This brief involves two parts. There is need for a substantial investigation on a specific issue before creating a body of work that addresses said issue. For this 'problem' the investigation will be looking into political correctness and how it is stifling legitimate debate. Political correctness is the idea of avoiding expression or action that may insult or exclude a social group.
This investigation has started with a documentary by Trevor Phillips, a former Labour politician. The documentary looked at various examples of political correctness having an effect on ordinary people and limiting freedom of speech. The documentary looked at the PEGIDA group and how they are forced into holding their public demonstrations in an empty industrial estate for the sole purpose of avoiding a conflict. Phillips explains that even if we don't like their views and opinions, should they really be being forced to demonstrate in such an area. Another example of this in effect is Brexit voters being labelled as racist even if they did not cast their vote because of race and immigration. People who's views are considered 'politically incorrect' are being affected by this and feel left behind which is increasing the support of populist figures including Nigel Farage and Donald Trump who are connecting with this demographic. One contributing factor to this is the generation gap. The older generation have been bought up with values and believes that are today considered not right groups such as UKIP are connecting with this demographic.
This investigation has followed by looking into more discussions including from Stephen fry who discusses political correctness in an interview. In this interview he discusses the case of the Cecil Rhodes statue in Oxford, where students want the statue removed because of his history, and the atrocious things he did as part of the British Empire. It is Fry's argument that this is a good example of how political correctness is having a negative effect. Although these statues originally celebrated these persons, they should be kept to remember how negative these people are and remember the atrocities that the British Empire took part in. He says the way to fight colonialism is to expose the major figures.
To receive some feedback about this research and to ensure that it is taking the right direction, it was pitched to a focus group in a five minute presentation. In this presentation, I presented Trevor Phillips' and Stephen Fry's arguments and the examples of how political correctness has caused controversy that have been investigated into.
After presenting this research, the feedback I received made it clear that this is a very opinion based project and it would be difficult to produce some substantial and viable research. This is going to make research difficult ensuring that it is non bias.
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