Political Correctness News

A Northern Territory mayor has slammed his own council's decision to ban merchandise bearing the witty slogan CU in the NT.

T-shirts, beer stubbies, caps and thongs bearing an allusion to a rude word will banned from being displayed at Darwin's popular Nightcliff and Mindil Beach markets.

Darwin Lord Mayor Kon Vatskalis actually voted for a motion to pull the merchandise from public display but he did express misgivings about people being too easily offended. He told Daily Mail Australia:

My problem is that we live in a "I find offence society" and there's always a push to remove things from the public Where do we stop?

I'm not going to actively try to find out what's moral, what's offensive or what's not offensive.

Greens councillor Robin Knox moved the motion after receiving complaints about children seeing the CU in the NT stall. She whinged:

The market stall was next to a children's playground - it's a very family friendly market.

The advertising agency VMLY&R has teamed up with the Polish newspaper Gazeta.pl to buy out Poland's longest-running erotic magazine and to close it down.

VMLY&R and Gazeta bought Twoj Weekend to close it down to do a little virtue signalling in opposing porn. They will produce one final issue without any of the magazines signature erotic content and will instead bang on about 'progressive' issues like gender, sexism etc.

This last issue will be promoted by an advertising campaign, including outdoor, media, cinema, radio, press, social media and online with support from client partners including Mastercard and Bank BGZ BNP Paribas.

A chef has criticised Instagram after it decided that a photograph she posted of two pigs' trotters and a pair of ears needed to be protected from 'sensitive' readers.

Olia Hercules, a writer and chef who regularly appears on Saturday Kitchen and Sunday Brunch , shared the photo alongside a caption in which she praised the quality and affordability of the ears and trotters before asking why the cuts had fallen out of favour with people in the UK.

However Hercules later discovered that the image had been censored by the photo-sharing app with a warning that read: Sensitive content. This photo contains sensitive content which some people may find offensive or disturbing.

Hercules hit back at the decision on Twitter, condemning Instagram and the general public for becoming detached from reality.

#MeToo is a 2019 India crime thriller by Harsh Warrdhan (as Harshvardhan) and Harsh Warrdhan.
Starring Ritika Singh, Manish Jhanjholia and Gyan Prakash.

Recently out on bail and on his way to a hideout, Richie coerces his elder brother, Yash and Mama (Mother's brother) to kidnap a girl. Sakshi, on her way to college, is snatched from a bus stop in the broad daylight. This is a story of one of the 34,768 girls kidnapped every year in India.

Indian film censors from the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) have demanded that a film titled #MeToo must change that title before being certified for cinema screening.

Directed by Harsh Warrdhan, #MeToo is 110-minute indie film about a young woman being kidnapped and sexually assaulted in a moving car. Starring National Award-winning actor Ritika Singh, it was shot in Haryana for over a month. The film's makers reportedly applied for a CBFC certificate in October last year. The film was rejected by the CBFC's first tier censors and then by the Revising Committee, the second tier.

Now that the film hasn't been cleared by the CBFC, Warrdhan and the movie's producers have filed a petition against the CBFC at the Delhi High Court on March 6. Shilpi Jain, the lawyer who is representing the filmmakers said:

In the petition we are arguing that the cuts/modifications that have been ordered by CBFC are serious encroachment of the right to speech and expression guaranteed by the Constitution of India. Board has missed the central theme of the film. Film deals with a highly sensitive issue and any tampering with respect to the scenes can cripple the narrative.

We had applied for an Adult certificate considering the film has strong language. Even then, the certificate didn't come through.

A few shoppers have been 'outraged' a saucy Valentine's Day advert for high end lingerie brand Agent Provocateur. The poster was prominently displayed Bath's House of Fraser store and shows an underwear-clad model gazing at herself in the mirror in pink underwear.

Local councillors said they were absolutely shocked and appalled by the picture, saying it is pornographic imagery of women that is not suitable for the high street.

