WWJK: Who would Jesus Kill - Military supplier adds bible references to rifle sights

[classicman]

Originally Posted by DanaC

I am often bemused by how much effort people put into arguing their right to offend and equally bemused by the level of venom aimed at those who would choose to temper language in an effort not to cause undue offence.

Not their right to offend, not at all. Its their right to not have so much of what is said or done be misconstrued or misinterpreted as an offense when it was not intended as such. The issue, I think, for some is that we have become overly concerned about unintentionally offending anyone, that we almost can't say anything to anyone. It really is getting ridiculous.

There seems far more venom directed at the 'PC brigade' than at the people who are causing offence by using outdated and offensive language to describe groups of people. Likewise there is far more venom in here for those who would seek not to offend moslems generally through clumsy inclusion of bible verses on gun sights, than there is for a company who was clumsy enough to include those verses in the first place.

Anybody who is offended, or claims an awareness of the potential for offence gets lumped in to a big group and discounted instantly.
Not true. Not even close.

More disturbingly, given the context of this discussion, is that any moslem who might be offended by this is assumed to be 'the enemy' ... any moslem in Afghanistan should apparently be more concerned by why they are being sighted with this equipment than what is written on it...in other words, all Afghan Moslems are the enemy.

Let me play Devil's advocate here - just for the topic of discussion. (I'm afraid already this is gonna go really badly)

1) Does the company not have the right to express their religion in a very VERY unobtrusive way? These markings were on their scopes long before any of this started. The situation has changed since then. Apparently the need to change as well. If so,

I and many many others are offended by those people who wish to cover their entire faces as if they were about to commit a crime. I find it politically incorrect for them to wear this type of extremely concealing clothing especially in these troubling and difficult times.

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by classicman

Not their right to offend, not at all. Its their right to not have so much of what is said or done be misconstrued or misinterpreted as an offense when it was not intended as such. The issue, I think, for some is that we have become overly concerned about unintentionally offending anyone, that we almost can't say anything to anyone. It really is getting ridiculous.

You are exaggerating Classicman. The "PC is taking over our language" bandwagon is easy to get on but its not reality.

Obviously this is generalized, but really see two types of political correctness. One tries to eliminate things that attacks entire groups of people and the other tries to eliminate things that do not attack entire groups of people. Examples of the first are racist, sexist, and homophobic words or something like putting a confederate flag outside an African American cultural center. Examples of the second are words such as black (not an insulting word to vast majority) or actions such as Christmas lights or putting up the confederate flag in a "state's pride" manner.

Personally, I believe the first type is legitimate political correctness and the second is not legitimate and used by insecure overly offended people who are looking for attention (there is an obvious gray area but I am ignoring that for this). And fuck those people. Unless you speak publically or that insecure person holds some power over you, you are usually fine.