Finally our nation is beginning to notice. Political correctness is helping to destroy America. Political correctness is crushing free speech as well as other freedoms .... grow up already.
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Political correctness 101: Praising America, virtues of hard work
dubbed 'micro-aggression' on campuses
Simply asking someone “Where are you from?” or calling America "the land of opportunity” is now considered offensive at some colleges and universities, where such "micro-aggressions" are detailed in training programs and seminars for new faculty and staff.
Other examples of “offensive” statements include, “I believe the most qualified person should get the job,” “Affirmative action is racist,” Everyone can succeed in this society, if they work hard enough,” When I look at you, I don’t see color,” and “I don’t believe in race.” A full list of these “offensive” statements can be seen here. The newly forbidden terms were initially identified in a 2007 American Psychologist publication by Columbia University’s Psychology and Education Professor Derald Wind Sue, that has now become a key training primer for incoming faculty at schools including the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point.
“It does students no service to treat them like children — or to threaten to punish people for starting perfectly legitimate political convictions.”
- Harvard Law School Professor Cass Sunstein
“The only reason why we bring up the topic for our new faculty and staff is simply to make our faculty aware that students in their classrooms may perceive different statements in ways that are surprising," said Greg Summers, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the school, which he said does not have an official policy on microaggressions.
The relatively new term refers to small slights and snubs that may not have been intended, but may be taken as minor insults. But a backlash has begun against the policing of what was previously considered innocuous speech, with many blogs and op-ed articles online crying foul about schools adopting Sue’s controversial list.
“In well-functioning democracies and universities, feelings will sometimes be hurt," said Harvard Law School Professor Cass Sunstein in a Bloomberg View article. “It does students no service to treat them like children — or to threaten to punish people for starting perfectly legitimate political convictions.”
The University of California is also in the spotlight for a similar situation — where it “offered these seminars [about microaggression] to make people aware of how their words or actions may be interpreted when used in certain contexts,” University of California Media Relations Representative Shelly Meron told Foxnews.com. But Meron insisted that no one's freedom of speech was being trampled upon.
“To suggest that the University of California is censoring classroom discussions on our campuses is wrong and irresponsible,” Meron added.
Some members of academia disagree about microaggressions and think UC has gone too far, with one wondering whether America's most revered civil rights leader would have run afoul of the campus code by famously stating people should be judged not by "the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
“I don’t think the University of California realizes how crazy it’s become," Tim Groseclose, an economics professor at George Mason University who left the California system, told Foxnews.com. ”According to that document, Martin Luther King Jr. would be guilty of micro-aggressions.”
Others say microaggressions are real and must be taken seriously.
“According to psychological and public health research, microaggressions can lead to negative health consequences including heart disease, diabetes, depression and substance abuse,” said Oi Yan Poon, assistant professor of education at Loyola University in Chicago.
“These statements may seem innocent, but…they underhandedly and subtly undermine the very real experiences with racism, sexism and other forms of oppression,” Poon said.
Sue said this topic is a very complicated and controversial issue to understand because “offensive” statements like “America is the land of opportunity” is not fully understood from the perspective of a minority American citizen.
“Tell [‘America is the land of opportunity’] to black people who were enslaved and brought over here. Tell that to Native Americans who had their lands taken away from them. Tell that to Japanese Americans during World War II who were incarcerated in concentration camps…it’s inspirational to hear that type of statement from a person who truly believes it, but it is not when you look at reality and the history of the United States,” Sue said.
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Government Trolls Are Using ‘Psychology-Based Influence Techniques’ On YouTube, Facebook And Twitter
by Michael Snyder | End Of The American Dream
Have you ever come across someone on the Internet that you suspected was a paid government troll?
Well, there is a very good chance that you were not imagining things. Thanks to Edward Snowden, we now have solid proof that paid government trolls are using “psychology-based influence techniques” on social media websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Documents leaked by Snowden also reveal that government agents have been conducting denial-of-service attacks, flooding social media websites with thinly veiled propaganda and have been purposely attempting to warp public discourse online. If we do not stand up and object to this kind of Orwellian behavior, it is only going to get worse and worse.
In the UK, the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) is a specialized unit within the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). If it wasn’t for Edward Snowden, we probably still would never have heard of them. This particular specialized unit is engaged in some very “questionable” online activities. The following is an excerpt from a recent piece by Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…
Though its existence was secret until last year, JTRIG quickly developed a distinctive profile in the public understanding, after documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden revealedthat the unit had engaged in “dirty tricks” like deploying sexual “honey traps” designed to discredit targets, launching denial-of-service attacks to shut down Internet chat rooms, pushing veiled propaganda onto social networks and generally warping discourse online.
