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Politically Correct Fanatics: Their denial of patterns and genetics among people Introduction You may be reading this because you " ve made one or some of the following politically correct statements: 1. "Not all of them are like that. " 2. "You can't generalize or stereotype, there is good and bad (or anything being contrasted) everywhere. " 3. "Stereotypes and generalizations are bad, harmful, and always wrong. " 4. "I know this person or that who doesn't fit your generalization. " 5. "People are the same everywhere you go. " or "Everyone is unique and individual, so it is wrong and inaccurate to make generalizations or stereotypes. " (a seeming contradiction) The "politically correct" mentality that denies any sort of patterns in people, and denies the whole science of genetics, seems prevalent among mainstream people today, especially in the US. Though odd and illogical, it has spread widely and in various degrees among the world's populations into popular thought today. For some reason, these people, in their idealistic cause to appease and unify the people of the world with political correctness, are willing to deny facts and reality to support their politically correct beliefs. And they do this to the point of making it not just a mentality, but almost a religion as well. They seem motivated by a belief or desire to ignore all differences in people, in order to unify all, get agreement from all, and offend none. Thus, in effect, when it comes to choosing between truth and political correctness, they choose the latter.
For terminology purposes, we will call these kinds of people "PC fanatics" (politically correct fanatics). These PC fanatics, however, are tedious to debate, because they bring up the same protests over and over again (e. g. the four statements above) and even when you point out why they " re wrong, getting them to admit it sometimes too, they still bring up the same points again later. It becomes tedious and repetitive.
Therefore, I've written this article to knock some sense into them, and to save me time from having to repeat the same arguments to them over and over again. I give no bull, and cut to the chase, telling it like it is. PC fanatics' denial of patterns among people First, there is a double standard here. PC fanatics are willing to acknowledge patterns that exist in things (non-living), aspects, or trends, but when it comes to identifying patterns in people, that becomes a grave sin to them. And any attempt at describing patterns in people is immediately labeled as "generalizing" or "stereotyping", and rebuked by one of the five PC statements above.
What these PC fanatics never understand, no matter how many times its pointed out to them, is that those who seemingly "generalize" or "stereotype" NEVER claim that what they are saying applies to "all" members of that group. In fact, they don't even use the term "all", but "most", "in general", or "tend to." Instead, they are merely IDENTIFYING PATTERNS that are observed and / or experienced. Therefore, attributing their claim to "all" is merely a false straw man argument; in other words, putting words into their mouth that they never said in order to knock it down easily. There's nothing wrong with identifying patterns. It's not immoral, wrong, or inaccurate. In fact, it's done by every scientific and business discipline.
Marketing and research specialists do it too, putting things and people into statistics and percentages. If patterns among people didn't exist, then they wouldn't do that. But they do, so there's obviously something to it that's useful. It's as simple as that.
For example, marketing specialists identify consumer buying habits, graphing them into statistics and percentages, in order to more effectively target their products and services into the market. Scientific research specialists identify patterns in order to observe cause and effect. And insurance companies evaluate risks and profit using patterns, statistics, and percentages as well. Now, since auto insurance companies conclude that young males are higher risk drivers than young females, they set car insurance premiums for young males higher. So does that mean that these insurance companies claim that "all" young males are high risk drivers, as PC fanatics would protest?
No, of course not. It's merely a statistic that they need to properly assess risk and cost, or else the business would go belly-up. If only PC fanatics would get that. Also, patterns exist in people across cultures and genders too. Here are just a few of the endless possible examples of patterns that one could observe: Asians tend to be shorter than Whites, there is a higher percentage of tall people in Holland than in Japan, more women wear make-up and high heeled shoes than men, there are far more women than men at psychic fairs, there are more male car mechanics than females, etc. etc.
Now, those are merely observable patterns that most would agree with. In addition to the above, there are an endless number of contrasts you could make between cultures, mentalities, lifestyles, behaviors, etc. among people of different nations and geographic regions. None of them claim that "all" members of a group or category fit these tendencies. Therefore, to make one of the five PC statements above in response, while even if true, is both USELESS and IRRELEVANT.
If one doesn't agree with the patterns identified, or if one has a different experience, then one can state it as well. But to use the 5 PC statements above does nothing but create a straw man. Let me give you a very simple example to illustrate what I mean. Here below you see two boxes, A and B. In box A, you see eight + plus symbols and two asterisks, while in Box B, you see seven asterisks and three + plus symbols.
BoBo Now, suppose I said that "Box A tends to have pluses in them and Box B tends to have asterisks" or "Most symbols in Box A are pluses, and most in Box B are asterisks. " And suppose the PC fanatics respond by citing some of the common PC arguments, "You can't generalize like that. There are pluses are asterisks in both boxes. " or "Not all symbols in Box A are pluses. Not all symbols in Box B are asterisks. " What would that accomplish? Those typical PC statements, though true, do NOTHING to refute the statements I made, identifying patterns I observed in those two boxes. Yet they are presented as a denial or challenge.
Again, they are both USELESS and IRRELEVANT. Instead, all they do is create a false straw man, insinuating that the pattern observer claimed that 100 percent all symbols were one or the other, when in fact, he / she did no such thing! Do you see how trifling silly this odd twist on basic facts is? Yet, it's EXACTLY what so many PC fanatics do! I've seen and heard it so many times, that I could say, "If I had a dime for everytime I heard that, I'd be rich. " Now since PC statements # 1 - 3 outlined in the introduction have already been dealt with, let's address # 4 and 5. 4. "I know this person or that who doesn't fit your generalization. " 5. "People are the same everywhere you go. " or "Everyone is unique and individual, so it is wrong and inaccurate to make generalizations or stereotypes. " (a seeming contradiction) Again, these are silly straw mans that do not refute the pattern being observed and claimed.
In regard to # 4, sure everyone knows or can find exceptions to the patterns being identified, and in most cases even the claimant can. However, a few exceptions do NOT refute or falsify a general pattern. For example, you can find a few people in India who are rich, but that doesn't change the fact that most there are poor. You can also find poor people in Malibu, CA, but that doesn't change the fact that most who live there are of upper class income and affluent. Similarly, you can find white people in China, but that doesn't change the fact that most people there are Chinese.
These are all very simple and elementary things, but PC f...
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