I can still remember the first time I encountered the term "politically correct". I was living in Berkeley, California in the 1970's, and the first time I heard it, I didn't have to have it explained because the very things it addressed were the very things that annoyed me about the left in which I was immersed. Instead of everybody being treated equally -- the goal of actual liberalism -- systems of privelege based upon various traits were creeping into people's world view, and so, to, was the cognitive dissonance based upon the double standards.
Since then, political correctness has become almost institutionalized, and is so internally punative from the standpoint of a brand of ostracism based upon the expression of impure thoughts that it has become so self-regulating that it almost acts as a cult in at least one regard. If somebody holds up three fingers and everybody swears they are holding up two, a person MUST swear that they are two or else be called names. In the particular case of this discussion at hand, one is called a bigot or an Islamophobe or a neo con or a right winger or any of a number of convenient terms that indicate one cannot possibly be one of the cult. The funny thing is -- these accusations are hurled at anybody who wants to hold everybody to the same standard instead of treating one group as special and one group not.
I find it odd how those most determined to view the world in terms of race are now the ones who treat members of any but their pown as inviolate. Sure, there are still pockets of the good, old fashioned white racists, but these numbers are absolutely dwarfed by the numbers of hypocrites of the left for whom political correctness demands they attack anybody who hasn't elevated those different than them to a status so special they cannot be criticized.
Thread has degenerated further, there are multiple violations of the in thread warning and it is now closed.