What is Political Correctness?

I was reading the Daily Journal and Clarion Ledger today, and saw Charlie Mitchell's op-ed on PC.

Now, I think Charlie is one of those well-meaning guys who just doesn't see things for what they are.  I was intrigued by his assertion that PC is little more than politeness, which it probably was back in the 1970s when you could get away with saying the N-word on TV.  Can you imagine such a thing today?  I can't think of a time when the word has been uttered on TV outside of hip hop since an episode of Law & Order (Original Flavor) in the early 1990s, uttered by Courtney B Vance, until the American Crime Story OJ series. (Also featuring Mr. Vance.  Admittedly, it would have been impossible to not use the word in that series, with much of the defense being based around the use or non-use of the word.)

But today?  It would seem that Mr. Mitchell, who is a professor of journalism at Ole Miss, has missed out on the Social Justice Warrior.  Maybe it just hasn't hit Ole Miss yet.  But it's hit Missouri, with the school president forced to resign.  It's on many of the Ivies and Potted-Ivy schools.  They rail against privilege, most of which exists in their heads.  They mostly suffer from Selma envy, wishing they could measure up to their grandparents.  (I don't suffer from this problem.  I figured out long ago I'd never measure up to them.)

What's going on at the American college is similar-eerily so-to China's Cultural Revolution.  Started in 1966, it sought to replace what Mao thought of as the ills of society.  He described them as the Four Olds.  These were the Old Culture, Old Customs, Old Thoughts, and Old Habits.  His followers forced people to self-criticize themselves, admitting to "crimes," and destroyed anything they considered emblematic of it, such as priceless artifacts, manuscripts, and other treasures.

If this sounds familiar, it's EXACTLY the SJW playbook.

So when people are Anti-PC, this is what they are.  It has nothing to do with manners, which is what Mr. Mitchell seems to think it is.  It's not about not acknowledging the past.  It's all about combating the Thought Police, before we're all in front of a committee apologizing for something that happened before we were born, or when we were small children.  It means not allowing people to be destroyed because they don't want to associate themselves with something they feel violates their conscience.  Bryan Adams, after all, was allowed to not do business with Mississippi because of his conscience.  Many of us just wish we were given the same allowance as Mr. Adams.

My thoughts are incomplete on this, and it's late at night.  I may later add to this.  But it's miles to ride before I sleep.

(That's an old poem, written before I was born.  I hope it's ok to use it.)