The "Thought Police" have a warrant to search your mind

I am not one to parse words or soften my language to minimize any possible perceived offense to those who may be listening to me. It's not meant to be offensive it's simply how I am. I am also not able to ignore stupidity, ignorance or just plain silliness when they rear their ugly heads. There are times when moderating what I say is just not possible when confronted by the slings and arrows of outrageous thinking. Of all the things I find either distasteful or wrong with modern society, political correctness is the most insidious and dangerous element to gain a foothold. Gone are the days of rational thinking and civil discourse with someone with an opposing viewpoint.

My plain spoken approach has left me on many occasions, branded as a racist, a bigot or a sexist just to name a few. This very thing happened recently while attempting to have a thoughtful exchange of ideas on racial perceptions and it's current impact on society. I was branded a racist because I deigned to speak openly and somewhat bluntly about race relations in America. Since our new president is black, I assumed that this indicated that we as a nation had indeed made some great strides towards Martin Luther King Jr's dream of looking beyond skin color to the character of people. I assumed I could talk openly of Obama's character with little fear of reproach.

I was wrong.

By simply talking about race, I was instantly thrust into the "David Duke For President" crowd based solely on the few words I had uttered. It brought the point home to me in a clear and somewhat brutal way, that what I may think is infinitely more important than what I may I may do. Not really even what I was thinking but what someone perceived my thinking was. So many people these days have thinking that has narrowed so profoundly that to them, actions no longer speak louder than words. Words are all that matters and you'd better be saying the right ones if you want to escape the moniker of "unenlightened". This perception that words are more important completely nullifies one of my mother's most important and often reinforced lessons. Having said this, I must now question the very fabric of the "Don't run with scissors" thesis and the ever popular, "Watching TV in the dark is bad for your eyes" postulate.

I know how shocking this must seem. The faint ripping noise you may be hearing is the delicate fabric of reality being torn down the middle as the many pieces of our basic learning begin to crumble before our very eyes. Next thing you know, I'll be telling you that broccoli is bad for you.

How could my mother have been so wrong? How could she insist for so long that it would be my actions and not my words that would eventually determine the shape of my character and the quality of my ethical makeup? I had been focusing so much on my actions through the course of my life, that I had neglected to give a scant thought...to my thoughts. I suspect that the next conversation I have with my mother, the woman who raised me and tried to instill a sense of values and ethics in me and my siblings, will have some very pointed questions about swimming after I eat and whether or not there truly is a boogeyman.

Calling me a racist because I talk openly about race is tantamount to calling me a baker because I talk openly about my affection for cake. It's ridiculous at best and meant to silence independent thought at it's worst. That's the sad truth behind the rise and eventual rule of political correctness. It's meant to quell an opposing viewpoint and silence the speaker in order to bring them into line. The only thing left after that is re-education camps for the pathologically truthful. I've learned to accept the occasional mischaracterizations of what I say as the product of narrow minds. I can sometimes hear, if I listen very closely, the offended party's mind closing. Slamming shut against what they see as wrongheadedness and provincial thinking.

We live now in a society where political correctness has run amok. No longer are people blind, they are visually impaired. No one need worry about being short, fat, thin, poor or handicapped ever again. The language and thought police have rendered us all "societally neutral" now. Vanished like smoke are the differences that made our country such a rich and varied place to live. They have officially made us all the same now. Bland and devoid of individualism and independence. I expect to be served with a warrant for all the dangerous and unenlightened thoughts I may still have. I can just picture them exiting my home with file boxes filled with all those thoughts they find wrong.

I no longer have to live my life as a short, bald Italian man. Thanks to the thought police I am now a vertically and follically challenged person of color. Somehow, I don't feel particularly comforted by this change. I don't look or feel any differently than I did before which begs the question...

Is the change really necessary?