Exposing the Politically Correct Rot in Academia

Exposing the Politically Correct Rot in Academia

—October 20, 2018

A team of self-proclaimed, Left-leaning academics this month released results from an experiment they conducted that suggests “pervasive political corruption” in U.S. university humanities departments. This corruption is broad-based and inherently entrenched in many academic disciplines, including women’s and gender studies, feminist studies, race studies, sexuality studies, fat studies, queer studies, and cultural studies, they say. While these are niche study areas in most university humanities programs, many universities now force students to take such classes as part of “diversity” requirements to graduate. The ideas promulgated by these studies are also increasingly being injected into the curriculum of more mainstream fields, such as psychology, history, sociology, and even the STEM fields.

Additionally, these postmodernist ideas are also being adopted by other cultural institutions, elements of the media, and some companies. Google, a prime example of the latter, has incorporated postmodernist thinking into employee training, and sanctions employees who don’t adhere to its dictates. Consider James Damore, the Google engineer who was fired last year after suggesting that fewer women worked in technology fields because men and women “think differently” due to natural biological and physiological differences. So much for Google’s “foundational premise for employees” that they have “the freedom to speak up about anything and everything.”

Bottom line is that these niche university academics are the driving force behind today’s politically correct climate and many of the inane concepts adopted by the far Left as key components of their social justice ideal. When you hear terms such as “toxic masculinity,” “privilege,” “cis-gender,” “non-binary,” “white fragility,” “safe spaces,” “cultural appropriation,” “social construct,” “heteronormative,” “intersectionality,” and related PC terminology, know that they emanated from postmodernist-influenced academia.

The problem is, as exposed in part by the aforementioned experiment, such concepts and the thinking behind it are not supported by rigorous research and objective truth, but instead from subjective dogma. Dogma that its adherents defend without question and insist upon foisting upon the rest of us as irrefutable truth.

“A culture has developed in which only certain conclusions are allowed, like those that make ‘whiteness’ and ‘masculinity’ problematic,” said project collaborator James Lindsay. “The fields we’re concerned about put social grievances ahead of objective truth. So as a simple summary, we call the problem ‘grievance studies.’”

To test the extent of this problem, Lindsay and his fellow collaborators devoted themselves to seeing how many nonsensical articles they could get published in top peer-reviewed “grievance study” academic journals. They crafted each hoax article by developing politically correct conclusions that were usually absurd or morally repellent, and then utilized the “existing canon” of the study area, along with citations and quotations from already published studies and papers to support them.

The first published hoax paper—“Human Reactions to Rape Culture and Queer Performativity in Urban Dog Parks in Portland, Oregon”—was not only published, but received accolades from the feminist journal, Gender, Place, and Culture. “Arguably [the team’s] most absurd paper,” its purpose in the experiment was to show that academic journals “will accept arguments which should be clearly ludicrous and unethical if they provide (an unfalsifiable) way to perpetuate notions of toxic masculinity, heteronormativity, and implicit bias.”

Another published paper—“Going in through the Back Door: Challenging Straight Male Homohysteria and Transphobia through Repetitive Penetrative Sex Toy Use”—was designed to prove that academic journals will “accept ludicrous arguments if they support (unfalsifiable) claims that common (and harmless) sexual choices made by straight men are actually homophobic, transphobic, and anti-feminist.”

“Our Struggle is My Struggle: Solidarity Feminism as an Intersectional Reply to Neoliberal and Choice Feminism,” was accepted for publication, which means that Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work, has accepted for publication, in part, a rewrite of chapter 12 in Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” (“My Struggle”). The collaborators basically crafted this one to prove that they could get anything published as long as it was put in “terms of politically fashionable arguments and existing scholarship.”

Another accepted paper—no surprise here—argues that social justice activists have the right to make fun of others, but no one is allowed to make fun of social justice. Ironically titled “When the Joke Is on You,” reviewers called it an excellent contribution to feminist philosophy and the topic of social justice pedagogy.

