Political correctness is really such an unfortunate thing. There are genuine cases of discrimination, but they become muddled in the millions of stupid trivial complaints. The problem is that most of these Social Justice protestors have never faced real problems in their life, nor do they have engaging hobbies, so they have to police everyone else on such trivial matters. The ultra politically correct are basically the Left’s versions of Evangelical fundamentalists who get deeply offended at everything that’s not their specific liking.
You’re exactly right: the social justice weenies are the secular equivalent of religious fundamentalists… on steroids!
Political correctness has all the down-side of religion, and none of the up-side.
That’s why abolishing religion does not abolish the evils of religion.
On the contrary, it simply cloaks those same evils in a shroud of faux-rationality, which makes them all the more pernicious. Worse, it allows those evils to re-infect the government from which they had been banished by the separation of church and state.
And this is exactly why cultural Marxists introduced political correctness – and the whole corrosive swill of critical theory – into Western thought: to destroy the West.
It’s working.
Powerful, prosperous nations have a culture that values hard work, knowledge, prudence, risk-taking, self-reliance, charity, honour, family, and country.
It’s no accident that cultural Marxism undermines all these values.
And it’s no accident that the West fails to the degree that cultural Marxism succeeds.
This paper by Campbell and Manning is very interesting, especially for what they dare not say.
They describe a sequence, from (in their terms) the culture of honour, to the culture of dignity, to the culture of victimhood.
However, “culture of dignity” is a flagrant misnomer that whitewashes a thoroughly disreputable reality. It should be called the culture of ratting people out. And the descent from there to the culture of victimhood is unavoidable.
As soon as you deny a man’s right and obligation (!) to defend his own honour, person and property, those of his family, and those of his people, you begin the inexorable slide into decadence and decrepitude.
The idea, that you should never resort to violence – that you should never take matters into your own hands, that appealing to authority is the responsible thing to do – removes the final barrier to the uncontrolled, cancerous growth of the authoritarian governance machine, whether of the left or the right.
The truth is the exact opposite: self-reliance is the moral and responsible way to live. You should never call for help until all other options have been exhausted.
People with a sign on their door, saying we don’t call 911 have the right idea.
so, how do we differentiate (in practical terms – as in, physical language) the positive culture of honour which lead to Western civilization and the destructive ‘honour’ culture of tribal peoples?
The culture of honour is not the problem. The honesty of the practitioners is the problem.
To put it another way, there are obvious, characteristic differences in how different peoples conceptualize honour.
I guess you’ve heard the old joke: “it’s not how good you do, it’s how good you look.” This represents an outlook characteristic of the East, where saving face is everything.
In the West, by contrast, we say “it’s not sufficient that Ceasar’s wife be pure; she must be seen to be pure.” Performance is paramount, appearances secondary.
This difference is perhaps best exemplified by the Islamic concept of temporary marriage. It is nothing but a cheap trick to save face by allowing one to comply with the letter of the law in a way that makes a complete mockery of the spirit of the law.
In the West, we have nothing but scorn for such customs, because true honour cannot be based on false pretences.
Thus the Islamic culture of honour is a farce, not because of tribalism (humans are innately tribal), but because Islam explicitly allows it to be based on false pretences.
The culture of honour is a good thing to the degree that it is practiced honestly.
I fully agree with you and understand the distinction.
My question was not because of the meaning, but because of the language.
In our society, the term ‘honour culture’ or culture based on ‘honour’ is used exclusively in this negative way that it is practised, among others, by Muslims. This has become part of our language.
Therefore, we need to find another term to represent the ‘honest honour’ culture, if you will.
Associating the word, honour, with primitive stunted morality is another one of those cultural Marxist language-redefinition tricks.
Rather than let them destroy the meaning of the word, we must go out of our way to use it correctly at every possible opportunity.
For example, instead of blindly parroting the phrase “honour killing” we must emphasise repeatedly and unequivocally that so-called honour killings have nothing whatsoever to do with honour!
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 
April 13, 2016 at 17:34
Political correctness is really such an unfortunate thing. There are genuine cases of discrimination, but they become muddled in the millions of stupid trivial complaints. The problem is that most of these Social Justice protestors have never faced real problems in their life, nor do they have engaging hobbies, so they have to police everyone else on such trivial matters. The ultra politically correct are basically the Left’s versions of Evangelical fundamentalists who get deeply offended at everything that’s not their specific liking.
