They're not terrorists; they're just non-terror-challenged...

Senate Bill calls for "consulting with experts to ensure that the lexicon used within public statements...does not aid extremists by offending the American Muslim community"

S. 4, a bill to implement provisions of the 9/11 Commission, is currently on the Senate floor. It includes under "Miscellaneous Provisions" Section 1302, a "Sense of the Senate Regarding Combating Domestic Radicalization." Predictably, it is based on the usual premise (Subsection (a)(1)) that extremists are "exploiting" Islam to achieve "ideological ends" -- but what those ideological ends might be, and how exactly Islam is being exploited, is not explained.

Also predictable are the dhimmi measures suggested to take care of the problem, including:

"Consulting with experts to ensure that the lexicon used within public statements is precise and appropriate and does not aid extremists by offending the American Muslim community"

This is D'Souzaite thinking: if we speak honestly about the Islamic jihad being waged against us, it will drive Muslims who abhor the jihad to join it. That's like saying that a Christian who despises Fred Phelps (the "God hates fags" guy) will join his group if he or Christianity is criticized...

Read the Rest at Jihad Watch

Ban certain words, and it becomes easier to ban others. If I can't call terrorists base, murdering, cowardly wastes of perfectly good breathing air today, it becomes easier and easier to eventually ensure that the word "terrorist" disappears altogether.

Personally, I despise certain words - certain derrogatory racial terminology drives me up a tree. But there's a difference between social mores dictating what is and is not acceptable, and your GOVERNMENT deciding what you can and cannot say. When we start deciding that something can't be said because it might offend someone, the right to free speech itself is threatened.

Your Constitution never intended to guarantee that you would be free from ever being offended. It did, however, intend to guarantee that your government would not be able to dictate what you were or were not allowed to say. I understand reasonable restrictions (the whole "fire in a crowded theater" thing, but it's important to note that a rule like that does not ban the CONTENT of your speech. It simply clarifies that you do not have a right to risk others' lives.

To ensure that speech about jihadists is sanitized so as to not offend Muslims completely ignores the fact peaceful Muslims should be offended by Muslim terrorists, not critics of Muslim terrorists!!!

I talked about the dangers of banning words a little while ago here. And now we have another incident. Public outcry to chastize someone who says something people don't like is one thing. That is freedom. Don't like what a politician says - don't contribute to their campaign, and don't vote for them. Don't like what an actor says - don't pay to see their movies, and don't have them speak at your event.

But when the government starts engineering our speech, we are at grave risk. Political correctness is going to kill this country.

It's doubleplusbad.

Labels: opinion, political correctness, politics