Perhaps the most disturbing paper—“The Progressive Stack: An Intersectional Feminist Approach to Pedagogy”—was rejected, though with significant praise and suggestion that its premise is worthy of additional research. The premise being that “Patently unfair, inhumane, and abusive treatment of students [should] be acceptable in educational theory if it is framed as an opportunity to teach them about the problem of privilege.” Among treatment considered in the paper was that privileged students should not be allowed to speak in class, and that those students with “high levels of privilege” should be subjected to “experiential reparations,” such as by having to “sit

on the floor in chains.” Reviewers expressed concerns that the paper approached the topic with “too much compassion” for privileged students and suggested the need for crueler forms of experiential reparations.

And just think, these reviewers are likely teaching in university classrooms today!

With seven of 20 papers accepted for publication, four already published, almost all making it to the peer-review process, and glowing commentary from journal editors and academic peer reviewers, the experiment, which was exposed in early October by the media, has been deemed a success by the collaborators.

As noted by the Project Fact Sheet: “We conclude the problem we have identified in grievance studies, which has taken over large sectors of the humanities and social sciences, is real and significant. That problem is that a political bias which intentionally blends activism into scholarship (sometimes described as ‘academic leftism’) has become dominant and entrenched in varying degrees within those fields it has successfully corrupted. Moreover, it aims to spread its assumptions and methods into other fields, including the hard sciences. This, in turn, delegitimizes this scholarship and casts serious doubt upon its conclusions and results.

“Because the scholarship we infiltrated represents a view that currently has a great deal of cultural power, and because that power is nearly absolute within the universities (and seems to be going that way in media and many businesses, including large corporations), one conclusion this project provides is a permission slip for academics and others to openly doubt the scholarship that seems to legitimize and institutionalize these conclusions as factual.”

By exposing this rot in North American universities, the three project collaborators have likely ended any hopes of furthering their academic careers, but all feel the outcome of their work is worth it. “For us, the risk of letting biased research continue to influence education, media, policy and culture is far greater than anything that will happen to us for having done this,” said Lindsay, who also noted that “No one tolerates this sort of corruption when they find out an industry is funding biased research to make itself look a certain way. The same should apply to [university research].”

Heroes!

Sources:

Project Summary and Fact Sheet— https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/19tBy_fVlYIHTxxjuVMFxh4pqLHM_en18

Feature Video (in progress)— https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVk9a5Jcd1k

Fake News Comes to Academia— https://www.wsj.com/articles/fake-news-comes-to-academia-1538520950?redirect=amp#click=https://t.co/LrCM8kzgh6

Originally published Oct. 6, in Discernible Truth.

North American Campuses: Bastions of Batshit Crazy!

North American Campuses: Bastions of Batshit Crazy!

—October 27, 2016

Well, Kids, we’re more than halfway through the semester, so we’d better take stock of the level of Left-Wing battiness roiling North American university and college campuses to see if Loony-Left students, professors, and administrators are going even more bat-shit crazy than last year. All indications point to one big “yes,” which is hard to believe given the utter absurdity of many of their actions and pronouncements from last year. But then again, they’re probably feeling empowered as the mainstream Left seems to be adopting some of the inane belief systems and political correct ideals coming out of universities these days. Moreover, professors and administrators seem more emboldened and open about their Leftist tendencies and their influence on the behaviour and thoughts of their students.

To recap last year’s inanity, just recall the terms “Social Justice Warrior,” “cultural appropriation,” “self-identification,” “non-binary genders,” “trigger warnings,” “safe spaces,” “hate speech,” “micro-aggressions,” “patriarchal,” “white privilege,” and a host of other “privileges,” among other pertinent Leftist catch words. Or you can check out my blogs from the last school year such as “Free Speech Imperilled by Campus Political Correctness,” “Political Correct Absurdities of the Week,” “Better Put a Trigger Warning on This One,” “PC Potentates Declare Yoga ‘Culturally Insensitive,’” and “The Patients Have Taken Over the Asylum,” to name a few.

And without further ado, and in no particular order, here is a partial run-down of this school year’s campus follies to date:

freespeechzoneForget the campus establishment of “safe spaces,” as the new drive appears to be “free-speech zones.” This supports the ideal of making a campus one big safe space where speech that may be construed as harmful, inciting, triggering, or in any way controversial is prohibited except in specially designated free-speech zones.