The poster was used to promote Agent Provocateur's pop-up stores for Valentine's Day at House of Fraser branches across the country, including one at Jolly's in Bath.

Ahead of Valentine's Day, the lingerie brand's creative director, Sarah Shotton, said:

We want people to remember to love themselves in their body, mind and self-confidence.

The Daily Mail tracked down a few trivial whinges on Twitter.

Hannah Lees, who manages a Bath-based running group, tweeted: I have no words. Well, apart from these #objectification #everydaysexism. When other Twitter users suggested the pictures were harmless, she replied: She's not 'owning her sexuality and her body She's posing as directed by her employer.

local resident Kirsten Elliott wrote: It's disgraceful. Exposing girls and boys to this perpetuates the patriarchal hegemonies which damage us all. Your daughter is negatively impacted by this image.

Local councillor Victoria Atherstone complained about a similar poster in the Cheltenham branch of House of Fraser. She tweeted:

Absolutely shocked and appalled by this @TheMissAP high street store photographic campaign displayed in @houseoffraser #Cheltenham shocking pornographic imagery of women #exploitation NOT SUITABLE for the high street - please take it down.

A spokesman for Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said there had only been one official complaint about the images - but they weren't in the watchdog's remit.He said their advertising rules didn't extend to shop fittings or in-store material and that it likely fell to local councils.

Offsite Comment: The March of the Prudes

25th February 2019. See  article from reprobatepress.com by David Flint

Old-fashioned prudishness is alive and well across the world, but it's rarely ego-gratifying unless you dress it up in the modern clothing of concern over objectification and everyday sexism

Blackface refers to a long standing rule of political correctness banning white people from pretending to be black people. But now it seems that the pretence underpinning the rule is no longer required, and that any image of of a black face is now considered politically incorrect

A fashion line of shoes associated with Katy Perry has been withdrawn after being accused of using blackface.

The sandals and loafers, designed with a face featuring prominent red lips, are no longer on sale at retailers including Walmart. A spokesperson for the Kate Perry Collection told TMZ : In order to be respectful and sensitive the team is in the process of pulling the shoes.

Perry has released a statement describing the shoes as part of a collection envisioned as a nod to modern art and surrealism. She said:

I was saddened when it was brought to my attention that it was being compared to painful images reminiscent of blackface. Our intention was never to inflict any pain. She said they had been immediately removed from the website for her fashion line.

The Golden Glove (Der goldene Handschuh) is a 2019 Germany / France crime horror thriller by Fatih Akin.
Starring Marc Hosemann, Jonas Dassler and Adam Bousdoukos.

A serial killer strikes fear in the hearts of residents of Hamburg during the early 1970s.

One of Germany's most acclaimed directors, Fatih Akin, hit back at criticism of his new film about a real-life serial killer, The Golden Glove. Critics claimed that it exploits the female victims.

Akin insisted the ultra-violent new picture aimed to grant dignity to both the killer and the slain women. He commented:

We are living in a time in which the discussion about sexual violence is everywhere and that is justified. But when you make a film about sexual violence, you have to show it.

Akin said he had no desire to glorify violence against women with the film's scenes graphically depicting sexual torture, murder and dismemberment which many viewers said left them feeling queasy. He said for all the heightened sensitivity around sexual misconduct in the entertainment industry, it should not be used to stifle artistic freedom.

Another example of heavy handed policing has been highlighted by the Daily Mail.

Three police were sent to arrest Kate Scottow for critical comments about a trans person on Mumsnet. She was locked up for 7 hours and was questioned about her comment referring to a trans person as a man. The angry comments seem to be the result of an online tiff with a transgender activist who didn't like Scottow's view that men cannot become women.

Police investigations are continuing and the police are still retaining Scottow's laptop and phone seized when she was arrested two months ago. She has also been served with a court order that bans her from referring to her accuser as a man.

The case is the latest where police have been accused of being heavy-handed in dealing with people who go online to debate gender issues. Sitcom writer Graham Linehan was given a verbal harassment warning by West Yorkshire Police after transgender activist Stephanie Hayden reported him for referring to her by her previous names and pronouns on Twitter.

