From: donyee@athena.mit.edu (Donald Yee)
Subject: Vacant PC thinking Re: Elle MacPherson causes rape?
Keywords: clear thinking
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Distribution: na
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 19:14:24 GMT

DISCLAIMER: This IS what the subject line says, not a criticism
thereof.  If that is what you want, look elsewhere.  Apologies if
essentially the same message has already shown up, I could not find it
locally and assume I messed up on sending it, but I'm an egomaniac who
likes to see his name in lights, even if the letters are only .5 cm
tall and flashing at 60 Hz, so I reposted!

In article <92Nov08.082505.31886@acs.ucalgary.ca> panlilio@acs.ucalgary.ca (Victor P. Panlilio) writes:
>In article <1992Nov7.200151.12451@athena.mit.edu> donyee@athena.mit.edu (Donald Yee) writes:

>PC types are fundamentalists. I am surrounded by them. What did
>Oscar Wilde say? "The power of accurate observation is often
>called cynicism by those who do not possess it." PC thinking, to
>me, is one of the worst forms of intellectual *sloth* and moral
>abdication. It is the enemy of philosophy, art, and science. It
>represents one form of George Orwell's counter-utopian nightmare.

Perhaps I don't know what it means to PC then.  Does it mean to have
PC views, like "Elle MacP. causes rape, hunting is murder, etc." or is
it to insist that there is no other way and legislating it.

>I don't dislike statistics, I dislike *how* they're so often
>misused! Any basic course in research design and methodology

>And in the areas of epidemiology and occupational health,
>statistical analysis has had a decidedly mixed track record.

That I don't care to argue about.  What one does with stats is a
matter of judgement.  There are costs to action where none is needed,
but there are also costs to inaction.  It's up to the policy makers to
make the call.  I for one am glad that they have erred on the side of
excess caution (hence the mixed track record), because economically I
am still pretty well off, and after all, it's just $$$$, right?

>>certain level of social Darwinism, i.e. only the strong deserve to
>>survive.  That does not go down too well with me, because it presumes
>>we all grow up in the same environment, and have *absolute* free will.
>
>We have *constrained* free will. All of us. Do not *confuse* the
>issues here. Within *those* constraints (what we might call the
>extenuating or mitigating circumstances), we ascribe a great deal
>of autonomy and responsibility (under the law) to normal, mature
>human individuals. Many constitutions and charters of rights and
>freedoms (Canada's, for one) make this assumption about each and
>every person deemed competent to act on his or her own behalf by
>the state. I did not make the assumptions that you accuse me of
>making, but I have framed my reasoning within the context of what
>we call modern society, governed *imperfectly* as it is by laws.

OK, my mistake, neither you nor Darwin presumed absolute free will,
nor a level playing field environmentally.  What I meant to say was
that Darwinism is fair only when both of those applied, but then if I
am to lament all that is unfair, I will be lamenting well into the
next century, if not for eternity (:-( boo hoo hoo ).

>>Let us say that as a child, your father beats up your mother all the
>>time.  To you that is perfectly normal.  Now, let's throw you into a
>	^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Nope. Under no circumstances can a normal human being, possessed
>of an instinct for self-preservation and an innate empathy, find
>this type of behavior normal. I have not read much literature on

Hmm.. if I'm not mistaken, there is or was some society which
considered it perfectly normal for a grieving wife to commit suicide
upon the death of her husband (India?).  Whoosh- out the window (and
down 15 stories)- there goes that self-preservation.

>Citing even hypothetically implausible scenarios to argue your
>point does absolutely *nothing* for your case, dear fellow.
>
>Beating women *is* frowned upon, because beating human beings,
>under normal circumstances, goes against the collective genetic
>imperative to propagate the species (and hence the genome). If
>the sociobiological argument does not impress you, how about the
>argument for human compassion and empathy? In other words, I know
>what pain is like, and what causes it, and therefore, unless I am
>a mentally deranged individual, I would not want to cause pain.

Hypothetically implausible?  Propogate the species?  Well to me, the
concept of a society which makes no judgement on beating women seems
no more implausible to me than the aforementioned suicidal wives
society, or the Holocaust, or any wars for that matter.  And all this
MUST be true, because it was taught to me by (ultra PC mode on) my
white-male dominated view of history teachers (ultra PC off).  If my
local broadcasts aren't lying, beating women occurs even in a society
which presumably frowns upon it.  What would happen if we didn't?

>Of course, there is always a subset of the population that does
>not think along these lines. It is pathologically self-centered.

Wow.  Imagine almost a  whole nation, pathologically self-centered.
Yeah, maybe the Holocaust couldn't have happened.  And the Serbs and
Croats and Bosnians are really just having tea parties- the "news"
footage is from the back lot of Universal Studios.  Perhaps wife
beaters are a minority, but the point is, there could be more.

>Save your money and invest it in a good personal library, or even
>better yet, a high-speed modem (make that 14.4 Kbps, preferably).

I have done the latter already.  Maybe I should start on the former
(but then I might have to start reading some real writing.  Nah, these
flame fests are infinitely more fun than reading some stuffy books by
self important dead and some self-important living white men), or
better yet, I should get a Next, next (arrgh. painful puns).

