Where does political correctness go wrong

[DrZoidberg]

I think this is a good topic for this forum.

My old logic professor (who I am now friends with) has gotten into trouble because of the cover of the book he has written. It's the standard logic book used in Swedish universities.

https://www.bokus.com/bok/9789197845045/logic-basics-and-beyond/

On the cover is a white woman (the proffessors wife, who is also the CEO of a major Swedish company) and a black man (the CEO of a major corporation in Botswana) pointing at her back covered in predicate logic terms. He's just a friend of the professor. The colours have been inverted. So his wife looks black, and the man looks white. The thinking behind it is that logic is free from morality and politics. It operates in its own domain. It's clever, but is it apropriate?

But the controversy comes because some teachers in Sweden think that it looks like a white man pointing to a objectified black woman. And they think it's inapropriate in an age of #MeToo and BLM.

I know the guy. He's 100% aspie and wouldn't know social codes if it hit him in the face (which it is doing now). He couldn't be politically correct even if he tried. So there's just no way for him to win this. He just doesn't get what he's done wrong (if anything) and will never get it. He doesn't really care if they stop using his book. It's a very small income for him. Initially he wrote it just because the old one sucked so much and he wanted better teaching material. There's nothing preventing teachers to go back to the old book. It's just harder work, because it's so godawfully written. I've read and used both books. So he's cool either way.

This brings to questions:

1) Is the cover appropriate?
2) Is it fair to demand from aspies to be politically correct? This is the aspie handicap. They'll never get it and isn't it unreasonable to demand it from them?

 

[Bomb#20]

The colours have been inverted. So his wife looks black, and the man looks white. The thinking behind it is that logic is free from morality and politics. It operates in its own domain. It's clever, but is it apropriate?

But the controversy comes because some teachers in Sweden think that it looks like a white man pointing to a objectified black woman. ...

1) Is the cover appropriate?
2) Is it fair to demand from aspies to be politically correct? This is the aspie handicap. They'll never get it and isn't it unreasonable to demand it from them?

No, yes and no.

First, photoshopping a white woman deprived an actual black woman of the logic-symbols-on-naked-black-woman role so a white woman could play that role in blackface. (Well, in blackass, but the principle is the same.)

Second, any harm you do to an oppressor is by definition fair and reasonable. Your professor friend is the worst sort of oppressor. Seriously, man, 589 krona? That's like $70 for one friggin' book! Professors writing their own textbooks so their students will pad their salaries is such a racket!

And third, the standard criterion for appropriateness, fairness and reasonableness is whether we feel sorry for whoever's lobbying to be ranked higher in the stack. Why would anyone feel sorry for the author when he's got a wife that smokin' hot?

 

[Torin]

2) Is it fair to demand from aspies to be politically correct? This is the aspie handicap. They'll never get it and isn't it unreasonable to demand it from them?

Given the premise that a person with Asperger's can't understand political correctness, yes, it's unreasonable to expect it from them. Ought implies can.

I've been reading the extraordinarily controversial book Cynical Theories by Lindsay and Pluckrose. They claim that the Woke movement simultaneously condemns people who view Asperger's as a disability as "ableist," while also constructing an elaborate set of social norms of exactly the sort that people with Asperger's are not good at following, and attaching devastating consequences to deviating from those norms ("cancel culture"). This can put people with Asperger's in some difficult situations.

I thought that specific point was interesting. What are your thoughts?

 

[bigfield]

"Political correctness" isn't categorically good. Sometimes people make silly accusations. So I reject the idea that anyone, let alone Aspies, should be expected to be politically correct.

On the cover is a white woman (the proffessors wife, who is also the CEO of a major Swedish company) and a black man (the CEO of a major corporation in Botswana) pointing at her back covered in predicate logic terms. He's just a friend of the professor. The colours have been inverted. So his wife looks black, and the man looks white. The thinking behind it is that logic is free from morality and politics. It operates in its own domain. It's clever, but is it apropriate?

I didn't get any of that symbolism from looking at the cover. It just seems like it's saying that the book promises some insight into human nature, but the colour of the people doesn't seem to have any meaning beyond aesthetics. It seems a bit weird to have naked people on a book cover, but maybe that's because I'm from a more prudish culture. I don't see how the women is being objectified or why it would matter in this context. Seems more like I'm supposed to be looking at a human being studied.

It would help if it were clear what changes would need to be made to the design to make it politically correct in the eyes of its critics.

 

[Keith&Co.]

The entire point of creating POLITICAL CORRECTNESS was that people were using words with connotations they were unaware of, and giving unintentional offense.
For example, my grandmother insisted black people prefer to be called 'darkies' because when she was a little girl in Florida...

