Corporatist totalitarians of New Labour. I hate the daily Mail more than the pinkest of Guardianistas. Being lumped with those bastards fucking pisses me right of, and anyone who makes that mistake, is a cunt.

*I'm certain I am guilty of the same crime with "the left" . Sorry, but at least I have tried to define what I mean.