High Court papers obtained by The Mail on Sunday detail how Scottow is accused of a campaign of targeted harassment against the same activist,  Stephanie Hayden, allegedly motivated by her status as a transgender woman.

Surely harsh words can be said in anger but surely this police action has confirmed that holding a politically incorrect opinion is now illegal and can be enforced as if it was a serious crime.

The heavy handed police action has only managed to transform an online tiff into a serious demonstration that the police have corrupted the law into some sort of blasphemy like prohibition on politically incorrect debate. Millions of newspaper readers will now be even more worried that their own words may one day offend someone and get themselves arrested.

This police action just makes society more divisive and angry.

Offsite Comment: This PC policing has got to stop

9th February 2019. See  article from spiked-online.com

Cops told a blogger to tone down her comments about transgenderism.

An up-and-coming young author has cancelled the publication of her highly anticipated debut novel received a barrage of criticism from the PC lynch mob over her depiction of race and slavery.

Amélie Wen Zhao's novel, Blood Heir , is a fantastical retelling of the Anastasia story involving "a princess hiding a dark secret and the conman she must trust to clear her name for her father's murder, it was scheduled to be published in June.

After criticism on grounds of political correctness, Zhao said in a statement that negative feedback from the young adult community had led to her asking her publisher, Delacorte Press, not to release the book at this time. She said:

It was never my intention to bring harm to any reader of this valued community, particularly those for whom I seek to write and empower ... I don't wish to clarify, defend or have anyone defend me. This is not that; this is an apology.

Zhao had previously said on her website that she had set out to create "a diverse cast, many of which are beloved and dear to a third-culture kid like myself

Before the PC mob picked up on the book, early reviews had been positive.

Offsite Comment: The return of book-burning

The Twittermob's fury with un-woke novels has sinister echoes of the past.

See  article from spiked-online.com by Tim Dawson

Humberside Police questioned a man for more than half an hour after he liked a Twitter post with an ironic limerick about the transgender community.

Harry Miller said the formal investigation by the force was into his thinking and his reasons for liking the tweet. The constable told him he was investigating a report of hate speech after an unnamed complainant contacted the force, reports Grimsby Live. Miller explained:

The cop said he was in possession of 30 tweets by me. I asked if any contained criminal material. He said.. .No. I asked if any came close to being criminal...and he read me a limerick. Honestly. A limerick. A cop read me a limerick over the phone. After telling the PC he did not write it, he reportedly said: Ah. But you liked it and promoted it. It's not a crime, but it will be recorded as a hate incident.

The cop told me that he needed to speak with me because, even though I'd committed no crime whatsoever, he needed (and I quote) 'to check my THINKING!' Seriously. Honestly.

Finally, he lectured me. Said, 'Sometimes, a woman's brain grows a man's body in the womb and that is what transgender is.' You can imagine my response...

Lastly, he told me that I needed to watch my words more carefully or I was at risk of being sacked by the company for hate speech. Police said they take all reports of hate crime seriously Police said they take all reports of hate crime seriously

The offending limerick reads:

You're a man.

You're breasts are made of silicone
Your vagina goes nowhere
And we can tell the difference
Even when you are not there

Your hormones are synthetic
And lets just cross this bridge
What you have you stupid man
Is male privilege.

Offsite Video: Intersectionality nonsense

28th January 2019. Listen to The Britisher on this example police harassment on YouTube

Do not tell me that all this intersectional nonsense has made the world a better place

People convicted of insulting people online should be named and shamed on a government register of offenders under new laws to censor social media, says an all-party committee of MPs.

The Commons petitions committee claimed new laws were needed to combat online harms because current legislation was not fit for purpose and self-regulation by the social media firms had failed.

The committee was responding to a petition, backed by more than 220,000 people, from reality TV star and model Katie Price who demanded new online laws and a register of offenders after her disabled son, Harvey, was viciously trolled for his condition, colour and size.