....in the dark ages...

...that was the more polite term. Then she moved to Idaho, and met no black people until my wedding.

It's not that PC goes wrong, it's that people said "don't use that word, it'll cause offense when you don't mean to" but what too many heard was "you can't cause offense."
And that misunderstanding gives some people power like a mini-homeowner's association, so they can slam someone for giving intentional offense, or not giving a rat's about anyone being offended.

So, once again, it's people that go wrong. We are why we cannot have nice things.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Your professor friend is the worst sort of oppressor. Seriously, man, 589 krona? That's like $70 for one friggin' book! Professors writing their own textbooks so their students will pad their salaries is such a racket!

I think gauging students is standard all over the world. An evil evil practice. But he barely makes any money from it anyway. It's the publisher (and thereby university) who gets most of it.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I thought that specific point was interesting. What are your thoughts?

I think woke and cancel culture is rediculous. I don't like book burning, no matter who does it. I'm also against giving people with mental handicaps a free pass. Mental problems is an explanation, not an excuse. He should know better.

That said, I do applaud any attempt towards inclusivity and sensitivity to those of colour and those of alternative mental setups.

What I am against is that wokeness has now become mandatory and if it isn't respected people risks their jobs. While I think Jordan Peterson is a massive clown, he is correct in this. The woke has become a kind of neo-fascist movement reminiscent of Maoism.

At this point sexists and racists is becoming our last defenders of free speech... and that's just plain sad. Because free speech and free expression is sacred to me.

The latest news anyway is that he backed down instantly and the next issue will have a boring cover. He had no interest in fighting for this. He's an aspie and a logician... he personally couldn't give less of a shit what's on the cover. Which is why the original cover looked like that to begin with. I think it was a spur of the moment thing because they needed a cover.

 

[DrZoidberg]

"Political correctness" isn't categorically good. Sometimes people make silly accusations. So I reject the idea that anyone, let alone Aspies, should be expected to be politically correct.

On the cover is a white woman (the proffessors wife, who is also the CEO of a major Swedish company) and a black man (the CEO of a major corporation in Botswana) pointing at her back covered in predicate logic terms. He's just a friend of the professor. The colours have been inverted. So his wife looks black, and the man looks white. The thinking behind it is that logic is free from morality and politics. It operates in its own domain. It's clever, but is it apropriate?

I didn't get any of that symbolism from looking at the cover. It just seems like it's saying that the book promises some insight into human nature, but the colour of the people doesn't seem to have any meaning beyond aesthetics. It seems a bit weird to have naked people on a book cover, but maybe that's because I'm from a more prudish culture. I don't see how the women is being objectified or why it would matter in this context. Seems more like I'm supposed to be looking at a human being studied.

It would help if it were clear what changes would need to be made to the design to make it politically correct in the eyes of its critics.

Well... she is being objectified. It's logic. The whole point of logic is to break down each element to an object and define the relations between them. Black people and white people are categories. Also objects. Is she being sexually objectified.... I don't think so. But she is slightly bent forward pushing her ass out.

Yeah... Swedes are incredibly relaxed about nudity. In the right context. Nude girls trying to look sexy, we're incredibly prudish about. But if she just looks relaxed and going about her day, nobody would react. Her having clothes on or not is pretty irrelevant. We care more about the sexualisation than just naked skin. We don't see a naked body automatically as sexiness. A dressed woman trying to look sexy would get a Swede just as much up in arms.

 

[fromderinside]

Shit. My arms are up. Why? Social context? Fuck.

 

[Lion IRC]

In Private Truths, Public Lies: The Social Consequences of Preference Falsification, Timur Kuran explains why it’s less than ideal to have situations where there is widespread preference falsification—where people don’t say what they really think out of fear. First, widely disliked social structures may be preserved because no one is brave enough to say publicly that they, too, do not agree. Secondly, social structures which are predicated on false preferences are prone to sudden collapse once the majority realizes that no one else likes or believes in the particular thing which is being upheld. Finally, preference falsification distorts public opinion, public discourse, and human knowledge. If people cannot openly discuss their views, then certain views will not be explored or discussed, and the sum of human knowledge will be diminished.

From lawyer/author Katy Barnett
https://quillette.com/2018/07/28/inducing-peoples-employers-to-fire-them-should-be-a-civil-wrong/
http5://quillette.com/2018/07/28/inducing-peoples-employers-to-fire-them-should-be-a-civil-wrong/

 

[skepticalbip]

First, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the cover of that text. Anyone who is offended by it is looking to be offended. If they claim to be offended for the sake of some 'oppressed' group they are only virtue signaling. Such people are 'offended' no matter what so should be ignored.