You know, like that small parking lot behind the cafeteria next to the dumpsters.

A few universities have also experimented with “free speech walls” where students are free to post or write whatever they want without fear of retribution from the campus thought police. However, ever-so-tolerant members of the Left tend to destroy or erase comments they don’t agree with. These Lefties seem to take great umbrage at any mention of “Donald Trump,” and his slogan, “Make America Great Again.”

Speaking of which, the “chalking” of Trumpisms continues to be reported and investigated as a hate speech crime in campuses across America.

While considering such as “hate speech” is ludicrous enough, I’ve got to ask, “when did college kids start playing with chalk?”

Conservative speakers on campus? Hah! I’ve lost count of the number of conservative speakers who have had their speaking engagements cancelled by administrators over the past few months. Another trick to keep such harmful thinking off their campuses is to insist upon outrageous fees for security purposes.

Conservative speaking in general is frowned upon on college campuses with numerous campus conservative groups reporting incidents in which their meetings get disrupted by angry Social Justice Warriors. Of course, administrators take no action against the agitators, as the disruption  represents the exercise of their First Amendment rights.    

Overall, when a majority of university students polled say that the ideals of freedom of speech are over-rated or that the First Amendment should be repealed, I’d say we have a serious problem.

Campus bias-incident tribunals—or whatever names these campus Thought-Police prototype groups go under—seem to have become even more powerful in just the few short months since the end of the 2016 Spring semester. Instead of just waiting for students and professors to anonymously report their peers for possible acts of bias and dissemination of hate speech, these shadowy groups—whether composed of administrators, students, professors or some mixture thereof—are actively seeking out thoughtcrime. For example, dozens of these bias-incident groups have warned students at their respective schools not to wear Halloween costumes that may be offensive, with most threatening administrative action against potential transgressors. Tufts University in Boston even went so far as to warn the student body that campus police will be actively looking for potential violators.

My response to this is beautifully summed up by Paul Joseph Watson in this video:  

 “Inclusive language” policies seem to be an even bigger hit with administrators this year, with dozens of campuses launching new Thought-Police-like campaigns to discourage students from using words and phrases that may perhaps offend someone. This year’s policies are going way beyond the old-school PC efforts to to replace potentially offensive words with sugar-coated euphemisms that rely on soft catchwords like “challenged.” No, these policies—most of which suggest punishment for non-compliance—are going after those really hatful terms and phrases such as “hey guys,”“man up,” “mankind,” “man-made,” “color-blind,” and just about any word that might suggest exclusivity to a particular gender, race, sexual orientation or “ability” (or lack thereof).

And remember what I said about the Mainstream Left adopting emerging campus ideals? Well, the Obama Administration recently dictated that all those kind folks doing time in federal prison shouldn’t be stigmatized by being called “prisoners,” “inmates,” “convicts,” or “criminals,” and must now be referred to as “Justice Involved Individuals.”

It appears that last year’s identifying and shaming of potential “cultural appropriation” was just a warm up. Consider that fraternity and sorority members at the University of California Merced have been “instructed” not to use the terms “Greek,” “rush,” or “pledge” because they “appropriate Greek culture” and are “non-inclusive.”

Guess we’re going to have to change the name of the “Olympics,” so as not to offend those delicate Greek sensibilities.

Canoes, yoga, a whole range of food items, and a massive expansion of “inappropriate” Halloween costumes are also increasingly under the campus cultural appropriation gun.

Canoes? Yeah, how dare we white privileged Mo-Fos enjoy paddling in the native people’s traditional conveyance. Tell you what, we’ll give up our canoes if SJWs quit appropriating our modern transportation and communications systems.

“Toxic Masculinity” appears to be a new academic buzzword on several campuses, and is being taught as the primary reason for many of North American society’s ills, including mass shootings and violence in general. Orientation for incoming Gettysburg College students “who identified as male” included movies, lectures and group discussions on the subject, with one student reporting that the effort seemed to be driven to teach students that “masculinity is an unacceptable human trait.” Professors at the previously mentioned U of C—Merced lectured students that an Islamic student’s knife attack that seriously wounded four other students was driven by toxic masculinity and not radical ideology, despite his ISIS flag and hand-written radical manifesto. Students at this school seem to be already fully indoctrinated as all indications—Facebook postings, memorials, “teach-ins”—point to the stabber (killed by police) receiving far more sympathy and accolades than his four victims. And last, for the purpose of this blog, a Dartmouth professor is reportedly teaching a course that relates the Orlando shooting to toxic masculinity.