We are told that JTRIG only uses these techniques to go after the “bad guys”.
But precisely who are the “bad guys”?
It turns out that their definition of who the “bad guys” are is quite broad. Here is more from Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…
JTRIG’s domestic and law enforcement operations are made clear. The report states that the controversial unit “currently collaborates with other agencies” including the Metropolitan police, Security Service (MI5), Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), Border Agency, Revenue and Customs (HMRC), and National Public Order and Intelligence Unit (NPOIU). The document highlights that key JTRIG objectives include “providing intelligence for judicial outcomes”; monitoring “domestic extremist groups such as the English Defence League by conducting online HUMINT”; “denying, deterring or dissuading” criminals and “hacktivists”; and “deterring, disrupting or degrading online consumerism of stolen data or child porn.”
Particularly disturbing to me is the phrase “domestic extremist groups”. What does someone have to say or do to be considered an “extremist”? For example, the English Defence League is a non-violent street protest movement in the UK that is strongly against the spread of radical Islam and sharia law in the UK. So if they are “extremists”, how many millions upon millions of ordinary citizens in the United States would fit that definition?
When conducting operations against “extremists”, psychology-based influence techniques are among the tools that JTRIG uses to combat them online. The following comes from one of the documents that was posted by Greenwald and Fishman…
In other words, these government trolls try to mess with people’s minds.
And here is another document that was posted by Greenwald and Fishman that talks about how JTRIG uses YouTube, Facebook and Twitter to accomplish their goals…
It is very disturbing to think that some of the people that we may be interacting with on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter are actually paid government agents that are purposely trying to feed us propaganda and misinformation.
And of course this kind of thing does not just happen in the United Kingdom. In Canada, it has been publicly admitted that the government uses paid trolls to warp Internet discourse. The following comes from Natural News…
You’ve probably run into them before — those seemingly random antagonizers who always end up diverting the conversation in an online chat room or article comment section away from the issue at hand, and towards a much different agenda. Hot-button issues like illegal immigration, the two-party political system, the “war on terror” and even alternative medicine are among the most common targets of such attackers, known as internet “trolls” or “shills,” who in many cases are nothing more than paid lackeys hired by the federal government and other international organizations to sway and ultimately control public opinion.
Several years ago, Canada’s CTV News aired a short segment about how its own government had been exposed for hiring secret agents to monitor social media and track online conversations, as well as the activities of certain dissenting individuals. This report, which in obvious whitewashing language referred to such activities as the government simply “weighing in and correcting” allegedly false information posted online, basically admitted that the Canadian government had assumed the role ofsecret online police.
You can actually watch a video news report about what is happening up in Canadaright here.
Needless to say, the U.S. government is also engaged in this kind of activity as well. For instance, the U.S. government has actually been caught manipulating discourse on Reddit and editing Wikipedia. When it comes to spying, there is nobody that is off limits for our spooks. It just came out recently that we even spied on three French presidents, and they are supposed to be our “friends”.
And just like the UK, the U.S. government has a very broad definition of “extremists”. This has especially been true since Barack Obama has been in the White House. If you doubt this, please see my previous article entitled “72 Types Of Americans That Are Considered ‘Potential Terrorists’ In Official Government Documents“.
All of this is very disturbing to me. Why can’t they just leave us alone and let us talk to one another? Why do they have to spy on everything that we do and purposely try to manipulate public discourse? Why do they have to be such control freaks?
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Christians under assault – Does it matter? Should it? (Part I of II)
"..... In the hallowed halls of academia - the supposed bastions of free thought and free speech, Christians increasingly are under assault as intellectual discourse in the public arena of ideas has been replaced by pillorying students and faculty of faith in the public square of ridicule. This is one of the weapons used to dehumanize and delegitimize Christians.
As if silencing free speech in academia, subjecting students to an ant-religion narrative in the classroom, being threatened with lower grades, or relegating free thoughts and expression to designated "free speech zones" (I thought the USA was one big freedom of speech zone) isn't an Orwellian reality that ought to send a chill down all of us - liberal, conservative, moderate, rich, poor, educated or not, it is part of what seems to be a concerted attack by the left, certainly the "illiberal left" as Powers asserts, or intolerant among us, to silence, and make subhuman people who are Christian."
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