Most agree that the state of public discourse is deplorable. Social media has allowed a democracy of opinion, which in concept isn’t a bad thing. But the sounds of meaningless drivel from “regular” people as well as intellectuals have created a no-man's land of intellectual dialogue. It's chaos and the only hope is that, on some grand mythological and cosmological level, out of chaos there will arrive order.
Many of us lament the impossibility of having an actual discussion about ideas. The ground for that hasn't been fertile for some time, and all we’re left with is a lot of cross talk. The whole scene resembles some bar that's playing loud music, and no one’s able to hear each other and they're all drunk and shouting and slurring the words and nobody knows what the other one is really saying. Eventually and inevitably, a fight erupts.
There’s a reason for all this chaos. The introduction and the usage of ideological tool political correctness have effectively destroyed any normal communication. People are offended at everything that’s said and express fake moral outrage. The ideologues, who dominate the media, have suspended the notion of judgment. If one makes a judgment of any kind, which doesn't align with the currently dominant ideology (the globalist left), then very quickly one’s labeled with a negative signifier. Today, racism is the most popular charge. Bigot, homophobe, Islamophobe, and xenophobe are used a little less.
We make judgments every day. They may be aesthetic or ethical, or even simple discernments of what to have for lunch. We make judgments when we see a person on the street. We evaluate if someone is nice or nasty, attractive or ugly, fat or thin, short or tall. We even make judgments about ourselves. The point is that not a day passes when we don't make some kind of judgment or discernment. If we didn't, we wouldn’t be making any decisions and choices. We’d be in a constant state of suspension, minds of infinite fluidity that know nothing about the concrete world.
If we take these notions that I've laid out, into the public discourse, we can see how impossible it’s been to have a dialogue about a particular idea. If one asks a genuine question, especially one that deals with differences among cultures and societies, and concludes that society A is better than society B, they should be prepared to be tarred and feathered digital style. If they are to regain the entry into the public sphere, then they should, of course, issue a public apology for nothing more than having the right to free speech. Or did they ever have that right?
The imperative to be sensitive, to not offend, and to not say one thing or a person is better than the other is based on the twisted notion that there’s no such thing as incompatibility. The PC globalists are obsessed with everyone getting along and the fact that one group may not like another group of people, or quite simply that one person may not like another.
This is a false empathy. It has nothing to do with being protective or wanting to be inclusive. This is an attempt at annihilating greatness in individuals based entirely on a naïve view of humanity, denying natural differences as well as the artificial ones people create. If you’re a thinking person, you’ll be left confused. Perhaps the only thing to do is ape the words of Principal Skinner of The Simpsons: “All I know is that no one is better than anyone else, and everyone is the best at everything.”
These are difficult and strange times in America. Liberty, the very foundation of America, has become an elusive concept that’s rarely seen in practice. The euphemistic call of the past totalitarians used to be “for the security of the State.” Now, it’s “for the well being of the Global Society.” There’s no need to write dystopian novels anymore. In one way or another, we are living in an Orwell-Huxley-PKD hybrid. Except it feels like The Twilight Zone.
If people aren’t allowed to say what they’d like, given the oppressiveness of political correctness, they’ll become resentful and angry. If we’re told that making value judgments is wrong and unacceptable, then we’ll cease to make any distinctions, including what’s good and evil. We’ll stop being individuals and the society will be based on collectivism. Perhaps the shadow of that shape is already looming over us. We just haven't been paying attention.