The evils of political correctness.

[Speakpigeon]

Racism is about opinions. It's not about what words are used. When I was young the word for black people in Sweden was "neger". It had no connotation either way. A neutral word.

Then we got MTV in the early 90'ies and Sweden was suddenly exposed to a flood of American media, and the English word "nigger". Then started a transition where people started equating the English "nigger" with the Swedish "neger". If you know anything about European languages and the words for black, the racist assumptions is odd.

After this we got a transition period when older not racist people (who didn't watch MTV) were called racist and didn't understand why.

The Swedish "neger" discussion high-lights the issue. The Swedish PC people didn't care whether people were racist or not. They only cared what words people used. Sure, words matter. But context also matters. USA has a context that Sweden doesn't. If I tell you "din mammas fitta luktade get när jag knullade henne" you're not going to get offended, because it's not a language you use (I hope).

The Swedish PC brigade were using the word neger to bash people. It is intellectual snobbery. Either you are well read, well eduated and intellectual and know how to navigate the offensive words of the day or you reveal yourseld as an uneducated idiot. I wonder why the people most angry about PC is the uneducated working class? Each time they speak publically they are walking into a mine field of faux passes they don't master. Good intentions won't save them.

PC is being used as a bat to bash educationally weak classes in our socieites. I don't know about you, but I'm not cool with that.

I think there's a good test we can use for if someone is a pc-nice person or a pc-asshole. If you watch your mouth to not say offensive shit, you're a pc-nice guy. If you are listening for trigger words, rather than trying to understand what is meant in what other people are saying, and then making a show out of it, you're a pc-asshole.

Being offended about Mohammed Ali converting to Islam and joining the Nation of Islam is perfectly fine. We're allowed to have opinions. The Nation of Islam is not your garden variety Islamic congregation. They are not nice people. We have to be able to say that without being labelled Islamophobic or racist.

Most PC debates are more about words being used than what people mean. It's possible to use racist slurs without being racist. It's all about context. This seems to be completely lost today. Anybody saying the "n-word" is saying "nigger". They're synonyms. A world where one is ok to say but not the other is an insane world. We're so wrapped up in pseudo discussions and debates about trigger words that PC has turned into a joke.

That was a long rant. But this fear of not being PC has led to an inablity to talk about things in a language most people understand. That's what I took away from the documentary.

I think you are doing what you accuse other people of doing, namely that you choose to assume the worst motive behind PC just as you accuse the PC 'brigade' of choosing to assume that racism motivates the use of the word 'neger'.

I'm sure some are guilty as charged but all or even most of them?! What if any substantial number of those who use the word 'neger' do have racist motives and if any substantial number of the PC crowd are using PC to really fight prejudice?

Isn't the problem that language is a blunt instrument? Isn't the problem that all instruments are blunt to some extent? Isn't the problem that we all prefer to be liberal in our use of language rather than spend more money to solve problems?
EB

 

[DrZoidberg]

Racism is about opinions. It's not about what words are used. When I was young the word for black people in Sweden was "neger". It had no connotation either way. A neutral word.

Then we got MTV in the early 90'ies and Sweden was suddenly exposed to a flood of American media, and the English word "nigger". Then started a transition where people started equating the English "nigger" with the Swedish "neger". If you know anything about European languages and the words for black, the racist assumptions is odd.

After this we got a transition period when older not racist people (who didn't watch MTV) were called racist and didn't understand why.

The Swedish "neger" discussion high-lights the issue. The Swedish PC people didn't care whether people were racist or not. They only cared what words people used. Sure, words matter. But context also matters. USA has a context that Sweden doesn't. If I tell you "din mammas fitta luktade get när jag knullade henne" you're not going to get offended, because it's not a language you use (I hope).

The Swedish PC brigade were using the word neger to bash people. It is intellectual snobbery. Either you are well read, well eduated and intellectual and know how to navigate the offensive words of the day or you reveal yourseld as an uneducated idiot. I wonder why the people most angry about PC is the uneducated working class? Each time they speak publically they are walking into a mine field of faux passes they don't master. Good intentions won't save them.