April 14, 2016 at 19:35
Juggernaut:
You’re exactly right: the social justice weenies are the secular equivalent of religious fundamentalists… on steroids!
Political correctness has all the down-side of religion, and none of the up-side.
That’s why abolishing religion does not abolish the evils of religion.
On the contrary, it simply cloaks those same evils in a shroud of faux-rationality, which makes them all the more pernicious. Worse, it allows those evils to re-infect the government from which they had been banished by the separation of church and state.
And this is exactly why cultural Marxists introduced political correctness – and the whole corrosive swill of critical theory – into Western thought: to destroy the West.
It’s working.
Powerful, prosperous nations have a culture that values hard work, knowledge, prudence, risk-taking, self-reliance, charity, honour, family, and country.
It’s no accident that cultural Marxism undermines all these values.
And it’s no accident that the West fails to the degree that cultural Marxism succeeds.
April 13, 2016 at 18:27
Xanthippa:
This paper by Campbell and Manning is very interesting, especially for what they dare not say.
They describe a sequence, from (in their terms) the culture of honour, to the culture of dignity, to the culture of victimhood.
However, “culture of dignity” is a flagrant misnomer that whitewashes a thoroughly disreputable reality. It should be called the culture of ratting people out. And the descent from there to the culture of victimhood is unavoidable.
As soon as you deny a man’s right and obligation (!) to defend his own honour, person and property, those of his family, and those of his people, you begin the inexorable slide into decadence and decrepitude.
The idea, that you should never resort to violence – that you should never take matters into your own hands, that appealing to authority is the responsible thing to do – removes the final barrier to the uncontrolled, cancerous growth of the authoritarian governance machine, whether of the left or the right.
The truth is the exact opposite: self-reliance is the moral and responsible way to live. You should never call for help until all other options have been exhausted.
People with a sign on their door, saying we don’t call 911 have the right idea.
Fight your own battles.
Bury your own dead.
Ignore the governance machine.
April 13, 2016 at 23:12
Ah, CodeSlinger,
but the culture of ‘honour’, as lived by tribalists like Muslims, is the antithesis of individualism!
April 14, 2016 at 19:38
Xanthippa:
Very true. But…
The culture of honour as lived by the Aryan people is the root source of the ideas that made Western civilization great.
Like the concept individual rights.
And the idea that women are people too.
April 15, 2016 at 01:01
CodeSlinger:
so, how do we differentiate (in practical terms – as in, physical language) the positive culture of honour which lead to Western civilization and the destructive ‘honour’ culture of tribal peoples?
April 15, 2016 at 16:37
Xanthippa:
The culture of honour is not the problem. The honesty of the practitioners is the problem.
To put it another way, there are obvious, characteristic differences in how different peoples conceptualize honour.
I guess you’ve heard the old joke: “it’s not how good you do, it’s how good you look.” This represents an outlook characteristic of the East, where saving face is everything.
In the West, by contrast, we say “it’s not sufficient that Ceasar’s wife be pure; she must be seen to be pure.” Performance is paramount, appearances secondary.
This difference is perhaps best exemplified by the Islamic concept of temporary marriage. It is nothing but a cheap trick to save face by allowing one to comply with the letter of the law in a way that makes a complete mockery of the spirit of the law.
In the West, we have nothing but scorn for such customs, because true honour cannot be based on false pretences.
Thus the Islamic culture of honour is a farce, not because of tribalism (humans are innately tribal), but because Islam explicitly allows it to be based on false pretences.
The culture of honour is a good thing to the degree that it is practiced honestly.
It’s as simple as that.
April 15, 2016 at 17:16
CodeSlinger:
I fully agree with you and understand the distinction.
My question was not because of the meaning, but because of the language.
In our society, the term ‘honour culture’ or culture based on ‘honour’ is used exclusively in this negative way that it is practised, among others, by Muslims. This has become part of our language.
Therefore, we need to find another term to represent the ‘honest honour’ culture, if you will.
April 16, 2016 at 13:50
Xanthippa:
We need no such thing.
Associating the word, honour, with primitive stunted morality is another one of those cultural Marxist language-redefinition tricks.
Rather than let them destroy the meaning of the word, we must go out of our way to use it correctly at every possible opportunity.
For example, instead of blindly parroting the phrase “honour killing” we must emphasise repeatedly and unequivocally that so-called honour killings have nothing whatsoever to do with honour!