Demolition Man

Source: Wikimedia Foundation. I claim Fair Use for the academic comparison of themes from the movie to contemporary American society. Posting here is not intended to generate any revenue for the author.

Are we living in the world of the 1993 science fiction movie Demolition Man? It is a world of tyrannical kindness, political correctness run amok, where even mildly offensive language can result in an automated citation from ubiquitous surveillance devices. The world of Demolition Man is one of peace achieved at the cost of personal freedom. Freedom of choice, speech, and conscience are severely curtailed in that vision of future Los Angeles.

We are not quite in the world of Demolition Man yet, but our society seems headed into a condition where even the slightest hint of impoliteness or offense is considered a crime. Offending people is considered the same as an act of violence. This stifles freedom.

I'm with the late George Carlin on the topic of political correctness. It seems to be politeness and consideration for others on the surface. But really it's pernicious, because it is intolerance pretending to be tolerance. The politically correct people want tolerance of identity: race, gender, sexual orientation, tangible characteristics that can be used to categorize people, but do not tolerate diversity of ideas or thought. They believe virtue comes from who you are rather than what you believe or your personal conduct. This extends even to the point of curtailing freedom of choice and freedom of conscience.

The politically correct have a set of ideas they consider orthodox, which are fundamentally tied to identity rather than reason, philosophy, or cultural values. Ideas that are new or otherwise lie outside of the orthodoxy are treated like heresy. Being accused of harmful, offensive speech is the modern day equivalent of being accused of witchcraft in the Middle Ages. Political correctness is barbarism disguised as progress.

The world is too diverse a place, with too many different views of what constitutes offense to expect everyone to avoid offending others at all times. We should tolerate people who look different and act differently from us, but we should also tolerate ideas or speech that are different or unfamiliar to us. That's the most important type of tolerance. We should tolerate difference of belief.

If someone offends you, ignore them. Don't seek to punish them or try to reorganize all of society around your particularly orthodoxy. Virtue is derived from reason and carefully considered values, not inherent traits conferred through genetics, such as skin color or biological sex. Of course you should tolerate people who look different from you, but you should also tolerate people who think differently from you.

If you want to live in a tolerant society, then you must also be willing to tolerate people who don't agree with you. There isn't another path to a happy society. That's the only path. Tolerance must flow in every direction.

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