Yeah, my son’s definitely not going to any of those schools.

In the “irony of ironies” department, the pro-life, Catholic DePaul University banned public display of a campus pro-life group’s “Unborn Lives Matter” poster because the message is rooted in “bigotry” by theoretically mocking the Black Lives Matter movement, and might “provoke” other students….

You know, provoke those pro-choice students who probably have no business going to a pro-life school to begin with.  

And while this incident happened last year, a Columbia University student this month provided a Kafkaesque account of his experiences with the “Gender-Based Misconduct Office” after being accused by an anonymous student of referring to himself as “handsome” in Chinese during his Chinese language class. The Gender Misconduct administrator apparently told the student that his actions were likely the result of “white male privilege,” but the student refused to admit any wrongdoing, and after an hour or so of apparent “re-education” efforts the administrator gave up.

Like the student, I’m not quite sure what the offence was, but this just goes to show that SJW, Loony-Left culture on campuses is poised to find just about everything offensive.

And I could go on and on and on, but getting into it so deep is making me howl-at-the-moon crazy. I’ll just close by relating the latest Loony-Left campus story to hit my news feed: The University of Denver hasFree Speech wall placed “content restrictions” on what can be placed or written on the university’s “free speech wall.” Because the university has a “zero tolerance policy for discrimination, harassment and gender-based violence,” any form of hate speech put on the wall will be considered a violation. Not only is the university’s definition of “hate speech” described with especially broad strokes, but a camera has been installed to monitor what people put on the wall.

Oh, and the language that instigated the restrictions included the following (and is construed by the university as prosecutable hate speech): “I’m Sorry for Something I Didn’t Do/Lynched Somebody, But I Didn’t Know Who” and “GUILTY OF BEING WHITE/GUILTY OF BEING RIGHT!”    

“ARH-WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

The Patients Have Taken Over the Asylum!

The Patients Have Taken Over the Asylum!

—May 14, 2016

Well kids, the level of political correct lunacy appears to be reaching all-time highs this month, with the recent antics of the Loony Left leaving me gobsmacked and thinking that the world is truly going crazy.

I mean, President Obama has determined that children can “self-identify” whether they are male or female independent of any biological determinants or parental input. Crazy or what?

Pee AnywhereIf “self identification” is going to be the law of the land then I choose to self identify as a dog so that I can shit and piss wherever I please, bathrooms be damned. Of course, as self identification is a PC construct its use will undoubtedly be restricted to marginalized peoples and off-limits to straight, white, privileged folks such as myself. 

Anyhow, Obama’s PC-related gambit is just one small sample of this month’s lunacy. Social justice warriors (SJWs) across the land seem to be working overtime in pursuit of enacting their various PC-oriented agenda. It seems like a concerted effort, almost as if the SJWs have been triggered into mass activism.

Perhaps it’s because one of their activists was taken down a notch or two late last month after she tried to disrupt a panel discussion at the University of Massachusetts on whether political correctness has gone too far. The insightful and humorous panel discussion, featuring Christina Hoff Sommers, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Steven Crowder, can be seen here: The Triggering: Has Political Correctness Gone Too Far?

If you have the time the video is well worth watching, as the panel totally rips into the nonsense and hypocrisy that is today’s political correctness.

