Why Political Correctness Matters

This morning my 10 year old asked me one of those innocent questions that only children can ask — the type that can occupy your brain for hours, forcing you to think, question and look deeply at all your beliefs to find the answer.

In the sequel she’s reading to RJ Palacio’s book Wonder, a grandmother who does not speak English asks her granddaughter the word for “cripple" so she can use it to describe a boy. The girl responds “Grandmomma, that’s not politically correct.” 

So Ava wanted to know this morning, what does politically correct mean? 

This question deserves a good answer, and I did my best in the morning crush that is our breakfast.

I said: “Words are powerful and they matter, especially ones you use to describe others. Political correctness means to think, before you use a word, whether you yourself would want to be described with it. For example, if I were disabled, I would not want to be labeled a cripple.”

The conversation turned to the fact that we have been hearing the phrase "politically correct” so often this election season, and almost always it has negative connotations. Why?

In a Snapchat world, perhaps we simply don’t have time to be PC. Perhaps being PC is too stifling. Or perhaps not being PC makes some feel powerful, enabled to label and thus lessen, while elevating themselves. 

After my answer to Ava, a point was bought up that even the word “disabled” might be falling out of vogue. 

If this is true, it would underscore the stifling, laughable side of political correctness; if language is subject to whims similar to ones that dictate the jeans we buy, why take it seriously? It is simply too difficult because you cannot please everyone. Let’s just throw it all out the window.

But I could not stop thinking about Ava’s question. As a family that has come through significant health challenges, the concept of disability touches me deeply. As I drove away from carpool this morning, I thought about alternative phrases that could be used.

In doing so, I had a eureka moment.

The true meaning of political correctness isn’t in the words we use. It is in the concession we make when we stop and ponder if the label we are about to speak is right and just. It is in a tiny moment of silence and wondering.

In that moment we acknowledge what a person or group has been through. The pain of disability. The injustice of slavery. The struggles of immigrants trying to better the lives of their children. And in acknowledging people for who they are and what they have been through, we can better understand, connect, and unite. 

It was then that I had my second eureka moment. 

I realized the true reason the phrase "political correctness” is under fire.  

People who scoff at the phrase have pain too. Many struggle to pay bills and provide for their children. Many see no future for themselves and have been left behind in an unequal and unfair society. They think "why should others' pain be acknowledged, tiptoed around, and not mine?"

And you know, they are right. 

Perhaps the term “political correctness” needs a facelift. After all, anything labeled “political” these days automatically divides and distracts from its true function. Instead we need a phrase that unites.

As I was searching for alternatives, a phrase from the movie Avatar popped into my mind, something the characters use to express love to one another: 

“I see you.” 

It is not a label, it simply communicates that I see all of you – the ugly, the bad and the good – and I acknowledge everything that is you. I think there is something beautiful and affirming in that.

So when my daughter gets back from school today, I’m going to do a better job of answering her question. I’m going to tell her that while it may be easy or feel momentarily powerful to label someone something that is not "politically correct," actually there is more power in the pause that the tool - political correctness - engenders. 

I’m going to tell her that true power comes from the moment it takes to stand in the shoes of another to try to understand them, and the incredible ability this gives you to connect, learn and grow.

I see you.