BY JOHN K. WILSON
A Yahoo/YouGov poll last week (May 24-26, 2021) showed a notable result: 39% of Americans think “political correctness” is “a very big problem,” far more than the 32% who say that Covid-19 is “a very big problem.” This was the response even though Covid-19 is still killing 3,500 Americans every week (and 75,000 around the world). How did political correctness become a worse problem than a global pandemic?
Political correctness is a deeply partisan idea: 70% of 2020 Trump voters (compared to 23% of Biden voters) called political correctness a very big problem (another 17% called it a “somewhat big problem”). Interestingly, only 57% of Republicans say it’s a very big problem. That tells us something remarkable: Believing that political correctness is a big problem is the core value of Trump voters. Trump voters are probably more anti-PC than pro-Republican. Republicans who don’t see political correctness as a problem probably tended not to vote for Trump. Yet the power of political correctness as a hated idea has persuaded millions of people who otherwise would reject conservative talking points. This recent poll found that 38% of Blacks and 34% of Hispanics agree that PC is “a very big problem.”
For Trump voters, more of them think “political correctness” is a very big problem than any other topic in the survey, including violent crime (65%), the economy (58%), race relations (22%), and especially Covid-19, which only 16% of Trump voters think is a very big problem. It’s a remarkable fact: you can have the equivalent in America of a 9/11 every single week, and most Trump supporters will say that political correctness is worse.
Political correctness has had a profound impact on American politics, and Trump seized upon it as the core value of his presidential campaign: “I refuse to be politically correct.” The people responding to this poll are simply repeating what Trump has said: “I think the big problem this country has is being politically correct.”
Trump’s stand against political correctness helps explain why all of his sexist and racist and insulting and offensive comments did not destroy his candidacy, as would have happened to any other candidate. Trump turns his offensive statements into a heroic act of resistance against the forces of political correctness. Even when people dislike what he says, they support the idea of someone who is willing to offend the establishment in every way. So the fight against political correctness not only drove a lot of support for Trump, it also saved his candidacy despite all of his political scandals.
The cries about political correctness began as an attack on college campuses, but it became a universal touchstone for the broader cultural assault on liberal ideas, a point that the podcast You’re Wrong About recently analyzed. For Trump, political correctness became a slogan for every liberal idea. “We’re fighting a very politically correct war,” Trump claimed, because we do not torture terrorists and murder their families. Trump even praised some of the worst people in the world for rejecting PC: “Saddam Hussein killed terrorists. He didn’t do it politically correct.”
Denouncing “political correctness” is also an effective way of marketing bigotry. Whenever Trump wanted to say something offensive based on gender or race, he simply declared that he would like to say this offensive thing, but it’s not politically correct: “I refuse to call Megyn Kelly a bimbo, because that would not be politically correct.” He depicts himself as a victim of some invisible force while he’s victimizing someone else with a vile statement. Trump noted, “I never worry about being politically correct.” In reality, Trump worries about it a lot. He intentionally takes controversial stands in order to strengthen his politically incorrect credentials.
As Daily Beast commentator Tom Nichols argued, “To understand Trump’s seemingly effortless seizure of the public spotlight, forget about programs, and instead zero in on the one complaint that seems to unite all of the disparate angry factions gravitating to him: political correctness. This, more than anything, is how the left created Trump.” But actually, it was the right that created political correctness, and activated the sense of victimhood that Trump exploited. David French, one of the leading Never Trumpers, was also a key force in attacking political correctness as the first executive director of FIRE. The left may have supplied some of the stupidity that fed the flames, but it was the right who defined political correctness as a very big problem–and that sense of victimhood is only growing on the right.
While I often agree with John Wilson, I wonder how often he ever reads news outlets outside of the liberal echo chamber, or even regularly reads the comments on articles in the NYT or WaPo. I am a Biden voter, but 1) feel that the pandemic, especially currently, is no longer a “very big problem and 2) believe PC IS a very big problem.