Cora Segal, the social justice warrior who aggressively tried to disrupt the discussion, has become the new face of political correctness. While “Trigglypuff,” as Cora has been aptly renamed on social media, wasn’t the only SJW in attendance, her lunacy was perfectly captured by student journalist Kassy Dillon, who is helping chronicle and publicize the rise of censorship on North American campuses. Kassy’s video has made Trigglypuff (and the bemused attendee in front of her)  a You Tube sensation and you can watch a short clip of it below:

While I doubt the public downfall of SJW Trigglypuff, and subsequent publicity given to the common-sense panel discussion, is the actual trigger for some kind of mass effort by the PC holy warrior faithful, they sure have been especially active ever since. Consider the following:

Student activists at Seattle University’s Matteo Ricci College have taken over the dean’s office and threaten prolonged occupation unless a lengthy list of demands is met. The bloviated manifesto—MRC Student Coalition Demands—is so poorly written that I could have as much fun eviscerating it editorially as I could ripping apart its ludicrous demands.

Consider the second sentence: “We consider it an ethical matter to name the disturbing experiences we have lived while in this college,f_grade while also noting that we are not the first students in this college to express these concerns, as they reflect a long-standing history of oppression and resistance in cohorts long since graduated.”

I know, “huh?” And the writer(s) never do get around to specifically “naming” the “disturbing experiences,” so I guess we’ll just have to call them “Bill,” “Ted” and “Alice.”

Anyhow, from what I can construe from the bloviation, key among the dozens of “demands” are the firing of the dean, hiring of gay and minority professors, and a teaching of “non-Eurocentric” humanities courses that “decentralize whiteness” but focus on white oppression and aggression. As noted in the manifesto, the “current curriculum does not reflect the kind of education we expected nor want,” which begs the question as to why they applied to the college to begin with.

The demands also seek far more student power within the professor-student relationship and the silencing of voices and ideology that do not conform to the students’ own beliefs. The stifling of “microaggressions” and “triggers,” as well as creation of “safe spaces,” along with other means for latent censorship of voices and ideology the students don’t like, play a key role throughout the list of demands.

I sincerely hope that Seattle University does not put up with this nonsense for much longer. I mean, tear gas and billy clubs will certainly not be needed, as the delicate snowflakes will undoubtedly collapse in tears at the sight of handcuffs. 

And then we’ve got the Chicago Public School system, responsible for almost 400,000 children. It rolled out new rules last week that require students and teachers to address transgendered students and school employees by their preferred name and pronouns. According to the rules, transgendered students and employees can choose their preferred bathroom, locker room, name and pronouns, and everyone is required to conform to their new chosen identities.

Not sure what the penalties for non-compliance are, but the whole PC “gender identity” movement is filled with all kinds of confusing and constantly-evolving terminology. I mean, “Ze?” Really? What the fuck is that supposed to mean? And “gender-fluid” seems to be especially popular with the PC transgender movement. Students identifying as such will certainly have fun getting their classmates in trouble.

Student “Black Lives Matter” activists at Dartmouth College tore down a display honoring police officers who had fallen in the line of duty because the display was “offensive,” “white supremacist,” and allegedly “promoted violence against black people.” The activists replaced the display with dozens of flyers that stated: “YOU CANNOT CO-OPT THE MOVEMENT AGAINST STATE VIOLENCE TO MEMORIALIZE THE PERPETRATORS.”

My message to Black Lives Matter: “YES, BLACK LIVES MATTER; HOWEVER, THE BIGGEST KILLER OF BLACK LIVES IS OTHER BLACK FOLKS, NOT THE OCCASIONAL ROGUE COP—FOR EVERY ONE WRONGFUL MURDER COMMITTED BY A POLICE OFFICER (MANY OF WHOM ARE “BLACK”) THOUSANDS ARE COMMITTED BY YOUR OWN PEOPLE.”

Over in Illinois, SJWs at Millikin University’s Office of Inclusion and Student Engagement (OISE) have warned fraternities that they will be punished if they use face paint during their annual frat pledge events. Yeah, OISE warned Tau Kappa Epsilon and other university fraternities that fraternities “are prohibited from wearing black and red paint wigs/and clothing items that mimic or depict an ethnicity or culture,” and threatened them with “student conduct sanctions” should they fail to abide by the warning.

Warrior Face PaintWell, as a direct descendent of ancient Gallic tribes, Nordic Vikings and—yes (not kidding)—even the Powhatan native American tribe, I am offended that OISE is preventing my cultures from being honored by the frat boys who want to paint their faces in ways reminiscent of my various ancestors’ preparations for battle.