But I don't think the cover is what is being claimed about it. It appears to be exactly what it looks like, the back of a black woman and the arm of a white man, not a negative image of a white woman and the arm of a black man. Otherwise, a negative image of the cover should look like what is being claimed and it doesn't.

 

[DrZoidberg]

In Private Truths, Public Lies: The Social Consequences of Preference Falsification, Timur Kuran explains why it’s less than ideal to have situations where there is widespread preference falsification—where people don’t say what they really think out of fear. First, widely disliked social structures may be preserved because no one is brave enough to say publicly that they, too, do not agree. Secondly, social structures which are predicated on false preferences are prone to sudden collapse once the majority realizes that no one else likes or believes in the particular thing which is being upheld. Finally, preference falsification distorts public opinion, public discourse, and human knowledge. If people cannot openly discuss their views, then certain views will not be explored or discussed, and the sum of human knowledge will be diminished.

From lawyer/author Katy Barnett
https://quillette.com/2018/07/28/inducing-peoples-employers-to-fire-them-should-be-a-civil-wrong/
http5://quillette.com/2018/07/28/inducing-peoples-employers-to-fire-them-should-be-a-civil-wrong/

View attachment 29168

Interesting. I think I'll read it. Yeah, people watching their language not to say certain hurty words is newspeak. Today, racists are trying hard not to say racist words and manage to delude themselves into thinking they're not racists = no social progress. While progressives caught on camera saying a bad word out of context is crucified as a racist. It's an upside down world right now. I can't see how the worlds we have now is progress.

 

[DrZoidberg]

First, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the cover of that text. Anyone who is offended by it is looking to be offended. If they claim to be offended for the sake of some 'oppressed' group they are only virtue signaling. Such people are 'offended' no matter what so should be ignored.

But I don't think the cover is what is being claimed about it. It appears to be exactly what it looks like, the back of a black woman and the arm of a white man, not a negative image of a white woman and the arm of a black man. Otherwise, a negative image of the cover should look like what is being claimed and it doesn't.

View attachment 29170

I know his wife. She's white. It's her. I have not met the guy though.

 

[Jokodo]

First, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the cover of that text. Anyone who is offended by it is looking to be offended. If they claim to be offended for the sake of some 'oppressed' group they are only virtue signaling. Such people are 'offended' no matter what so should be ignored.

But I don't think the cover is what is being claimed about it. It appears to be exactly what it looks like, the back of a black woman and the arm of a white man, not a negative image of a white woman and the arm of a black man. Otherwise, a negative image of the cover should look like what is being claimed and it doesn't.

View attachment 29170

I know his wife. She's white. It's her. I have not met the guy though.

He has a point. It doesn't look like a negative image of a light-skinned person, but a positive image of a dark-skinned person. Just look at the shades and reflections.

 

[Jokodo]

1) Is the cover appropriate?

Not really.

2) Is it fair to demand from aspies to be politically correct?

It is not fair to expect them to get it right at first. It is however fair to expect them to listen when they're told by others with a better talent of reading social cues that it might be inappropriate.

 

[DrZoidberg]

1) Is the cover appropriate?

Not really.

2) Is it fair to demand from aspies to be politically correct?

It is not fair to expect them to get it right at first. It is however fair to expect them to listen when they're told by others with a better talent of reading social cues that it might be inappropriate.

He is a logic professor. The only people he's ever likely to have any contact with are likely to be other aspies. Or people on the spectrum. As goes for anybody responsible for publishing the book. It was published in 2010, and it's been used by all Swedish logic students since then. It's not until now anybody reacted. He's in an environment where nobody will get it.

The woman who reacted was a logic lecturer. So she has enough social skills to react. Which is cool and challenges my preconceptions about people who teach logic.

 

[ruby sparks]

It doesn't look like a negative image of a light-skinned person, but a positive image of a dark-skinned person.

Yeah. It looks like that to me.

 

[DrZoidberg]

It doesn't look like a negative image of a light-skinned person, but a positive image of a dark-skinned person.

Yeah. It looks like that to me.

Perhaps Photoshop skillz have been involved?

 

[Lion IRC]

...But the controversy comes because some teachers in Sweden think that it looks like a white man pointing to a objectified black woman. And they think it's inappropriate in an age of #MeToo and BLM.

Where can we read more about the controversy?
Also, I agree - photoshopped. Or stunt double. (Its not a negative.)

The colours have been inverted.

Yeah, sort of.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Regardless of the race of the woman, why is a naked woman on the cover of a logic textbook??