>recovery movement, that we are all dysfunctional adults in need
>of having our *Inner Children* healed and made whole again. The
>whole society now seems to be composed of walking wounded people
>who have been persecuted in one way or another, if the self-help

Maybe we are.  Maybe we just used to be better at hiding it.  It's all
my father's fault.

>Maybe maturity and wisdom are *rare* virtues. Maybe not. 8^)
>
>PC thinking would have us believe that people are incompetent,
>and have to be told how they should think and act all the time.

Ahh, is this what PC means to you?

>>	I gave a rather extreme example, but societal pressures are
>>everywhere, and if Victor can say that he has never done anything that
>>he didn't want to do because of peer pressure, more power to him.  But

>I'm not interested in *merely* being politically correct. 8^)

Damn.  That's all I'm interested in, but the target keeps on moving.
10 years ago I was all for trickle down economics, small government,
SDI, a strong military, but now I have to be a vegan, homosexual
appreciating, whale hugging...

>"Do not go gently unto the good night...rage, rage against the
> dying of the light." (I forget who said this...oh, well...)

That was Thomas Dylan.  No, Dylan Thomas.  No Fleetwood Mac.. Ohh,
fergit it.
>
>>to hold EVERYBODY to that standard,  I would call him unsympathetic.
 >
>(tongue-in-cheek mode on)
>Progress (moral, intellectual, and spiritual) is not achieved by
>holding back the superlative members of the human species for the
>sake of sparing the feelings of those who are less fortunate.

Arrghh!  An Objectivist!  PC Police! Turn on the hoses!

>(tongue-in-cheek mode off)
>
>Actually, I'm a *lot* more compassionate than I let on above...
>
>But then, since you don't know me personally, how'd you tell?

I'm a psychic, of course.  But then, why do you need the TIC mode
markers?  Shouldn't it be intuitively obvious?  NOT.  Your statements
and the way you deal with people individually do not have to
correspond exactly, I should know, mine don't.  I'm sure you're a very
decent and caring person on that level, most people are.

Regarding that, I have my own theory for a good amount of
philosophical blabbing (based on a very small sample)... we all seek
the center... those of us who give a lot of themselves, need to find a
reason why we should not give infinitely.  Those of us (myself
included) who are selfish little bastards need some reason to temper
our overbearing greed, hence the PC guilt trips.  Those of either type
who don't are the ones who become in the former case, saints, in the
latter case, psychopathic murderers.

>>It seems to me that fashion and media images of women's bodies are a
>>rather arbitrary choice with a possible health impact (yo-yo dieting,

>See my explanation of how the camera lies. I photograph fashion
>models, and believe me, none of them are thin or unhealthy. If I
>thought they were, I'd be the first to tell them to eat properly.

Some other person mentioned this already, I don't know if you
responded yet to him.. couldn't the camera "lies" be all in the mind?
If all photos of models are ultrathin, won't one expect them all to be
ultrathin?  I have found myself staring at such pictures for long
periods of time (merely to test the phenomenon, of course <pant
pant>), and realizing yes, these women are unrealistically thin.

>>consequences.  Perhaps this "thin and tall" thing will come to pass,

>Nope, not as long as camera optics make "normal" people look fat.
>And as someone who is beginning to work more in the photography
>of models, I'll repeat that while most of the young women I work
>with may be tall (usually starting at 5'9"), they *aren't* thin.

Umm. Why not?  It used to be different.  Marilyn Monroe would be "fat"
or at least a bit chunky by today's standards for models, yet if the
camera "lies" were truly objective, she should have been chunky by the
standards of those days also.  Perhaps it is a bit much to be asking
you to revolutionize the world of fashion and glamour, but if you ever
get to be a "SuperPhotographer" of the scale of Avedon or something,
please consider pushing things back towards more fleshiness.  I would
bet thousands of women would be ever thankful (even if they didn't
know your name).

>>but in the meantime, the PC ravers serve a purpose- to make us realize
>>that things could be different and perhaps better.
>
>The PC ravers serve to illustrate just how little things in fact
>change; humans get impassioned about pet causes, and abandon all
>sense of balance. It doesn't matter if it's Greenpeace, ACT-UP,
>the Moral Majority, NOW, Perot volunteers, or what-have-you --
>people like to make things black and white, when in fact they're
>an infinitely varied collection of shades of gray and much else

Well, my view is that individual groups are not the ones that need the
balance; it is not the job of the prosecution to prove the defendant
innocent.  It is not Greenpeace's job to show that hunting may be
good.  As long as zealots exist on one side, there is a need for them
on the other side, or OUR (oops, YOUR, I forgot that I'm supposed to
be a raving PC lunatic for now) sense of balance is set all askew.

>Hmm. I seem to have offended a wide range of groups back there...

Isn't that what these newsgroups are for?

>Mother in Heaven, forgive me, for I know not what I do!
>*chuckle*

Obviously not *double chuckle*

>Geez, and to think this started with that simple subject line!

Yeah, simple but loaded.  Maybe time for a subject line change,
equally loaded.  Hmm...

don

Xref: sparky alt.supermodels:1515 soc.women:18853 alt.feminism:3734 soc.men:18684