Political correctness (“PC”) is such a threat to liberty that only a few people have the courage to defend their convictions, which, in fact, should be our convictions: Freedom of speech, which is the right to peacefully protest, march, picket or assemble, in defense of those issues we will defend with our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

Without that freedom, which is first among equals and enshrined in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, all subsequent rights are moot. For you cannot be silent about this particular right, under penalty of expulsion from a university or termination of employment or exclusion by society, and be vocal about the other nine amendments that define the Bill of Rights.

And yet, how many of us will take that risk – a risk that should not even exist because it is a violation of law, and an attack against the morality of law – when the PC police seek to enforce their tyrannical legislation?

Our silence, the very thing these bullies demand we obey, is the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil. By saying nothing, we will do nothing, thereby allowing the enemies of speech – the opponents of dissent, and the forces of totalitarianism – to declare victory against language.

Words are the arsenal of democracy. They are the means by which we communicate, and the way we clarify the difference between justice and injustice.

When some anonymous bully attempts to censor us, when he or she applies a red pen to certain words, redacting whole pages about the brutality of Islamic fundamentalism or the problems of illegal immigration, and we say nothing; when we must use euphemisms to disguise the truth, and when the greatest offense is the “offensive” restatement of the obvious, then we will retain our citizenship by having forfeited our freedom.

That scenario is unacceptable; regardless of how “sensitive” the PC activists claim to be.

The Constitution protects rights, not feelings. Taking offense at what someone says is not an argument; it is an excuse to destroy my (and your) liberty.

To emote is an assault against rational thought. That is, a frown is not a persuasive response to . . . anything. And tears, of the crocodile kind, are no more convincing than a toddler having a temper tantrum.

We are the sensitive ones because, either as a result of embarrassment toward these antics or an aversion to sadness, we abet the undoing of the exchange of ideas, civil discourse, self-rule and the sanctity of the secret ballot.

All the foundational markers of our republic – an independent judiciary and due process of law, a free press and the proliferation of religious belief – all this, and much more, is kindling for a funeral pyre, reducing our rights to ashes.

What, you may ask, should we do to prevent this onslaught? In a word: Fight!

Fight with words, not arms.

Fight by exposing the sham that is political correctness.

Fight by refusing to succumb to false accusations and blatant lies. Fight by brandishing facts, and fight by broadcasting the truth to those who yearn to hear it.

Fight by not responding to the taunts and curses spewed against you.

Fight by letting the other side talk itself to defeat, as their shouting grows weaker and their howling grows softer.

Fight like gentlemen and gentlewomen, and speak like heroes.

The defense of liberty is a heroic mission because, where others have bled to preserve it and millions more have died to save it, it is now our duty to revive it.

That is our destiny.

 

 

Elizabeth Rice Grossman