Political Correctness Rant

[old man emu]

In these days of heightened political correctness, it only takes one person to bring down the wrath of Government on another. How many of you get raise a smile at the imaginative arrangement of letters and numbers on personalised number plates? Trying to determine a meaning for these apparently random collections releases some tension during the daily peak hour traffic battles. But for some with a Puritanical streak, the slightest hint of carnal depravity sends them into a frenzy of offence-driven hysteria.

 

What can you make of this group of letters: L G O P N R? If you can't come up with anything, you are in the majority. If you can figure it our, you are definitely in a small minority. If it offends you, you are nearly on your own. Only Transport NSW will be beside you.

 

A top Sydney barrister has got into a legal battle of his own over the “offensive” number plate on his bright yellow Lamborghini, which reads: “LGOPNR”. Peter Lavac said most people would never connect the dots and realise his number plate was cheekily saying “leg opener”. But at least one person did, in fact, connect those dots, and soon Transport NSW was calling for his plates to be removed. Transport NSW gave him 18 days to change his number plate, writing in a letter: “Transport for NSW determined that these number plates could be considered offensive and must be returned.”

 

Transport NSW safety, environment and regulation deputy secretary Tara McCarthy said that the department relies a lot on members of the public to report offensive plates, as many controversial number plates slip through the vetting process. “If a member of the public finds a plate offensive they can report it to Transport for NSW which will investigate and the plate may then be recalled,” she said. 

The RMS no longer controls the vetting of personalised number plates. Since October, applications go through the contractor Plate Marketing Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of Licensys Pty Ltd.

Documents published by the RMS reveal the contract is worth $15 million over 15 years.

 

One of the banned combinations is RAC3M3 (Race Me). But I wonder if a florist who dealt in hyacinths could use the same group of letter because a "raceme" is a flower cluster with the separate flowers attached by short equal stalks at equal distances along a central stem. 

[pmccarthy]

I enjoy trying to work out what the number plates mean. Sometimes they make no sense.

 

[nomadpete]

That's nonsense!

[old man emu]

If you get the meaning, is it in sense?

[red750]

I knew a guy who used his number plate to recruit people to his business. He was an Amway distributor, and his Mercedes was registered-  U-CAN2. If anyone asked how they could get a Merc, he would give them the speil.

 

We could avctually start a thread for funny/clever/suggestive number plates. Here's one I got off the interwebby.

 

[red750]

[red750]

[Yenn]

It changed to white bred. Really politically incorrect.

One of the things I least like to see is a white person, not white like me, but one of those whiter than whites who never go out in the sun. They look as if they are ready to die, or should that be dye?

[red750]

I see whhere Peters has renamed their Eskimo Pie as Polar Pie.

 

[nomadpete]

I have a gripe but it really belongs here....

 

I find it smacks of hypocracy when a mixed race person claims to be 'aboriginal' when they are clearly descended from parents of disparate race.

(How did I do, trying to politely say 'cross bred'?).

 

I think (just a personal opinion, so please allow it as that), thet folk who are clearly of two different cultural genetic sources, should give equal credit for both culturah heritages.

 

For instance, many people who present themselves as being aboriginal, yet have fair complexion, blond hair, etc, should not simply call themselves 'aboriginal' as that completely ignores the long cultural heritage of the other half of their essential self.

 

They claim they belong to this wide brown land, but they also equally belong to the long anglo heritage of the other half of their own family.

[red750]

There are those who claim aboriginal heritage, whose great great grandmother was frightened by an aborigine, just for what they can get out of it.

[Yenn]

A white bloke who told me he was an aboriginal custodian of one of our national parks, admitted that he was not abo, but his wife was and the tribe accepted him as an abo.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I was accused of being a racist for doubting the ability of most indigenous to pass university exams. Apparently, there was an indigenous woman who had just graduated from medicine in WA.

Amazed, I looked her up, and she turned out to be a blonde. Apparently, she had at one time been fostered by a part-aboriginal couple.

[old man emu]

I seriously doubt if there is any physiological difference between and Aboriginal brain and a brain from any other strain of human in its ability to learn and remember.

 

The reason Aboriginal kids don't, as a generality, excel academically is exactly the same reason that white kids from the lowest socio-economic level don't excel. Kids copy their parents. If the parents live by lesser standards than those of us who make our way into the higher socio-economic levels, then the kids will consider those standards to be acceptable. As the twig is bent, so grows the tree.

