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Originally Posted by PsYcNeT
Just a reminder that PC2Respect is the best Chrome extension ever and makes these conversations way more hilarious. |
This is interesting. I'm a fan of Gaiman, but that little witticism of his (and the Chrome plugin they made to effect it) is totally off-base. It's a classic motte and bailey argument, discussed
here and
here, among other places.
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The writers of the paper compare this to a form of medieval castle, where there would be a field of desirable and economically productive land called a bailey, and a big ugly tower in the middle called the motte. If you were a medieval lord, you would do most of your economic activity in the bailey and get rich. If an enemy approached, you would retreat to the motte and rain down arrows on the enemy until they gave up and went away. Then you would go back to the bailey, which is the place you wanted to be all along.
The motte-and-bailey doctrine is when you make a bold, controversial statement. Then, when somebody challenges you, you claim you were just making an obvious, uncontroversial statement, so you are clearly right and they are silly for challenging you. Then when the argument is over, you go back to making the bold, controversial statement.
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In this case, devout political correctness doctrinaires demand all sorts of crazy things, e.g. medical professionals can't give medical advice if it'll upset someone, professors of classical literature can't teach Ovid because of the presence of sexual assault in the narrative, evolutionary biologists can't write papers describing inherent differences in the behaviours of women and men, or the classic cultural relativist schtick that the moral practices of other cultures can't be criticized because to do so would be somehow insensitive or racist. When someone then says that political correctness is resulting in some highly objectionable, and in some cases
batcrap insane edicts, they'll then retreat to the motte: "But political correctness just means treating people with respect!"
Then once everyone agrees that treating everyone with respect is a good thing - because that's obvious, and no one short of a sociopath would object to that statement - the proponents can go back to calling people misogynists for suggesting that the phrase "rape culture" is a bit much.