PC is being used as a bat to bash educationally weak classes in our socieites. I don't know about you, but I'm not cool with that.

I think there's a good test we can use for if someone is a pc-nice person or a pc-asshole. If you watch your mouth to not say offensive shit, you're a pc-nice guy. If you are listening for trigger words, rather than trying to understand what is meant in what other people are saying, and then making a show out of it, you're a pc-asshole.

Being offended about Mohammed Ali converting to Islam and joining the Nation of Islam is perfectly fine. We're allowed to have opinions. The Nation of Islam is not your garden variety Islamic congregation. They are not nice people. We have to be able to say that without being labelled Islamophobic or racist.

Most PC debates are more about words being used than what people mean. It's possible to use racist slurs without being racist. It's all about context. This seems to be completely lost today. Anybody saying the "n-word" is saying "nigger". They're synonyms. A world where one is ok to say but not the other is an insane world. We're so wrapped up in pseudo discussions and debates about trigger words that PC has turned into a joke.

That was a long rant. But this fear of not being PC has led to an inablity to talk about things in a language most people understand. That's what I took away from the documentary.

I think you are doing what you accuse other people of doing, namely that you choose to assume the worst motive behind PC just as you accuse the PC 'brigade' of choosing to assume that racism motivates the use of the word 'neger'.

I'm sure some are guilty as charged but all or even most of them?! What if any substantial number of those who use the word 'neger' do have racist motives and if any substantial number of the PC crowd are using PC to really fight prejudice?

Isn't the problem that language is a blunt instrument? Isn't the problem that all instruments are blunt to some extent? Isn't the problem that we all prefer to be liberal in our use of language rather than spend more money to solve problems?
EB

Yeah, I'm assuming the worst motives behind it, because it's not our jobs to police each other. That's normative social control of the worst kind. If you think that saying the word nigger is bad. Or calling a transsexual woman a "he". Then don't. Don't assume things about others who do. It's really not harder than that. It has to be ok to be wrong. Somebody isn't necessarily an evil person because they've misunderstood something. Compassion can go a long way.

I'm aware that in USA that word "nigger" is so loaded at this point that not judging is impossible. I'm just using it because it's the strongest example of pc language triggers.

Every culture has a majority group. This majority will set the norms for language use. That's not oppression. That's just practical. People who belong to the norm are very often (if not always) blind to the struggles of members of the non-norm. Anybody who belongs to a non-majority category in a culture will because of this sometimes get called things that may offend them. This is not going to change.

Making the majority in a culture aware of the struggles of minorities is an ever on-going project. If we force the majority, like we're doing now, to be aware of every single little special variety of human identity and to police their language about it, we're not actually making the world a better place. We're just making a world of people who are afraid to say anything.

My Facebook feed is full of three kinds of people basically.

People who constantly post political things and only say PC stuff. Boring, because it cannot be challenged. It's kicking down wide open doors.

Or people who constantly post political things and think there's a liberal conspiracy and post racist stuff. Boring, because it's all lies and nonsense. Fake news.

Or people, the smart people, who say nothing publicly. They only ever express any honest political opinion over a couple of beers at a party.

That's the society I see now.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Yeah, I'm assuming the worst motives behind it

So you're doing what you reproach other people of doing.

, because it's not our jobs to police each other.

But PC doesn't actually send the police to your door. In democracies where it is still legal, using PC to influence other people is just fair and square. Move to some theocratic regime if you don't like it.

That's normative social control of the worst kind. If you think that saying the word nigger is bad. Or calling a transsexual woman a "he". Then don't. Don't assume things about others who do.

Which is what you are doing with PC people, which seem to be because we have to assume motive and we can only do it from what people say, and this whatever we are saying.

Every culture has a majority group. This majority will set the norms for language use. That's not oppression. That's just practical. People who belong to the norm are very often (if not always) blind to the struggles of members of the non-norm. Anybody who belongs to a non-majority category in a culture will because of this sometimes get called things that may offend them. This is not going to change.

