[Gllug] BETT at Olympia

[Dermot Moynihan]

At 20:25 03/01/03, you wrote:

>On Fri, 2003-01-03 at 19:51, Pete Ryland wrote:
>
>FWIW, IMO there's nothing wrong with terms like spastic, deaf and dumb

Well, we're all entitled to our opinions and there's freedom of speech 
which is equally important.  (And in my book that means the right to say 
whatever you like, whenever you like, without qualification. Though, of 
course, a reasonably rational individual won't say something that s/he 
knows others will take offence at or at least not in order that they will 
take offence). But if we care for others shouldn't we use the terminology 
to describe them that they ask us to use.

On another related point which came up earlier - why the antipathy towards 
political correctness?  When one considers the rewriting of history so that 
it's not just the viewpoint of the victor - is that not a good thing?  For 
me, political correctness is about truth and justice. Vague words but most 
people would probably come up with fairly similar definitions. Because 
political correctness has received a bad press - usually from those who are 
happy for the status quo to remain as it is, or as a result of people going 
over the top (I'm reminded of the Council - Ham/Ful? - who deemed the use 
of black rubbish bags offensive to black people) does not mean it is a bad 
thing.  I see it as an attempt to correct an imbalance in many aspects of 
our society. And, of course, there will be many people who want us to 
dismiss it.

I see the whole thing as being in a state of flux and evolving nicely. It's 
only very recently that the word 'invalid' was seen to be inappropriate. It 
should have been blatantly obvious. I missed it myself ;)

We're moving slowly in the right direction.  And of course it will be 
difficult.

Dermot.