Crossing the line

A day in the life of a wired person: a handful of quick email messages, a quick post, and another – the opportunities to say something stupid and potentially offensive are endless.

A London-based office of an American law firm is taking the rap for an email sent by one of its partners, where, in response to a request to adopt a puppy, the lawyer wrote “don’t let that dog go to a Chinese restaurant.” The firm and the partner are still apologizing. The Asian Pacific American Law Student Association and a large, wired legal community (the incident was posted on a blog) responded quickly, with anger and a determination not to let the matter go unnoticed.

I have heard many in other countries mock the American “obsession with political correctness.” It seems, however, that PC is only an unleashing of a freedom to finally underscore grievances that had been festering for years. There is the hope that truly offensive speech is going to be put to rest, and that by reacting to the “somewhat” offensive speech (representing perhaps buried feelings of racism or sexism or any other –isms), we will instill greater vigilance over what we say and do to others.

In my first blog post, I worried that what would seem an okay post at the time of publishing would not appear okay to the reader, and that I’d regret publishing it. Yesterday, I posted two things that I later decided were potentially offensive. Toward the end of the day, I pulled one off, just in case (and thanked the stars that only one reader had had the opportunity to read it), and left the other because the damage was done, and I already apologized to the slightly offended person.

Just in the last week, I have taken pot shots at Iowa, Fed Ex, Wisconsin, my mother, and countless people in government. I’m still not sure which of those, if any, might have touched a raw nerve. Clearly Laura Bush would have been offended (see post, February 6). Leno can test his jokes, a blogger cannot. That’s the down-side of self-publishing. And the fact is, sometimes you’re so focused on a theme [Bukowski was one weird dude], or on spelling [why doesn’t literati have two t’s?], and always, always on the clock [like right now: this is taking too long, I need to get back to work] that you completely don’t notice potentially offensive peripherals. After more than a month of blogging, I am still worried. But I remain cautiously optimistic that I can be sensitive to the known and unknown reader. And if I fail, I’m sure you’ll let me know.