So Gary Oldman had an interview where he went off on a tangent about how this country is far too touchy lately, and how no one is really allowed to express themselves freely. I generally agree with his sentiment, and urge people to also read George Carlin's When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops which is mostly an outline of the ridiculousness of people, and essentially mob mentality bullying through this guise of political correctness.
Political correctness is ok in small doses. It mainly serves as a barrier from the public and hate filled diatribes. Much in the same way you shouldn't yell fire in a movie theater, you also really shouldn't directly attack a certain group of people based on race or gender on TV. But lately it seems that nearly everything said, even ever so slightly is a broad based attack and the person that made those comments should be completely and utterly destroyed over it.
A rebuttal was made to Oldman and, while I agree with some of the things said in it, I'd like to point out how very wrong it is:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-peron/gary-oldman-doesnt-get-fr_b_5532638.html
What the author here is basically saying, is no free speech is not dead, but you will reap what you sow. This is a fair assessment, but not a fair assessment of certain instances. Much in the same way Bill Maher is allowed to say call his audience Lesbians and get away with it, Stephen Colbert is bullied by the internet for making a harmless joke about Asians. The author is attempting to show that circumstance is what leads to the "reaping" for these people that make these off the cuff comments. And yet, it's entirely inconsistent. Someone like Colbert can be utterly eviscerated online for a harmless joke, whereas Maher is ignored for his harmless joke?
This is where I feel this author and I part ways. I am in agreement with him in regards to bad things said shouldn't go unpunished, but I feel there needs to be consistency in this whereas he doesn't feel it matters if the mob rises over one thing and not another. It's their choice to bully them and that bullying is perfectly ok. There's also a degree of bullying at which I feel is entirely unjustified.
In Colbert's case, sure his joke may have indeed offended some people. But the level to which the hatred rose seems far too high than what it deserved. This is the mob mentality effect coming into play that the author is ignoring. And I pose the question, which is more harmful? Colbert's simple joke, or hundreds of thousands of hateful comments from anonymous "victims" some that include calling for his death and other unsavory things.
And let's ask some HONEST questions, something that I feel is entirely ignored by these internet victims that turn to bullies. Was Colbert's joke an attack against Asians? Clearly, no it wasn't, it was a joke. Was Alec Baldwin slighting all gay people by using the word fag against someone that was upsetting him? Was it really? The answer, I feel, is no. Sure the word is used as a slight, to demean, and it's representative of that group, but our vernacular has taken the word "fag" to simply mean someone you dislike, and that was the context with which he was using the word. If you lived in England your concept of the word fag is also different, it means ciggarrette. And our use of words evolve over time too. No one says they are having a "gay old time" anymore, and in that time period it wasn't used to describe a circle jerk or some other gay activity ;) We live in a time where the word "fag" can mean TWO things, and Alec didn't mean them both at the same time. Who does, unless you're trying to be needlessly clever utilizing wordplay. So we have to ask ourselves the HONEST question of was he using the word to slight gay people, or to use the word in the same way we could also say, that "jerk" or that "moron."
This is where political correctness goes too far, and will tear down a human being like Stephen, or Alec, by taking their commentary out of context or reinserting their own context. More obvious instances would be ones like Mel Gibson who the author and I are in agreement, clearly was attacking the Jews unprovoked and really got what he deserved. Donald Sterling would be another example of this. If you were to ask yourself honest questions with their instances, rather than take a knee jerk emotional reaction to buzzwords, then the answers are much more clear and the flack given is deserved.
But even still, it goes too far. These people that make these lousy statements deserve second chances too though. Instead they are thrown out entirely without another word and bullied endlessly. They can't defend themselves or explain it either. It could be they were just having a really bad day, or drunk. And we've all done stupid things like that, every human alive has, and that's Oldman's main point. The punishments aren't befitting of the crime. They are far too extreme.
I feel that a lot of this started with the Michael Richards incident. Now I grant you, public figures who say bad things have gotten their just desserts too in the past and probably didn't start with Richards. But what DID start with him is the internet flaming that is now the expected reaction. The bullying. The vitriol. The outcasting online. One really bad incident and suddenly Richards is less than human. It wasn't until a year later where he was even allowed to discuss what happened and explain himself, and by then no one listened. What actually happened that night was he was doing his bit, got heckled, got upset, and tried to heckle them back using broad based black generalizations, but sadly lacked the material and light touch it needs (like say Family Guy or South Park) and he came off as hating them. And yeah, it was really bad. It's what's stand up comedians call dying on stage, but Richards just kept nosediving and put himself in a far worse position. He has apologized endlessly for it, but his career is still in the shitter anyway. All for one bad performance and internet bullying. The HONEST question that should be asked here is, is Richards actually a racist? Was his goal to victimize an entire group of people, or combat hecklers? If you answer these questions, and then read the hundreds of thousands of comments wanting Richards to be killed, then please answer me this....who are the real victims of political correctness here?
Hilariously, this entire piece I've written here will be misconstrued as protecting racists or people that spew hate or giving excuses. That's not at all what this is. This is a plea for common sense. This is a plea against needless victimizing of people on knee jerk reactions. I want the people of the internet to think and discuss rather than cry foul immediately for every possible little thing. The internet called racism over the new Far Cry 4 game box because a "white" guy (who is actually Asian) had another guy held captive of a different race. Clearly the game is about racism and how great it is! Look how successful he is! I want to be just like him! That's the message it's sending...apparently...to people with a screw loose. This is political correctness at it's finest folks, this is what we're dealing with, and this is what I can't stand. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to play a game where I kill thousands of Iranians. Which game is that? Who fucking cares there's hundreds of them, and no one calls those games Iranian people genocide simulators.
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