Why? In regard to the pandemic… Too many folks equate the pandemic with things like “a 9/11 each week” and pretend that if this went away those folks would live forever or something. The reality is that Covid has (and is) mostly killing folks who have multiple serious medical conditions. Yes, these folks are dying sooner than they would otherwise with modern medical care, but it can also be projected that death rates will be lower than normal for the next 2-3 years in the USA since those who would have died of something else instead died earlier. In several states, more than 1/2 of those dying are nursing home patients. Covid is neither Ebola or the 1917 flu which killed young and healthy people as a population…. Yes, a handful of young people died, and yes, the deaths of these sick nursing home patients affected their families, but folks die everyday, Covid is still not the #1 cause of death for Americans…
In regard to PC… I greatly fear that progressive PC talking points are going to rip the USA apart. Even as someone who would be considered more of a typical liberal than anyone who goes to a Trump rally have watched in horror as PC has become more of a cult-like religion that brooks no heretics. Any attempt to debate the wisdom of using critical race theory outside of a simple reexamination of historical tropes is called “racist”. Any attempt to debate whether “anti-racism” helps the communities it claims to instead of profoundly harming them is “whiteness”. Attacks on folks who do not have African heritage braiding their hair, a White person owning a tortilla factory etc as cultural appropriation. PC states that its purpose is to protect people from the “violence” of hearing things that “trigger” them. If we were talking its use as simple politeness, I would have no issues with it. However, when it is used to protect people from having to debate their ideas in the public sphere, or to deride folks who disagree with this ideas, it is a BIG problem. Unfortunately, PC and the arrogance of liberal progressives has pushed many people who would normally be live and let live types into the arms of the Trump right wing.
If you are not wealthy or privileged, it is really galling for people who are to call you a “deplorable” when you are living your life. If you believe in letting people live their life, but are called “racist” when you object to folks you live side by side with (or who may live in a nicer house than you) getting extra benefits because of their skin tone with no debate allowed about whether that is fair? You are again are not going to be persuaded into progressive talking points. The conservatives have training programs such as the Leadership Institute that trains young conservatives how to talk to the press and debate their positions with facts. The progressives don’t seem to see a need to persuade, instead they use PC to belittle those who don’t agree which just causes those who would otherwise be happy to debate facts and perhaps shift position, to enjoy watching Trump “own the libs”.
Much of what I read and listen to comes from conservative media, while I rarely read the NYT or WaPo. I wish more people would pay attention to conservative media, because everything you say about the left (“cult-like religion” “no heretics”) applies at least as much to the right, which is far more influential and powerful than the obscure leftists who uselessly complain about tortilla factories. By the way, I never hear leftists use the term “deplorable,” only conservatives such as Steve Bannon who invoke it with pride. I would ask you, why do annoying leftists bother you more than the guy who was actually president and his supporters who say and do far more disturbing and intolerant things?
Well, the “deplorable” comment came from Hillary Clinton’s mouth, not sure we can blame that one on Bannon…
I think the reason the leftists bother me more than the MAGA folks is that the leftists negatively affect my day to day life way more. While I make sure to check in on Newsmax and Fox every day, my radio is perpetually tuned to NPR which has become a tiresome parade of virtue signaling folks being more woke than thou. As a university professor, the equity agenda which removes our ability to measure academic preparation (test optional etc) or even the idea of encouraging academic preparation (California initiative to remove accelerated math curricula, no calculus in high school) is greatly disturbing as it further erodes the ability of Americans to be able to compete in science and math with the rest of the world. Any efforts to teach about professionalism becomes “whiteness” etc. Trump being a loud mouth pig does not affect my day to day one bit…
My perspective also comes from being a first gen female academic who came through the educational system in the 1980s. Particularly, I also find the hand ringing about gender inequity in the academy tiresome. My STEM graduate program was over 1/2 female 30 years ago. That has not translated into a similar distribution of full professors today because nearly all of my classmates went into industry as it required less time commitment (ie better work life balance) and less geographic restriction so better worked with having professional spouse while yielding a higher salary. These are perfectly rational decisions, not sexism in the academy. Personal choices do matter while tenure is incompatible with the ability to change jobs when a spouse needs to move for work. That said, academic is much more humane and “understanding” than anything one sees in the private sector. There, you either make more profit for the employer than you are paid, or you lose your job. Calling academia “cruel” just sounds like a whining child who does not get their way.
“Covid is still not the #1 cause of death for Americans…”
Covid is indeed the #1 cause of death in the U.S., as of February 2021.
https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/brief/covid-19-is-the-number-one-cause-of-death-in-the-u-s-in-early-2021/
John Wilson’s reading habits are not the issue, so let’s not descend to ad hominem critiques. The issue is “P.C.”, which I always put in quote marks because most of the “P.C.” codes are hardly politically correct.
And on that score, I also find a methodological flaw in Wilson’s argument: WHO CARES whether Republicans, Trumpists, or left-handed people consider “P.C.” to be a problem. And MY answer is a resounding YES, IT IS, especially when professors self-censor, lose their reputations and sometimes their jobs, over unintended “MICRO-aggressions” (like showing a nude painting in an Art History class or assigning HUCKLEBERRY FINN as required reading in an Amercan Lit course). Examples like this — including even more absurd instances — have filled the pages of neutral and even liberal publications (i.e., THE ATLANTIC, CHRONICLE OF HIGHER ED) for many years.
