George Orwell, the prophet of political correctness

One only has to look at how words such as “elitist” or “discrimination” have been altered since Orwell’s death to see how changing the meaning of a word can make the terrain of debate very difficult for one side.

All these practices were alive in Orwell’s day, in Soviet Russia, where a more brutal form of correct thinking was imposed, but the essential principle was the same – “designed to make lies sound truthful”, as Orwell said. That was the quote used by Bradford headmaster Ray Honeyford to describe the process of multiculturalism in action, and in that particular area the state becomes the most Orwellian, from its “diversity is strength”-style posters to its rewriting of national history, not to mention the disturbing policies that followed the Macpherson report, where teachers were even asked to monitor the language of young infants for thoughtcrime.

That’s why today Orwell, and in particular his final work, is quoted far more by the Right than the Left, and why you’ll find few objections to a statue from conservatives. Perhaps that’s not the real reason, and the Beeb are just saving the spot for Antonio Gramsci.

via George Orwell, the prophet of political correctness, does not belong to the Left – Telegraph Blogs.