Actually, it does change. I can remember how people made silly jokes about Jews when I was a kid and now they don't do it so overtly. It doesn't stop it altogether but it does limit the spreading the jokes and I suspect it helps at least some people think about it.

Making the majority in a culture aware of the struggles of minorities is an ever on-going project. If we force the majority, like we're doing now, to be aware of every single little special variety of human identity and to police their language about it, we're not actually making the world a better place. We're just making a world of people who are afraid to say anything.

Nobody is actually forced to do anything. It's a battle of influence and nobody goes to jail.

My Facebook feed is full of three kinds of people basically.

People who constantly post political things and only say PC stuff. Boring, because it cannot be challenged. It's kicking down wide open doors.

Or people who constantly post political things and think there's a liberal conspiracy and post racist stuff. Boring, because it's all lies and nonsense. Fake news.

Or people, the smart people, who say nothing publicly. They only ever express any honest political opinion over a couple of beers at a party.

That's the society I see now.

Sounds like PC has nothing to do with that.

The tentation to try and get other people to speak in certain ways is not limited to the PC crowd. Uneducated people are just as likely to do it. The anti-PC crowd is also doing it, obviously, just as you are.

So, where's the problem with PC exactly if it's just doing what most people do anyway?
EB

 

[DrZoidberg]

So you're doing what you reproach other people of doing.

I don't think it's the same thing. I'm for tolerance. PC is against tolerance. They're for language that signal tolerance. But that's not tolerance.

, because it's not our jobs to police each other.

But PC doesn't actually send the police to your door. In democracies where it is still legal, using PC to influence other people is just fair and square. Move to some theocratic regime if you don't like it.

Erm... PC-brigade wants to live in a theocracy. I belong to the other side. I don't. We have to be tolerant of dissenting opinions, or we're de-facto living in a theocracy. Blasphemy laws are blasphemy laws whatever the context.

That's normative social control of the worst kind. If you think that saying the word nigger is bad. Or calling a transsexual woman a "he". Then don't. Don't assume things about others who do.

Which is what you are doing with PC people, which seem to be because we have to assume motive and we can only do it from what people say, and this whatever we are saying.

Yes, I am. Doesn't mean I'm wrong.

Every culture has a majority group. This majority will set the norms for language use. That's not oppression. That's just practical. People who belong to the norm are very often (if not always) blind to the struggles of members of the non-norm. Anybody who belongs to a non-majority category in a culture will because of this sometimes get called things that may offend them. This is not going to change.

Actually, it does change. I can remember how people made silly jokes about Jews when I was a kid and now they don't do it so overtly. It doesn't stop it altogether but it does limit the spreading the jokes and I suspect it helps at least some people think about it.

The cynic might say that's because the majority have started picking on Muslims now. This is how pecking orders work. It doesn't mean we now accept Jews.

Making the majority in a culture aware of the struggles of minorities is an ever on-going project. If we force the majority, like we're doing now, to be aware of every single little special variety of human identity and to police their language about it, we're not actually making the world a better place. We're just making a world of people who are afraid to say anything.

Nobody is actually forced to do anything. It's a battle of influence and nobody goes to jail.

If you lose your job over it, then it's force. Or lose opportunities in life.

 

[iolo]

It is surprising to me that so many who reject religion can still have so deep a faith in something as obviously made up as 'political correctness'. Demonstrates the necessity of some nonsensical belief, obviously.

 

[untermensche]

.....The Swedish PC brigade were using the word neger to bash people.....

Are there hospital reports of the injuries?

Pictures of the blood?

Your hysterics are ridiculous.

Nobody is harmed because they are told saying "neger" is now considered offensive and other words should be used.

What it is is arrogant white people that do not want to be told what they can say by lower forms of life.

 

[DrZoidberg]

.....The Swedish PC brigade were using the word neger to bash people.....

Are there hospital reports of the injuries?

Pictures of the blood?

Your hysterics are ridiculous.

Nobody is harmed because they are told saying "neger" is now considered offensive and other words should be used.

What it is is arrogant white people that do not want to be told what they can say by lower forms of life.