The MPs believe a criminal law, which covered online abuse and included proper recognition of hate crimes against disabled people, will achieve what the petition is looking for from a register, as criminal convictions will show up as part of a Disclosure and Barring Service check, said the MPs.

The committee said a high proportion of abusive content related to football with most shockingly the name of Harvey Price used by fans as an insult for someone's ability as a footballer.

Reports from the launch meeting for the recent publication of updated BBFC guidelines reveals some of the politically correct nonsense underpinning the changes.

thetelegraphandargus.co.uk reports that film censors have hit back at what has been deemed the pornification of culture. The BBFC has announced that the creeping-in of pornographic themes to popular culture is of major concern to the British viewing public.

The animated comedy Sausage Party was singled out as an example of where cinema has borrowed from the world of porn. The new guidelines prescribe higher age ratings for works with sexual violence, darkly realistic themes, and films steeped in the language of pornography.

Speaking at their launch in London, BBFC head of compliance Craig Lapper said:

I think there's a tendency for people to assume that everything must be increasingly more liberal. It always has that possibility of reaching a point and going the other way.

Public views are changing. This partly comes from the pornification of culture and whether almost borrowing from porn, cruder, stronger and harder sexual references are making their way into mainstream entertainment.

I think it's about the borrowing of themes and images from porn, and the visuals of pornography. It's all more available than it used to be when you had to go into a sex shop.

One film was Sausage Party. We had a lot of feedback. We heard from all sort of people about that, including teenagers. Of course they had watched it.

There is a scene in the film where animated vegetables engage in an orgy. It's crude.

Actually perhaps they (the public) feel that we need to rein it in. I think it's just the because it's so widespread and available.

Just before Christmas last year, one person complained that a South African TV commercial for Chicken Licken was offensive and the ad was duly banned.

The advert was quite witty and made for a good news story which was picked up by major newswire services such as the Associated Press and AFP. News that SA's new regulator, the Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB) had deemed the ad offensive popped up in New Zealand, Australia, America, India, and the UK. In South Africa, of course, social media homed in on the ad and it went ballistically viral.

So, if the ARB had thought about the implication of their ban and just ignored that one complaint the ad campaign would have run for a few more weeks and given the declining number of viewers who actually watch commercial breaks on TV these days, perhaps a few hundred thousand viewers would have seen it. Instead, in South Africa alone the ad was viewed by millions of people. Quite possibly hundreds times more than would have seen the ad on television.

So, instead of protecting the sensitivities of those few people who might have found the ad offensive, banning it simply compounded the very problem the ARB was trying to solve.

Family Guy is known for its politically incorrect humour, but now the team behind the show are making some changes. It appears that the jokes targeted at the LGBT community are on the way out.

In Sunday's episode, Peter Griffin, who is voiced by the show's creator Seth MacFarlane, was seen telling a cartoon President Trump that the show was trying to phase out gay jokes.

In fairness, we've been trying to phase out the gay stuff, Peter replies. But you know what? We're a cartoon. You're the president.

The change in direction has been confirmed by the show's executive producers Alec Sulkin and Rich Appel, who told TV Line that they want to better reflect the current climate in the show.

One of the defences of the show's controversial storylines is that they make fun of all minority groups equally and some have argued that there's no reason one particular minority group should be exempt.

If Family Guy is gonna be mainstream and not edgy, what's the point? asked one fan of the show on Twitter. And some in the LGBT community argued the show does not offend them.

68 complaints to TV censor Ofcom have been binned. A few viewers felt that a lesbian character seducing a straight guy with the aim of becoming pregnant was somehow not representative of what gay women should do,

The controversial scene, which saw Kate Connor attempt to seduce Adam Barlow in the hopes of becoming pregnant, was deemed unfair by some viewers as they believed it was unrepresentative of gay women.

After the episode aired, 68 people filed complaints to Ofcom. The TV censor told Digital Spy that the complaints were not upheld as they didn't believe that the storyline reflected their sexual orientation in a derogatory manner.