It's not about watching what you say,it's having the class and knowledge to not think them in the first place.*

I don't really do that. I'd rather not walk on eggshells. Besides, if I say something that is wrong, I can have the chance to be corrected. If I keep it locked up in my mind, will I ever get that chance?

Because I would never intentionally hurt someone's feelings for the sake of just hurting their feelings. I try to think of the other person...and I don't see anything wrong with that. If others would put others before themselves...wow, the world would be a changed place.

As a diabetic must regulate sugars the person with politicorrectitis must regulate speech. The bigest difference is that the regulated diabetic can live an unhampered life the person with politicorrectitis is seriously handicapped. I work with three black men and two hispanic men - I'm the white guy. We enjoy the differences between us and most importamtly we do not let the differences cloud who we "really" are. Political correctness is a foolish concept.

i watch what i say to avoid hurting peoples feelings regardless of what demographic group they may belong to why? because tact is a useful trait to have in a civilized society

I avoid to hurt any people's feeling, whether minorities or majorities. It is mostly quite easy to achieve with a little training (although I am personally not very good at it...). And you don't want to be a jerk, do you?

well, there is a difference between being mean and offensive as opposed to speaking your mind. if you speak your mind and it offends minorities, thats okay, but if you go out on a mission to offend people, thats not

I'm conscious of what I say to everyone. Their minority/majority status makes no difference to me. I was raised to be polite and to believe that a civil society is a healthy society. And it's really not difficult at all. Civility and politeness are second nature to those who have had a proper upbringing. Now, this isn't to say that I can't be rude. If offended or angered I can be a right son of a bitch. But that's the exception, not the rule. Some people excuse their rudeness by throwing around the label "politically correct" whenever they're rightfully called on their rudeness. Case in point: At lunch last week with some co-workers, one of them (male) made a "cute" joke about rape. All of the women looked uncomfortable, but one actually called him on it for being offensive. His response? "Everybody's so politically correct these days. Why does everyone have to have a chip on their shoulder?" Same lunch, different incident: This same guy, when we're waiting for our check says to the guy sitting across from him, "See if you can get that chinaman's attention and tell him we need our check." This time I spoke up and said, "First of all, he's Japanese, not Chinese. Second of all, "chinaman" is a rude term. Third of all, what difference does his race make? What's wrong with asking someone to flag down our *waiter*?" You know what his response was, right? He told me that I needed to chill out and stop being so politically correct. I told him that I'd remember that the next time I felt the urge to refer to him as "ill-bred white trash." His response? "Now you're just being rude!" LMAO!!!

It is either because they do not want to hurt somebody's feelings, which is understandable, or it is because of a subtle constriction of the range of what is considered free speech. One is OK, the other is a big issue.