The damage something can have to society isn't measured in buckets of blood. I don't want to be told by anybody what I'm allowed to say.

But on that topic. The Swedish black artist Makode Linde got assaulted and beaten by the leader of Black Coffee, which is a Swedish black rights group. The reason. He made an exhibition about racism where he used the word "neger".

Here's the exhibition. You be the judge if it's racist.

https://www.google.dk/search?q=nege...1pzUAhXLBiwKHUnZBuoQ_AUICigB&biw=1280&bih=627

He's for a long time been exploring racism and racist symbolism. He's also been exploring white guilt. And how white guilt often leads to people giving attention to non-white artists and then not caring about the art. Unless the non-white artist is willing to play the victim-of-racism card nobody is interested in what the say or do. That's what he says anyway. He wants to be judged on the merits of his art alone, and not because of his identity. He wants to be an artist. Not a black artist.

Confusingly enough the same artists has also been attacked and beaten by racists for racist reasons.

 

[untermensche]

I don't want to be told by anybody what I'm allowed to say...

Too fucking bad.

If you are saying something that offends people you should stop.

If somebody is literally beating you for saying it that is a crime. Not some new crime. People have been assaulted for the things they say as long as there have been people saying things.

If they are scolding you, grow up.

 

[fromderinside]

Political dimension in permitted and not permitted discourse can be reduced to segment, tribe, family, cohort. Those in minority or resented or appearing to have more or less or to be different are all targets of, my word, hate speech or denigration.

Now if correct were simply with respect to a nation's standards, reflected in documents and practice, we'd only have, hopefully, rational. or, better, empirical speech. However such are starting points where subgroups differing in some respect are either the subject of or the provider of hate speech (political correctness on steroids). We've all going for advantage or acceptance so subjective speech tied to perceived defects or traits. Resorting to red flag code labels changes nothing except to turn off discussion.

Political correctness is our current way to be at war without paying taxes for fighting and killing. Fortunately this type of thing is usually practiced by many small minorities all of differing flavors of advantage disadvantage causing little effect except to bring this or that practice to a halt by raising it to a more general audience for arbitration.

Usually we don't get exercised too much if the perceived chasm is only and inch deed and two inches wide.Sometimes though we recruit others into our petty disputes with more general, fear producing code language at which time we need be careful else war between nations or societies may result.

In my view the way to defuse political speech is to remove hate components from it. Much cliche political speech is so because everybody knows it's just a small child's, or group's tantrum. Objectively making political speech cliche, thus forgettable, should be the objective of anyone offended by it.

 

[DrZoidberg]

If you are saying something that offends people you should stop.

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

 

[untermensche]

If you are saying something that offends people you should stop.

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

So in your world a person SHOULD offend people when they can easily avoid it?

I say they should not.

And the world will be better for it. Less people offended.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I don't think it's the same thing. I'm for tolerance. PC is against tolerance. They're for language that signal tolerance. But that's not tolerance.

The only thing that PC people have in common is that they find certain declarations offensive and are prepared to say so. But you choose to portray them as all guilty of some serious piece of wrongdoing, which you still haven't clearly characterised. I'm sure some of them are seriously wrong but I fail to see how you could possibly know that all of them are. PC is not in itself morally or legally problematic. Doing it is perfectly legal and ethical. Some PC people surely are guilty of some serious wrongs but take any group of people and you'll find a number of nasties.

In democracies where it is still legal, using PC to influence other people is just fair and square. Move to some theocratic regime if you don't like it.

Erm... PC-brigade wants to live in a theocracy.

That's just an idiotic statement. A theocracy is a regime where you can end up having to pay a fine, end up in prison, have you hand chopped off or be hanged just for expressing dissenting opinion. I don't think that more than a few idiots among the PC-crowd would push the joke to such an extreme.

I belong to the other side. I don't. We have to be tolerant of dissenting opinions, or we're de-facto living in a theocracy. Blasphemy laws are blasphemy laws whatever the context.

There are no PC laws in the U.S or in Britain. You are being delusional.

Don't assume things about others who do.