MY specific example: https://www.academia.edu/31680392/Self_Censorship_of_College_Faculty
And, yes, it’s from THE WALL STREET JOURNAL but sometimes “politics makes strange bedfellows.” If Trumpers happen to agree with me on only one thing — Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom — then I will align with them ON THAT ONE ISSUE and oppose my so-called “comrades” who push a phony semantic “SJW” game of “P.C.” — rather than actually DO anything about social injustice.
Leftists who trample free speech and violate the principle of academic freedom when they want to promote their own ideology or political causes bother me, even while I am bothered by the actions of those on the right doing the same. I think we ought to be challenging any instances where academic freedom and faculty governance of the curriculum are trampled. I don’t want a university non-faculty bureaucrat telling me which readings or statements to include on my syllabus–whether the readings or statements are well-meaning, left-leaning “woke” ones or whether they are well-meaning, right-leaning “anti-PC” ones.
Title IX was weaponized by left-leaning activists on many campuses, and it occurred during Obama’s presidency. Professors got investigated just for expressing the “wrong” opinion; even an academic’s critique of Title IX could get them investigated under Title IX (read what happened to Professor Laura Kipnis). So sure, Trump was more recently the “guy who was actually president,” but there were disturbing things happening that we failed to interrogate adequately. I hope more left-leaning people will stop looking the other way as, for example, left-leaning students try to get their professors fired for saying or doing something they regard to be politically incorrect. Indeed, for some on the left this worldview is like a religion (read Professor John McWhorter on this) and anyone who takes even gentle issue with their worldview is downright heretical. Small wonder that some people then want to resist this orthodoxy. For this reason, I’d say Tom Nichols is spot on when he says the left helped create Trump and his popularity.
Right on, Martha McCaughey! Or, “Left on,” if you prefer. Academic Freedom should not be a partisan political rule; it should apply to and protect (almost) ALL viewpoints, even wrongheaded ones (like Galileo’s).
The AAUP did an excellent report in 2016 on the uses and abuses of Title IX (https://www.aaup.org/report/history-uses-and-abuses-title-ix). But the truth is that anybody can complain about anybody for any reason, and they often do, on the left and the right. Title IX has been abused at times, but nothing done in its name can compare to what happened at Boise State this year, with 52 classes suspended, all class discussions banned, and a massive investigation undertaken without any formal complaint. By contrast, Laura Kipnis was never punished at all, and never believed she would be. Colleges need to fix their policies to prohibit preliminary suspensions, to dismiss meritless complaints without an investigation, to protect due process, and to ensure faculty control. Title IX is only a small part of the problem.
While I agree that Title IX is only a small part of the Free Speech denier problem, I’m nitpicky enough to challenge the claim that “Title IX has been abused at times, but nothing done in its name can COMPARE to what happened at Boise State this year, with 52 classes suspended, all class discussions banned, and a massive investigation undertaken without any formal complaint.”
How do we make “comparisons” among all the bad acts and bad actors who stifle Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom, whether they come from the right or left (or neither)? 52 classes sounds like a lot but haven’t there been more than 52 professors who’ve lost their reputations, dignity, money (in legal fees), or jobs because of unjustified “P.C.” police actions — and the college administrators that approve of such irrationality? Should we understand the anti-Free Speechers through (cherry-picked) statistics? Instead, shouldn’t we just say that (almost) ALL censorship and cancel culture in academia is wrong?
Yes, I know that 2016 report and of course I understand that Title IX is not the entire problem. My point was to give an example to show that bad things for academics have occurred before Trump was elected POTUS and from a left-leaning agenda. I know multiple faculty members who’ve been publicly shamed, silenced, investigated, removed from the classroom, and otherwise treated horribly for not appearing to be woke or left-wing enough. And still many more who refuse to teach certain classes, topics, films, or readings for fear that they will meet the same fate as those other faculty did. It strikes me as somewhat dismissive to say Kipnis wasn’t punished, as if to indicate that nothing really bad happened to her. I would say her ordeal was incredibly punishing, stressful, and chilling–especially to her less famous and untenured colleagues. We wouldn’t want to say that the teachers at Boise State weren’t fired or punished, as if no harm was done, would we? I just don’t think you can make a convincing comparison that one group’s or political party’s suspensions of classes and bogus investigations are ok and not harmful while the other group’s is alarming.