[nomadpete]

Since this thread is titled "Political correctness Rant" I must ask the question.  .......

 

Why is political correctness POLITICAL?

 

It seems to me that the phrase or statement that refers somehow to any words that somebody somewhere might choose to find offensive.

 

That makes it a broad brush.

 

But how does it involve politics?

 

It's an honest question. OME I'm sure you can help me here........

Edited September 13, 2022 by nomadpete
spellin ishoos

[old man emu]

In Middle English, a period of roughly 300 years from around 1150 to around 1450, the word politic  related to governing. That's when the term "body politic" got borrowed and translated from Old French politique  (14c.). After about 1450 it was used to refer to rulers being prudent or judicious - doing the correct thing. Political  now is used to mean things related to governing. That reflects its Latin origin - politicus. 

 

Then we get to the word that looks and sounds like politic. That word is "polite". Back around 1450, polite was used in metalwork. It meant to polish or to make smooth. The meaning "elegant, cultured" (of literature, arts, etc.) is from around 1500. By the 1620s it meant "refined or cultivated in speech, manner, or behaviour". By 1750 we get the current meaning "behaving courteously, showing consideration for others".

 

By using the adjective "political" we are reinstating the 1450s meaning of being prudent. We are linking it to the meaning of correctness, "the quality of being in conformity with an acknowledged rule or standard of what is considered true, right, moral, or proper". Therefore, the term "political correctness" means either  "prudent conformity with what is acknowledged as proper", or "judicious courteous behaviour".

 

So "political correctness" has nothing to do with "politics" in the sense of government.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I reckon "political correctness" means kowtowing to insane but fashionable theories, like how all cultures are equal and therefore their stupid beliefs are as good as each others.

[nomadpete]

So perhaps, since 'political' now refers to matters of government, it would be better engrish to use the term 'politely correct'?

Edited September 13, 2022 by nomadpete
it still means what Bruce said

[old man emu]

14 minutes ago, nomadpete said:

So perhaps, since 'political' now refers to matters of government, it would be better engrish to use the term 'politely correct'?

Or, in an attempt to avoid pretentious, redundant loquaciousness, why not  simply "polite"

[Bruce Tuncks]

To me, "polite " is good but "politically correct " is bad.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Over here, it has become a bit like Russia. People have been arrested for holding a piece of paper with "Not My King". https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220913-not-my-king-anti-monarchist-arrests-spark-criticism-in-britain

 

Now, I hazard to guess it was and is (https://metro.co.uk/2022/09/13/man-threatened-with-arrest-if-he-wrote-not-my-king-on-blank-sign-17362896/ being done to keep the peace rather than to suppress discourse, but have a listen to this blloke:

 

It appears to me political correctness is like beauty - it is in the eye odf the beholder.

[nomadpete]

I didn't know that UK has a anti-monarchy movement. Or is it just another "anti change" person that can't cope with the inevitable?

[Jerry_Atrick]

Lizz Truss was, in her student days an anti-monarchist.. She started political lifein the Lib Dems (sort of what was the Democrats in Aus), and then decided she need to be a conservative. My, how people change for opportunity..

[red750]

This is not politically correct in any sense of the term.

 

Functional MRI (fMRI) is a specialist device for scanning the brain, particularly in the case of brain tumour. There are, I think, only two units in Victoria. Both are out of service.

 

A woman diagnosed with a brain tumour requires an fMRI scan but has been told she would have to wait until December, which may well be too late. When asked out it, the lovely ALP Minister for Health responded, "Sometimes you have to roll with the punches." And they expect to get re-elected in November. I think the ladies husband said she might get an earlier scan in Adelaide.

[onetrack]

There are anti-monarchists in every society in every country. Scratch them a little, and you'll usually find they're of Irish ancestry. A good mate is of recent Irish ancestry, but he's a law-abiding and worthy citizen and a Vietnam Veteran as well. But he's strongly anti-monarchy, and he'll never change.

 

I don't know how he got on in the AMF whenever QE2 was brought up, but no doubt he made his feelings clear at all times, he's that sort of bloke.

 

These people are simply disturbers of the peace, and you can get arrested in a multitude of circumstances for disturbing the peace.

Lucky it's not 1522, or the ruling monarch would've issued an order to hang them! They don't know how lucky they are, that they can protest with just a bit of police attention and little else. 
In many other countries they'd end up in jail for 10 or 15 years just for offending the ruler/dictator or monarch. Britain is a very tolerant country, probably much to its detriment.