We Americans are members of a culture of victims. The glaring dichotomy of our cherished freedom advocated against the background of our dirty past (slavery, sexism, etc.) has burdened the country's collective conscience with the shameful aura of hypocrisy. In order to clear our guilt and to propagate our image as the safeguard of liberty, America has enrolled itself in a sensitivity class, elevating fairness, equality and inclusiveness into a religion. In our effort to finish the class with honors, we have sterilized the country in politically correct etiquette, enforcing it fiercely and frequently by lawsuits and public censure. In addressing political correctness, I am not concerned with the suffocation of our freedom of speech. Although last semester's episode with "The Men's Room" raised a ridiculous amount of hoopla for absolutely nothing, I wouldn't challenge the actions of the University, given that a private institution has a right to monitor both its image and content. Rather, what amuses (and saddens?) me is the outraged reaction of the students, revealing the rampant internalization of politically correct custom into the core of our personalities.

Being politically correct implies following a customary prototype of speech and action, so as to function smoothly and properly in society. The abundance of rules and stigmas help us not to offend the homosexuals, the women, the non-whites, the crippled, the mentally impaired, the fat and the ugly and simultaneously appear noble and open minded, both to those engaged in the act and to those for whom the act is performed. The pressure to participate in this social conformity has settled into a gnawing sensation of guilt, and thereby transformed this external custom into an internal standard of self-evaluation.

If in public we happen to say that "black men are good at basketball" an array of dreadful possibilities flash before our eyes. If I'm noting their color, does it mean I'm too conscious of it? Am I implying that they're only good at basketball? Am I even allowed to say "black" or should I have said "African American?" Humorously enough, these cognitive palpitations are more than premonitions of a social taboo, but of personal inadequacy, leading to the haunting possibility that because I think most black men are good at basketball, I might be racist. The most guilt-ridden members of our society (i.e., rich, white males) are quickest to interpret this slip of the tongue as a slip of the mind, prompting them to mold not only their speech but also their outlooks to a more socially acceptable form. The result: Worship of the victim. The poorer, darker and more oppressed the victim is, the more we want to help, hoping that the world will notice our admirable concern for the underdogs, despite their distance and irrelevance to our cozy Brandeis existence.

I am not implying that even the most distant "victim" is irrelevant, nor am I categorizing all concern for socially noble issues as a self-gratifying attempt to cleanse and then display our attitude toward the less fortunate. I am simply pointing out that we, as Americans, have been so frightened by the stigma of our words and thoughts that our search for personal and social approval has found outlets in causes (such as freeing Tibet or affirmative action) that would have had no appeal to us in the absence of the pressing internal and external guilt that has been seeped into the core of our society by an appeal for political correctness.

--Yana Litovsky '05 submits a column to the Justice