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Viliam_Bur comments on Open Thread, June 16-30, 2012 - Less Wrong
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A political correctness (without hypocrisy) feels from inside as a fight against factual incorrectness with dangerous social consequences. It's not just "you are wrong", but "you are wrong, and if people believe this, horrible things will happen".
Mere factual incorrectness will not invoke the same reaction. If one professor of mathematics admits belief that 2+2=5, and other professor of mathematics admit belief that women in average are worse in math than men, both could be fired, but people will not be angry at the former. It's not just about fixing an error, but also about saving the world.
Then, what is the difference between a politically incorrect opinion, and a factually incorrect opinion with dangerous social consequences? In theory, the latter can be proved wrong. In real life, some proofs are expensive or take a lot of time; also many people are irrational, so even a proof would not convince everyone. But still I suspect that in case of factually incorrect opinion, opponents would at least try to prove it wrong, and would expect support from experts; while in case of politically incorrect opinion an experiment would be considered dangerous and experts unreliable. (Not completely sure about this part.)
It may feel like that for some people. For me the 'feeling' is factual incorrectness agnostic.
I agree that concern about the consequences of a belief is important to the cluster you're describing. There's also an element of "in the past, people who have asserted X have had motives of which I disapprove, and therefore the fact that you are asserting X is evidence that I will disapprove of your motives as well."
Not just motives-- the idea is that those beliefs have reliably led to destructive actions.
I am confused by this comment. I was agreeing with Viliam that concern about consequences was important, and adding that concern about motives was also important... to which you seem to be responding that the idea is that concern about consequences is important. Have I missed something, or are we just going in circles now?
Sorry-- I missed the "also" in "There's also an element...."
I wish I had another upvote.
Strictly speaking, path dependency may not always be rational - but until we raise the sanity line high enough, it is a highly predictable part of human interaction.
To me, asserting that one is "politically incorrect" is a statement that one's opponents are extremely mindkilled and are willing to use their power to suppress opposition (i.e. you).
But there's nothing about being mindkilled or willing to suppress dissent that proves one is wrong. Likewise, being opposed by the mindkilled is not evidence that one is not mindkilled oneself.
That dramatically decreases the informational value of bringing up the issue of political correctness in a debate. And accusing someone of adopting a position because it complies with political correctness is essentially identical to an accusation that your opponent is mindkilled - hence it is quite inflammatory in this community.
Political correctness is also an evidence of filtering evidence. Some people are saying X because it is good signalling, and some people avoid saying non-X, because it is a bad signalling. We shouldn't reverse stupidity, but we should suspect that we were not exposed to the best arguments against X yet.