I don’t know, do I have some kind of justification for a lawsuit here?

And, while not last among the recent “are-you-fucking-kidding-me” PC news, a teen advocacy organization has reportedly come up with a plan to encourage television animators to fatten up their cartoon characters to protect fat kids from body shaming. Apparently “Project Know” believes that the svelte teenage action hero cartoon characters are demoralizing role models for overweight pre-teens.

I’m sorry, even though there’s way more recent PC bullshit to report, I just can’t handle it anymore. I mean, can you say, “Bark at the moon?” ‘cause we’re getting to that level of crazy.

 

 

 

Snapchat, Curt Schilling in the PC Crosshairs

Snapchat, Curt Schilling in the PC Crosshairs

—April 22, 2016

OK, Kid’s, it’s Friday and you know what that means….

That’s right, time for the MJM weekly rantathon about the latest politically correct idiocy and/or other bullshit afflicting our world like….

I don’t know, like…it’s getting ridiculous. The easily outraged and offended PC crowd seems to be getting more volatile by the week—more touchy about anything that might cause offense, especially if the offense is at all directed in any manner toward any of their sacred cows.

I mean, it sucks to be a comedian these days, cause just about everybody but straight, white, conservative males is off limits. Bust a joke about Blacks, Gays, Chinese, Muslims, Mexicans, females, the mentally unstable, anything “trans,” etc., and the PC righteous will set out to destroy you for your insensitivity.

Begs the question: if the PC crowd refuses to find any humor amidst the foibles of humanity (other than that of straight, White, conservative males), and seem to spend all of their time and energies looking for excuses to wield their self-righteous outrage, do they ever find time to have fun? Do they have a sense of humor? Can they crack a smile? I kind of doubt it….

But I digress. I am supposed to be ranting about the latest politically correct idiocy afflicting our world like…for this week we’ll say “like the fetid puss of a festering boil.”

Heading our list for this week are the usual easily outraged suspects who just had to jump on the PC bandwagon to express their outrage and offense over Snapchat’s use of a Bob Marley filter on 420 Day.  The filter allows users to superimpose the reggae star’s classic dreadlocked Jamaican look over their own or others’ faces on the social media photo-sharing service.

Not only were the PC holy warriors outraged by this alleged cyber “Blackface,” but they felt the use of the iconic musician’s likeness as a Snapchat filter was a case of cultural appropriation and that its use diminished Marley to a stereotype. The release of the filter on 420 Day, an unofficial day to celebrate Marijuana, also incensed the PC righteous because they felt it diminished Marley’s other talents by focusing on his well-known adoration and support of Marijuana.

OK, PC freaks, get over yourselves. Bob Marley was Black. Any image of Marley should be Black, and if a White person superimposes that image over their own it shouldn’t automatically be construed as “racist.” In fact, chances are that 99 percent of people using this filter love Bob Marley, his music and even his love of pot, and in no way are trying to insult his Blackness or anything else for that matter.

In fact, get over the whole “Blackface” thing—the days of the minstrel are long over, and the vast majority of people who utilize Blackface these days as part of a costume are not doing it in any way to purposely insult Black folks.

As for the release of the filter on 420 Day, get over that one, too, because Bob Marley is one of the historical proponents of Marijuana usage and legalization and should be honored on such a day. In no way does this diminish his musical talents or cultural achievements.

Finally, the filter was created in partnership with the Bob Marley estate, so this kind of makes all of the PC crowd’s complaints utterly moot and worthless.

While the above marks yet another case of PC inanity, the politically correct unfortunately managed to score two victories this week.

ESPN caved in to PC pressure and fired baseball analyst Curt Schilling due to a meme andCurt-Schilling-Meme comments he posted on his Facebook page. You can see the meme to the right, and among his comments were: “A man is a man no matter what they call themselves. I don’t care what they are, who they sleep with, men’s room was designed for the penis, women’s not so much. Now you need laws telling us differently? Pathetic.”

Unreal. If bullshit like this keeps up, no one will feel comfortable expressing his or her opinions about anything anymore….

