Derbyshire on Strong vs. Weak PC
07/14/2007
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John Derbyshire has a good piece in the American Conservative about political correctness.[Better Dead Than Rude, July 2, 2007 ] Weak PC is multicultural manners, saying e.g. African-American if that's the polite expression. Strong PC is generally a denial of reality, about IQ or crime rates or something.

One example:

Law enforcement. The fact, borne out by every statistical inquiry under the sun, that some racial groups are more inclined to criminality than others, is of course anathema to those who have internalized PC precepts. Any program of law enforcement that delivers disproportionate numbers of black or Hispanic perpetrators to the courts and prisons is ipso facto considered to be ”racist.” Such programs are strongly discouraged.

In my own county of Suffolk (New York), the police launched a campaign against unlicensed drivers. Within three weeks they arrested 50 such, with Hispanics heavily over-represented. The police commissioner, on orders from the district attorney and a local judge, thereupon suspended the program on suspicion of ”racial profiling.” A revised version of the program has since been permitted, but presumably, while the program was in suspense, some county residents–myself, perhaps–might have been killed or maimed in crashes with unlicensed drivers, another instance of the ”better dead than rude” mentality that has long ruled our airport-security screening procedures.

Read the whole thing.

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