h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

With all this new P/Correct world these days that seem to have been thrust upon us all, we cannot speak our minds any more in case we upset some ethnic minority or someones human rights?

I'm with you there Smudger. I firmly believe we should be able to say what we think, as long as we don't use denigratory or derogatory remarks towards others in our discussions. The problem is that too many people forget to engage their brain before opening their mouths..
And of course, the worst instances arise when someone is trying to enforce their personal views on another person. A good discussion, to me at least, is when people can sit around and talk and accept that we are all different. For example, my edest sister is a Jehovah's
Witness, my younger brother follows the Mormon faith, I am a total non believer. Yet we have the greatest of conversations and discussions together, and we have one standard rule. We can express our beliefs and feelings, but none of us are permitted to impose or force the others to "convert".to our individual beliefs. And, what is best, the discussions are full of humour and love. Plus a drink or two...



Peeb

"We cannot speak our minds any more ..."

Who's stopping you?


"... in case we upset some ethnic minority or someone's human rights."

Do you think it would be a good thing to upset someone's human rights? Of course, free speach is a right, within bounds.

TRiG.

we should be able to speak our minds because its what we are meant to do.
if people try to stop us then i have a few shocking words for them!!!!

Cheers for your posts, at least now I know that I am not alone in my belief
I don't know how and when it happened, but this P/Correct brigade just seemed to take over and lay down the law to us all

Remember the good old days when you could call a spade a spade and allowed to speak freely, seems that we are now in the ethnic minority?

I will probably get a lot of posts rebuking my thoughts on this, but hey! as mentioned in one of the above posts, its good to talk

Smudger.

When people are told that they are not allowed to speak their minds, the anger and frustration that builds up inside them often leads to disastrous and violent outbursts... Internal tension builds up to intolerable levels within us when we are forced to choose our words so carefully, that the tension has to eventually release in an explosive manner.



Peeb

That's so & in general i believe that people should be free to express their opinion where appropriate. On the other hand, words spoken in haste & anger are sometimes regretted. It's not always easy to guage when it's best to speak & when to at least consider first if not remain silent.

True, but I cant help thinking that with this "Nanny" state we seem to live in these days and the Big Brother approach to Shop your neighbours, we are not far from what happened in Germany in the 1930s, where people got paid for Shopping folk that spoke out against the Nazi regime, or disagreed with any of its policies

Smudger.

tru tru.
ma mum agrees with you

One of the worst things that I find is that you can speak your mind on issues which a government is trying to get your vote, and which coincides with their policies, eg immigration, but to speak on other matters, eg, Anti-Iraq War policies, you have to tread carefully lest you upset one of the mulitude of factions. Eff it I say, and speak up and be heard. Just do not denigrate anyone in the process.



Peeb

toooooooooo true.
eff that is what i will say to

cant speack your mind it is becoming a joke ok i'm scottish so i could take affence if someone called me a scot that is what i i'm a scot short for being scottish.
crazy aint it .

"True, but I cant help thinking that with this "Nanny" state we seem to live in these days and the Big Brother approach to Shop your neighbours, we are not far from what happened in Germany in the 1930s, where people got paid for Shopping folk that spoke out against the Nazi regime, or disagreed with any of its policies"

Oh sweet Jeezy Creezy, did you honestly compare being asked to show a bit of respect for members of different minorities to living in Nazi Germany? I take it you've never lived in Nazi Germany, had any relatives who lived in Nazi Germany or studied the society of Nazi Germany then?

I know lots of people who've spoken out against the government and guess what? None of them have been arrested and sentenced without trial to time in a correctional facility in order to make them good honest members of the Reich. I also know some people who have been members of the British Communist Party. None of them have been shot by government-employed stormtroopers, been beaten to death or been abducted from their homes in the middle of the night. I also have a friend in the police. At no point in his daily routine does he have to swear allegiance to Tony Blair and proclaim that it is his sworn duty to carry out the will of the leading politician of the day without regard for the needs and views of society as a whole. And no kid I've ever heard of has been asked "How many bombs would it take to incinerate the Jew-infested slums of Warsaw?" in a maths exam.

A far more accurate statement would be "The modern 'Nanny' state of Britain today is actually nothing at all like Nazi Germany."

The trouble with many people who 'speak their minds' is that they are they are not really 'speaking their minds' at all. Rather they are passing on some drivel or other they have picked up along life's crooked path, believing it to be the product of their own mind.

The Nazi reference above is a relevant one. There was no one who liked to 'speak his mind' more than Adolf Hitler. In fact he went as far as to write it all down in his best-selling book Mein Kampf. In fact Hitler wasn't really 'speaking his mind' at all, for what he understood to be his mind was in fact a conglomeration and hotchpotch of ideas picked up during his strange youth, spent mainly in Vienna, from speeches by people like the mayor Karl Lueger, articles in the anti-semitic gutter press and from watching too much German opera.

Some tears ago we had a politician who spoke her mind about several issues which many of us agreed with, and other issues which we did not agree with. But at least she brought things out into the open.
She certainly polarised the entire nation, but at least she was prepared to say openly what many were afraid to even whisper.
Unfortunately, and not unexpectedly, extremists from all shades of the political and media spectrum got onto the bandwagon, and things got very nasty.
Whilst I did not support her politically, or agree with many of her views, she had the courage to stand up in public and speak out for many of us who had been effectively silenced on many issues. Now, thanks to the internet and blogging to Newspaper sites, the voices of the people are being heard at last, and our political and other masters are being forced to sit up and take notice.


Power To The People, as John Lennon famously sang.



Peeb

Why can't you speak your mind? Sometimes it's because you won't. You are afraid for a whole range of reasons, both professional and personal.
We have too many people employed in public services with the time and opportunity to worry about things which matter, but not a lot, and the culture to worry about paper and statistics instead of production and service.
Attacking others is an easy way of ensuring that you are rarely if ever attacked yourself. Careless words are all that is required to justify an attack on someone else and once you have raised the spectre of incorrectness, the other individual's credibility is permanently damaged, so that they cannot be a threat to you.
We are taught in all forms of 'academic' training, to be concerned about others, to the extent that being concerned for our own is considered inappropriate. Don't despair, the worm always turns. Eventually those practicing these extreme examples of PC will be laughed at, and that is when real people will start to get together again.

well there is a old saying here a drunk man speaks the truth .

the problem here is with speaking your mind is that people have to many rights nowadays and can get you done for almost anything in this mad old world .

"the problem here is with speaking your mind is that people have to many rights nowadays"

...

re:

'people have to many rights nowadays' (sic)


elucidate please!