[webehere]

So there is not a single situation in which any group is allowed to be excluded based on anything that in't symptomatic of some larger conspiracy?

"I don't want Danny to come and see Jim Jeffries comedy because Jim says a lot of negative things about religion, and Danny as a Christian would be a buzzkill".

"I don't want Danny to come and see Anita Sarkesian talk because he is a man and his being there will be a buzzkill".

"I don't want Danny to come and see Barcelona Play Real Madrid because he is a buzzkill whenever sport comes up".

Seems to me that there are lots of valid reasons why people wouldn't want certain people around - people exclude me from all manner of things, and I don't think that is evidence of systematic bias against me. In fact, in many situations I'd say it is reasonable to exclude me, because I would very much be a buzzkill. As one such example:

"I don't want webehere to come and see the psychic, because he will spend his whole time trying to prove they are full of shit, and that will be a buzzkill".

[anigbrowl]

I can't help noticing that all your examples involve an individual, even though you advance them in the context of group discrimination.

What about 'I don't want any men coming to our next brainstorming session because they're always going on about margins and analytics and it's such a buzzkill?'

[e1g]

"I do not want your husbands on this shopping trip as they'll be such a buzkill". "Let's not invite our girlfriends to this snowboarding drunk fest as they'll be such a buzkill".

These phrases could be social cliches, but neither is immoral in principle. It's ok to be in the company of people who are definitely and exactly into your fetish.

Of course if it's a company sponsored snow trip then it's different matter altogether.

[smokeyj]

Like code camps exclusively for gender/race/socioeconomic/etc groups? I thought exclusionary practices were the pinnacle of progressive reasoning.

[untog]

You really don't see the difference between "Let's not invite any women to this event, they're all bitches" and "Let's make a women only event because they are a minority and their voices tend to not be heard in the masses"?

[smokeyj]

Oh sure, there's infinite differences. It just sounded as if anigbrowl was taking a principled position on exclusionary practices. Almost like we should tolerate people who look and act differently than ourselves instead of secluding ourselves into groups that mirror our values.

[anigbrowl]

Actually I was just pointing out the self-contradictory nature of the comment I was replying to, rather than making a sweeping statement about exclusionary practices, which you and some other people have projected onto it. I do not, for example, consider myself a 'progressive.'

You could, of course, have just asked me to clarify my views on the subject before taking pot-shots at it.

[oldmanjay]

one is a doomed attempt to fix sexism with sexism and the other is a strawman. they seem to have very little relation to each other.

[anigbrowl]

If you want to pick a fight, try someone else. I'm not in the mood for sarcasm on this pleasant afternoon.

[narrator]

If you want a conceptual framework to understand political correctness you need to understand Gramsci who wrote the rulebook for culture war back in the early 20th century. John Fonte explains the whole thing pretty well in this classic essay: http://www.hoover.org/research/why-there-culture-war

[tikhonj]

Wow, fascinating and yet deeply depressing read. I realized that I fundamentally disagree with both major sides in this cultural debate—the only ones that have any real chance of maintaining broad social control. Which would be fine, except both sides view any disagreement as inherently immoral. They cannot countenance any disagreement and actively try to suppress it and reeducate the populace.

I've been realizing that the world is a lot more moralistic and populist than I thought, and this just reinforces that. Distressing.

I'm content having my own preferences on how things should be run, even if they're different from most people's. And I certainly don't want to push them onto others! I would like a world where people can do their own thing with no problems as long as they're not trying to force their views on others. But that's not enough for either side; both insist that any person or organization has to follow their principles even if they're content to be self-contained.