A PC victory was also scored this week with the U.S. Department of Treasury, which made all the right PC moves in its planned revamping of the $20 bill. That is replacing a racist ex-president with a Black, feminist, abolitionist hero.

Unlike the first PC victory, I don’t really have a problem with this one. While Andrew Jackson was a pretty decent president and war hero, he was also kind of prick and a racist, what with being pro-slavery and the architect behind the Trail of Tears, which resulted in the death of thousands of Indians. And Ms. Tubman was a hero deserving of respect, helping to save thousands from slavery, and working to help secure the right of women to vote.

harriet-tubman2But man, I hope they can find a halfway decent image of her. I mean, talk about a scowl—her visage is the grumpy, outraged face I picture, whether White or Black, whenever I read or hear the pontifications of pompous PC potentates.

—Originally published on behalf of Hash It Out on its Facebook page 

PC Potentates Declare Yoga “Culturally Insensitive”

PC Potentates Declare Yoga “Culturally Insensitive”

—November 27, 2015

For the latest in politically correct absurdity I bring you to my adopted land up here in the North, the land of ice, moose, beavers and Eskimos known as Canada. And there I go, already committing a politically incorrect faux pas by daring to refer to Inuits as “Eskimos.” Perhaps the provincial human rights commission needs to mount an investigation to determine whether this constitutes “hate speech,” but at the very least I should obviously be vilified by all.

Anyhow, the politically correct absurdity of the week award goes to the University of Ottawa’s Student Federation, which has shut down yoga classes at the university, deeming yoga’s cultural issues too controversial for the student body.

“While yoga is a really great idea and accessible and great for students, there are cultural issues of implication involved in the practice,” stated an email ordering a yoga class long-held at the university’s Center for Students with Disabilities to be shut down. “Yoga has been under a lot of controversy lately due to how it is being practiced,” added the email, noting that the cultures from which yoga emerged have “experienced oppression, cultural genocide and diasporas due to colonialism and western supremacy [and] we need to be mindful of this and how we express ourselves while practicing yoga.”

The absurdity of this is almost beyond words, but stems from “cultural appropriation,” which is basically a politically correct activist concern that the Western (primarily “white”) world is (and has long been) appropriating the rest of the world’s culture without granting appropriate reverence and recompense in return.

PC Activists began ramping up their campaign against cultural appropriation many years ago, with protests against inappropriate sports team names—Redskins, Indians, Warriors, etc—marking their first shots in this regard. Inappropriate Halloween costumes came next on their list–In case you haven’t noticed (and how could you not, as Halloween seems to really piss the PC crowd off), in the past few years dressing up as an Indian, Chinaman, or any number of other “cultures” has been strictly forbidden by the potentates of PC.

More recently they’ve been tch-tching western celebrities who dare sport clothing that incorporates features that may come from a marginalized culture. Katy Perry was harangued for dressing like a geisha during an American Music Awards performance, and several celebrities have been harassed of late for sporting bindi designs. All indications suggest that the PC activists are getting ready to seriously ramp up their war against the cultural appropriation of fashion.

And now they’ve fired the first shot against yoga.

What’s next?

Well, from trolling the websites of noted PC activists I can tell you that martial arts, ethnic foods and rock and roll, among others, are being closely examined for their cultural appropriation, so stay tuned.

Oh, but don’t let me forget to mention the inherent hypocrisy of this latest PC movement (easy to forget as PC culture is rife with hypocrisy): “Multiculturalism” is a key mantra of the politically correct, and yet, if I utilize or display anything that may have evolved from another (perhaps “marginalized”) culture I am guilty of “cultural appropriation.”

But no need to worry about this possible inconvenience should you leanScreen Shot 2015-11-27 at 10.06.16 PM PC, because remember, if you’re PC you can self identify. Cultural appropriation only applies to “privileged” white folks such as myself–If you’re politically correct you will be applauded for your multiculturalism.

“Cultural Appropriation!” Add this to the list of politically correct activist catch phrases, such as “white privilege,” “social justice,” “hate speech,” “marginalized cultures,” “inclusiveness,” “trigger warnings,” “micro-aggression,” “safe spaces,” “gender neutrality,” “self identification,” etc…

. . . and be very afraid.