Which is what you are doing with PC people, which seem to be because we have to assume motive and we can only do it from what people say, and this whatever we are saying.

Yes, I am. Doesn't mean I'm wrong.

But you are asking that we don't assume things about other people while apparently accepting that you are doing it because we all have to do it. That's just straightforwardly contradictory.

Actually, it does change. I can remember how people made silly jokes about Jews when I was a kid and now they don't do it so overtly. It doesn't stop it altogether but it does limit the spreading the jokes and I suspect it helps at least some people think about it.

The cynic might say that's because the majority have started picking on Muslims now. This is how pecking orders work. It doesn't mean we now accept Jews.

No. Jokes about Jews started to disappear well before people started to see Muslims as the Black Sheep. And generally speaking, there's some progress for example in terms of LGBT rights and acceptation in the general population. Far from perfect but much better than in the past. Black people are more visible in many economic sector, the U.S did elect a black man as president. We have black people, Muslims, homosexuals, visible on television as a matter of routine. Something that would have been impossible only a few decades ago.

We're just making a world of people who are afraid to say anything.

Nobody is actually forced to do anything. It's a battle of influence and nobody goes to jail.

If you lose your job over it, then it's force. Or lose opportunities in life.

If ever somebody lost their job for no good reason in connection with PC then some particular people are responsible. You choose instead to regard all PC-minded people as responsible. This is just irrational, ridiculous, and you essentially being prejudiced.

Anyway, it's clear you are unable to argue your case properly. All you do is express your prejudice. There's no debate to be had.

Thanks for the video, though.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

If you are saying something that offends people you should stop.

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

PC is not about forcibly stopping people from making prejudiced or discriminatory declarations. It's about shaming them, and not for being offensive but for contributing to the misery of other people for no good reason.

It can be of course perfectly sound to choose to be offensive. If religious people want to go public about their beliefs it's only fair that non-religious people should be able to go public about their own views, including those on religious people and institutions, and even those on religious beliefs, and this without fear of violence or of justice courts. As long as you are only offensive, you should be safe. And if you don't like being offended about your faith then don't go public about your faith.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

We want to put political correctness into some form of social science.

OK. So Political correctness ranges from mild denigration to hate speech. Possible hate speech can lead to speciation which puts it in the class of beak size determining resource preferences and ultimately mating constraints.

In an informal scaling of speech I'd run one from disagreement to hatred, from mild to radical in each category with political speech running from in small groups to nations. Marrying scales then should be relatively simple. Small groups may have speech that leads to one side killing the other with societal loses being minimal and species consequences being negligible. As you can see modifiers are building up rather quickly and as they do levels of uncertainty in meaning and consequences becomes ever more blurred.

That is why I don't think political correctness as a subset of political speech as a subset of tribe ranging from family to local niche holders to divisions to societies is workable.

This thread is all over the place on what is political correctness, how to interpret, augmenting my distress with this even being something scientists should look at.

So I'm going to take myself out of the current discussion which seems to be accelerating toward back and forth brow beating.

ta ta.

 

[J842P]

.....The Swedish PC brigade were using the word neger to bash people.....

Are there hospital reports of the injuries?

Pictures of the blood?

Your hysterics are ridiculous.

Nobody is harmed because they are told saying "neger" is now considered offensive and other words should be used.

What it is is arrogant white people that do not want to be told what they can say by lower forms of life.

They were more than likely being told to say *by other white people*. As is usually the case, the PC crowd is not made up of the actual people they claim to represent. Consider the idea of cultural appropriation in the US. I can guarantee you that no one in Mexico gives a rat's ass if someone in Oregon opens a burrito stand selling Americanized burritos.

 

[J842P]

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

So in your world a person SHOULD offend people when they can easily avoid it?

I say they should not.

And the world will be better for it. Less people offended.

It depends on the nature of the offense.

If great swaths of America are offended by what you call Donald Trump, does that mean you shouldn't call Donald Trump a buffoon?

 

[laughing dog]

It used to be considered polite to avoid or abstain from knowingly insulting someone. And if one inadvertently insulted or offended someone, one apologized. To be polite (i.e. considerate of the feelings of others) was considered to be correct. Seemed to work pretty well.

