When I was young, PC meant police constable
The Campaign Against Political Correctness can’t believe their good fortune.
If you’re unfamiliar with their work, the CAPC was set up five years ago by husband-and-wife outfit John and Laura Midgley (pictured above) with the aim of fighting against, in John’s words, “the political correctness that is attacking the fabric of our nation with the ferocity of a vulture picking away at the bones of a carcass”.
Thus far their political influence has been limited to working with the odd maverick councillor to score small victories like scrapping Hull Council’s guide to acceptable language.
But all that’s set to change, as the Midgleys have been called in by Doncaster mayor Peter Davies to help him enact his manifesto promises to “scrap politically correct non-jobs and encourage the former employees to seek meaningful employment” and end support for “politically correct initiatives”.
The pair met the press this week alongside their new patron at a press briefing in the mayor’s office, where John explained:
“What we have got in Mayor Davies is a mayor who has been elected on a platform to reduce and eliminate PCness in Doncaster. People are crying out for it. We commissioned a survey recently that said 80 per cent of people are fed up to the back teeth with it. What we are here today to do is to look at the sorts of institutional PC that Doncaster has… and where possible to assist the mayor in providing advice on where PC can be cut.”
“Political correctness”, like that other great tabloid catchphrase “common sense”, is a phrase that means many things to many people so I asked for examples of the kind of thing they’d advise the mayor to get rid of.
“Doncaster has an ethnic minorities welfare rights service. At the end of the day people of all backgrounds may have an entitlement to benefits, there is no need to have a unit that serves one section of the community above all others. The reality is there are employees who deal with benefits advice for everybody. This is the sort of divide and rule politics that is outdated, not only in Doncaster but in the country as a whole.”
Like many people, I have to admit I initially thought Davies’ stance on political correctness would be a bit of an empty gesture – a vote-winning, populist soundbite that would be impossible to translate into concrete policies. But make no mistake, he’s deadly serious about this stuff.
The mayor himself took a back seat in the briefing but seemed enthused at the prospect of putting his anti-PC rhetoric into practice across the organisation. He’s already started, he said, by going back to using the term ”chairman” rather than “chair” at cabinet meetings – with deputy mayor Patricia Schofield now known as “madam deputy chairman”:
“A chair is a wooden inanimate object, and that may be descriptive of some of my predecessors but not me.”
Also at the briefing but keeping a very low profile was the mayor’s son, Tory MP for Shipley Philip Davies. He’s the parliamentary spokesman for the Campaign but was keen to stress he was acting as a go-between rather than being there to advise an English Democrat mayor (which you’d imagine wouldn’t go down too well with Conservative Central Office).
It’s hard to imagine what a council entirely shorn of all “politically correct” trappings would look like; how much time, effort and money it would take to bring it about; or what the knock-on effects of such a policy would be for the town.
And like many of Davies’ other policies, there may well be legal obstacles: many council services that could be deemed “PC” might be protected from the axe under race relations and human rights administration. And the council’s Race Equality Scheme, required by law, isn’t due to be revised until 2011.
But the CAPC have the mayor’s ear, and Doncaster is about to become a testing ground for their theories. The stage is set for a social experiment that will be very closely watched across the country.
How much is this crack squad of tabloid totting apparitions getting paid? What’s the cost / benefit to these cuts?
What is political correctness? The example given seems weak – I would’ve hoped for a sustentative follow up, and how do they tie in with Davies vision?
@James:
They’re not being paid for their services – only just realised I didn’t mention that in the main post.
“Political correctness”, like that other great tabloid catchphrase “common sense”, is a phrase that means many things to many people”
NO IT DOES NOT, Political Correctness / Common Sense DOES NOT MEAN MANY THINGS TO MANY PEOPLE!
The Union of Soviet SOCIALIST Republics had a very effective way of dealing with people who spoke words that they did not want others to hear and to effectively silence all dissidents… It was the Gulag… and it worked.
The modern (but equally freedom destroying) LEFT required a means of silencing people in the same way. But it would have to be less blatant, less obvious to the masses. So was born Political Correctness. Enthusiastically embraced by New Labor and every card carrying left wing SOCIALIST, Political Correctness, originally designed by the left in the eighties has been a phenomenal success, more successful than the original US left anticipated. It is a self proliferating, to criticise it is to be anti PC, to be anti GOOD.
The Thought Police already exist, enforcing political correctness with the threat of unemployment, fines and prison. A new Newspeak language is rapidly making it impossible to think and say things that the authorities dislike. It’s an invisible gulag… say what they don’t like and you’re an enemy of the state. Political Correctness destroys speech freedoms and the right to debate.
By boycotting and overthrowing all PC parties, especially the (Red, Blue & Green SOCIALIST), to make room for a new movement that opposes this tripe and installing people whose motives are dictated by common sense and a desire to serve (not greed and power) will reverse the cancer that has taken over my country. Good luck to Peter Davies.