Another cherished position of the "Anti-Political Correctness" brigade is the notion that governments are trying to force ridiculous language onto us.

Now maybe there was a civil servant somewhere who once referred to the blind as "visually challenged" - or whatever the original term was. But you won't find any such language in regular use in our government documents. Here, we refer to various degrees of visual impairment, which seems reasonable enough.
Yet the jokes run and run - "vertically challenged" for short "follically challenged" for bald "pigmentally challenged" for racially different, etc etc. - and funny jokes they often are too. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/biggrin.gif" alt="" />

An edict recently passed through the hallowed halls of our Mental Health department to the effect that "Psycho-Geriatric Services" shall now be known as "Older People's Services" - which sounds suspiciously PC. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> But, really, when you're an old fogey starting to go a bit nutty, how reassuring is it to be labelled "Psycho" and "Geriatric" - true though it may be. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/disagree.gif" alt="" />

In the area that I work in - Disability - we seem to change terms every decade or two, the most recent being from 'handicapped' to 'disabled'. Frankly, the changes don't always seem necessary, but the ideas behind the changes seem well meant - usually to drop terms that have become over-used in a negative way. I actually prefer 'handicapped' as to me it suggests someone who is required to carry extra weight, or start behind the rest of the field, but who can still win the race. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> As an Engineer, "disabled" sound to me like something that has been permanently prevented from working. So I still tend to use both terms.

Sure, "Political Correctness" can be overdone at times, but generally (at least here in Australia) it seems relatively benign, and there's more myth than reality in most cases.

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no one else seemed interested in this topic though ...


Perhaps we're all getting a bit tired of arguing... next time let's try something like SEX and see if that arouses any interest. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/biggrin.gif" alt="" />