So what exactly is the problem with being considerate of others? Why did some people have to rebel against politeness with the bogus specter of "political correctness"? Seems to me that much of the rebellion against "PC" is lead by people like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc.... who have worked tirelessly to lower the stand of political and social discourse.

 

[untermensche]

So in your world a person SHOULD offend people when they can easily avoid it?

I say they should not.

And the world will be better for it. Less people offended.

It depends on the nature of the offense.

If great swaths of America are offended by what you call Donald Trump, does that mean you shouldn't call Donald Trump a buffoon?

Trump is doing things that effect everybody. Things that actually harm people.

I was talking about deliberately offending somebody who is harming nobody.

No reason for it.

 

[DrZoidberg]

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

So in your world a person SHOULD offend people when they can easily avoid it?

I say they should not.

And the world will be better for it. Less people offended.

I want people to be honest. If that offends. So be it.

I don't think not offending should be a virtue.

Taking offence is having a strong emotional reaction to what other people say or do. Well... it's none of their fucking business. If you feel offended by someone... kindly shut the fuck up about it. You can chose who you interact with in your life. If someone offends you, just don't interact with that person anymore. Problem solved. Being offended should only be a problem to the person taking offence. And nobody else.

If you are offended by someone and you tell them that they offended you.. it has to be ok for that person to not do anything about it or not give a shit. Today we expect immediate action and some sort of apology. I think that is wrong. It assumes malice. When it's more appropriate to assume ignorance or just a simple mistake, or misunderstanding.

There's times when people might chose to censor themselves for tactical reasons. At lets say, parties where they've been invited and are a friends friend, and don't know that many. Or at work. Or when you've got a bipolar friend who is in one of their sensitive periods. I do it all the time. Because it's smart and often in my best interest. But I've got no illusions I'm making the world a better place. I'm not.

I don't want to live in a cotton wool world of non-offence. Yeah, it sucks being black in a racist society. But if you were a black guy in a racist society, would you really be more comfortable if everybody pretends to like you so you couldn't tell the racists apart from the non-racists? This BTW, is a big part of what the documentary is about. If we assume that black people are little sensitive flowers who can't be criticised we ARE in fact being racist.

The only way to improve anything is to dare to talk about it honestly. Avoiding to offend is avoiding to be honest.

 

[DrZoidberg]

No I shouldn't. I really shouldn't. And that's a terrible attitude.

If I say things that offends others I have given them valuable information. I've just helped them learn that they should stop wasting their time talking with me.

I couldn't imagine a more hellish existance than hanging out with a bunch of people who didn't feel they could speak freely. I hate people like that. There's no way to learn if I am surrounded by vile scumbags.

Its one thing if they're working in a service profession and are being proffesionally nice. But beyond that, just bring it. Warts and all.

PC is not about forcibly stopping people from making prejudiced or discriminatory declarations. It's about shaming them, and not for being offensive but for contributing to the misery of other people for no good reason.

We're a social species. Public shaming is an extremely powerful tool of retribution. Not long ago I heard a radio documentary about big scandals in the Swedish press. It was anything from gaffes to embezzlement accusations. They interviewed the targets of these 10 - 20 years on. They all reported on long depressions and bizarre and extreme long term mental problems. They all got powerful physical reactions to the extreme levels of stress.

I don't think we should downplay the damage of public shaming.

It can be of course perfectly sound to choose to be offensive. If religious people want to go public about their beliefs it's only fair that non-religious people should be able to go public about their own views, including those on religious people and institutions, and even those on religious beliefs, and this without fear of violence or of justice courts. As long as you are only offensive, you should be safe. And if you don't like being offended about your faith then don't go public about your faith.
EB

I agree 100%. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Then there's the aspect of value of what is being said. If we're discussing opinions and you don't risk offending with your statement you're most likely not adding value to the discussion. Discussions where everybody sits around and pats each other on the back is pointless IMHO. That's just masturbation, and I can do that fine on my own.