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Tone Policing Only Goes One Way
The thing about tone policing that is so galling to liberals particularly is it only goes one way. Even while the tone police cluck their tongues and accuse “both sides” of lowering the level of discourse, the only examples they ever give a crap about are the ones—often straw examples, of course–coming from the left. We saw this in Ron Lindsay’s speech at CFI, where he devoted time to the apparently world-shaking phenonemon of college-age anonymous blog commenters abusing the concept of privilege in arguments with trolls, but gave nary a nod to denouncing the bad faith arguments, stalking, and harassment that characterize the anti-feminists in the “debate”. (I use the scare quotes, because as demonstrated in the comment section, feminist detractors whine endlessly about being “silenced”, but refuse to actually produce the killer anti-feminist arguments they claim to have that they devote years and years to defending from imaginary oppressors without ever articulating them.)
I call it the Grandpa’s Making Racist Jokes Againg problem. Nine times out of 10, if someone is saying something horribly offensive, and someone else calls them out for it, everyone will turn on the person calling them out for it. You see this every time people get more up in arms because someone used the term “racist” or “sexist”, but not so much over the racist or sexist shit that caused the word to be articulated.
You see this problem with the Facebook wars over content, where breastfeeding pictures, artistic shots, and breast cancer stuff are routinely removed, but " target="_blank">this was allowed to stay up.
This was the least horrible example, by the way, but the rest are too disgusting to put up here.
Basically, I think the problem is everyone knows that progressives are the good guys and reactionaries are the bad guys, and so the onus to take the high road is always and forever on progressives. The problem, of course, is the “high road” is a constantly shifting target. If you refrain from overt jokes about conservatives, the next thing you’re told is too far is sarcasm. If you cave into the intense pressure to stop using terms like “racist” and “sexist” accurately, as we’ve witnessed, even talking about the concept of privilege is considered a bridge too far. You begin to realize that speaking at all from the position of moral authority as a progressive is what is offensive, because you make people feel bad for, well, being bad people.
Indeed, the entire term “political correctness” relies on this unarticulated understanding that the only person who can ever be rude rendering judgment of the opinions of the other side is progressives. Conservatives bitch about liberals constantly, usually in much nastier fashions, but are pretty much never accused of trying to enforce their political correctness on liberals. Refraining from having an opinion about the other side’s opinions is strictly a moral obligation of the left in mainstream discourse.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/05/22/tone-policing-only-goes-one-way/
I call it the Grandpa’s Making Racist Jokes Againg problem. Nine times out of 10, if someone is saying something horribly offensive, and someone else calls them out for it, everyone will turn on the person calling them out for it. You see this every time people get more up in arms because someone used the term “racist” or “sexist”, but not so much over the racist or sexist shit that caused the word to be articulated.
You see this problem with the Facebook wars over content, where breastfeeding pictures, artistic shots, and breast cancer stuff are routinely removed, but " target="_blank">this was allowed to stay up.
This was the least horrible example, by the way, but the rest are too disgusting to put up here.
Basically, I think the problem is everyone knows that progressives are the good guys and reactionaries are the bad guys, and so the onus to take the high road is always and forever on progressives. The problem, of course, is the “high road” is a constantly shifting target. If you refrain from overt jokes about conservatives, the next thing you’re told is too far is sarcasm. If you cave into the intense pressure to stop using terms like “racist” and “sexist” accurately, as we’ve witnessed, even talking about the concept of privilege is considered a bridge too far. You begin to realize that speaking at all from the position of moral authority as a progressive is what is offensive, because you make people feel bad for, well, being bad people.
Indeed, the entire term “political correctness” relies on this unarticulated understanding that the only person who can ever be rude rendering judgment of the opinions of the other side is progressives. Conservatives bitch about liberals constantly, usually in much nastier fashions, but are pretty much never accused of trying to enforce their political correctness on liberals. Refraining from having an opinion about the other side’s opinions is strictly a moral obligation of the left in mainstream discourse.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/05/22/tone-policing-only-goes-one-way/