But things began to change not so long ago. The changes occurred out of guilt over past mistakes or perhaps for other reasons. But things did change with the “Political Correctness” movement — the need to placate and bow to special interest groups on the perceived battlefields of race, sex, religion, age, social standing and a myriad of other PC causes.

As political correctness strengthened its grip on society it focused on the differences, not the common ideals that nourish pluralistic Western society. Ironically, those adhering to the “religion” of political correctness fail to see that it is choking our way of life. The PC movement makes us walk on eggshells for fear of offending anyone or everyone. Ironically, it flies in the face of the many freedoms it purports to support: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of thought.

In Britain, two women (at different places of work) were fired for wearing crucifix necklaces. Hardly offensive, but these small symbols of their faith did in fact draw complaint. The women’s bosses, undoubtedly courage not being their strong suits, fired the women when they refused to remove the “offending” crucifixes. The British government says their firings were justified because wearing a cross is not a religious necessity for being a Christian.

Yet, the hypocrisy is lost on this government that supports the right of a Sikh to wear a turban or a Muslim to wear a hijab in the workplace. For some reason, in the eyes of the state, Christians are second-class citizens when it comes to religious beliefs.

But set aside religion and imagine these women were wearing tattoos or revealing skirts that offended someone. Would they be fired? If they were fired, would the state’s innumerable human rights Pharisees and watchdogs not defend them and their jobs? You bet they would.

And the same sort of stuff happens here in Canada all the time, too. I have a friend who almost lost his printing business over massive debts incurred fighting Canada’s politically correct watchdogs after he politely declined, on religious grounds, to print material from a gay rights activist. He ultimately won his case when the courts overturned the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal. But it took generous financial support from his friends and church to prevent his legal victory from being more of a human tragedy than it already was.

We see political correctness every day in Canada and across Western society.

Earlier this year a four-year-old preschooler in North Carolina had her homemade lunch of turkey sandwich, banana, potato chips and apple juice taken from her because it was deemed not nutritious enough by school bureaucrats.

Instead, she was forced to eat chicken nuggets! (At least she was given some milk.)

In recent years, we’ve seen the Ontario Provincial Police stand by and do nothing when aboriginals in Caledonia broke the law and struck fear in the hearts of non-aboriginal neighbors.

We’ve seen little kids as young as six years old accused of sexual assault for “playing doctor” or kissing schoolmates.

Last December, we saw a principal at a school east of Ottawa cancel a Christmas concert for several hundred students and their families because nine students did not want to participate.

The list of stupid political correctness statements and actions is very long. I am sure every reader can come up with as many different examples or more. A backlash is a real possibility. The officious inflexibility and intolerance of the state’s human rights Pharisees is creating intolerance in others. This can breed bad things.

In no way are we advocating ill treatment or discrimination. We’re just asking for some common sense, decency and a willingness to say “enough is enough” with much of this silly political correctness.