An Impossible Standard

Today's glimpse of insanity is linked from the Orlando Sentinel. The outrage this time surrounds a 1930's era photograph hanging on the wall at a public golf course.

As can be seen in the picture at left, a white golfer is lining up a putt while the barefoot black caddy grasps the flag.

Daisy W. Lyman is a commissioner on the Orlando, Florida, City Council. The Orlando Sentinel story does not mention her heritage, but at the risk of perpetuating racial stereotypes a quick review of her image at the City Council web site suggests that Ms. Lynum may be of African-American ancestry. As images may apparently misrepresent fact (just ask Rodney King, among others) I do not claim as fact that my interpretation of her racial background is accurate. That belief could simply be an unfortunate result of my white middle class upbringing.

Commissioner Lynum does not believe the photograph belongs at a city-owned golf course where many blacks might find it degrading. She claims not to object to the fact that the black youth is a caddy, but rather that he is shoeless - that being a factor that "harkened [sic] back to more discriminatory times".

Yes commissioner, denying history has always been an effective means of making the unpleasantness of the past go away and never repeat itself.

Lynum is quoted in the article:

"There are different types of black folks, just like white folks. What offends one might not offend another," she said. "I still feel that if anyone finds it offensive, it should not be displayed."

It is the last sentence in that quote that addresses the huge problem that Political Correctness run amok has thrust upon this country. Indeed, a casual reading of the global headlines suggests this is a problem that threatens the entire western world.

If the standard is to be that if anyone finds it (whatever "it" might be) offensive, what then can possibly be displayed anywhere? For virtually any image or narrative you can conceive, there is someone who can claim grounds for being offended by it.

Ground beef at $1.99 a pound? Setting aside how offensive the price alone is to most of us, there are those justifiably disturbed that their scared cows are being defiled.

Pork chops on sale? Same story, different religions.

How about the bikini ad in the weekly sales circular that displays more flesh than can be commonly found on the cover of the average men's magazine? Certainly many groups can claim the right to be offended by that.

You see that woman driving the city bus? Shameful!

The list goes on and on and on, and some examples could even start edging towards slightly ridiculous.

There needs to be a return to the common sense standard that prevailed until fairly recent times. If you don't like it, don't look at it/read it/promulgate it. Accept that what is important to you and held dear may disturb others, and grant them the courtesy of pursuing their interests unrestrained just as you want the opportunity to follow your own preferences without restriction. Disagreement is fine, and can and should be addressed by civilized discourse. Trying to convince you to see my point of view is not a hate crime, regardless of how far beyond the bounds of reality that particular pendulum has swung of late.

Are there some restrictions that a moral and functioning society need to impose for the general well being? Certainly. Some are obvious, while others are a bit more difficult to pin down. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart in 1964 neatly summarized the difficulty of objectively defining pornography while stating a nearly universal truth - "I know it when I see it". Yes, there is going to be some audience somewhere for almost anything the human mind can conceive. When that audience can only be measured in minute fractions of one percent of a given population, it can be reasonably argued that that particular material is not suitable for or in concordance with the best interests and prevailing sentiments of the society at large.

For the most part, we need to live and let live. Denying history, or going out of the way to find that one individual who didn't take their meds this morning and so is offended by the sun rising in the east is not a functional way to manage any society.