A scandal rocked England last week, when a report revealed that town authorities knowingly covered up the systemic abduction and rape of young British girls (and a few boys) in the town of Rotherham.

The report showed that town officials knew this was going on for the better part of 16 years (1997-2013), but that no action was taken at any point during that time. The reason why? The officials and bureaucrats who were aware of the problem were afraid of confronting it because they feared being labelled racists.

Unfortunately, this fear of being called racist was because the perpetrators of this horror were Muslim immigrants from Pakistan. In short, political correctness went horribly wrong in this case, and led to the continued abuse of at least 1,400 British children. (It’s believed the number of children abused is probably higher.)

Some of the abuses the report revealed, beyond the sex slavery part, found that victims were threatened with guns and doused in gasoline and threatened with being set on fire. Truly horrible things, for anyone with an ounce of common sense.

Political correctness’s ability to distort reality meant that, as the report revealed, at least a third of these cases were known to town officials and others. But, because of the pressures of multiculturalism and political correctness, no one could rightly call out the horror being perpetrated upon the children.

The intent of political correctness played out perfectly in Rotherham. To control people, political correctness controls language and discourse. And in this instance, political correctness compelled those with the power to stop this horror into inaction. This, then, is the horror of political correctness.

Another part of this tragedy falls under the idea known as “anarcho-tyranny.” This is a concept that describes situations within a society where the law is being flagrantly violated, while relatively minor infractions are punished with the full power of the state’s law enforcement apparatus.

In coverage of Rotherham, it’s been reported that two fathers tracked their children to the places their children were being held and demanded them back from the gangs that had stolen them. The result? They were arrested themselves, while police did nothing to the men committing the truly horrible crimes.

Another part of the tyranny in the anarcho-tyranny aspect of this story was that in 2012, this same group of town officials and bureaucrats used their power to remove foster children from a Rotherham home. The reason for the removal? The foster parents belonged to Britain’s UKIP party, a faction analogous to our own Tea Party here in the U.S.

This was during the time when over 1,400 children were being abducted for the purpose of sex slavery, and, just in case the point has not been made completely clear yet, the town officials knew this was going on. The terrifying thing about Rotherham is that many believe this dynamic has been going on elsewhere in the U.K., but hasn’t yet come to light for many of the same reasons as Rotherham.

Rotherham may be instructive closer to home as well. It can certainly be argued that the overuse of the word racist in England, whether warranted or not, led to the paralysis exhibited by the Rotherham officials and bureaucrats.

What about in Federal Way? With recent allegations of racism bubbling up against Federal Way Public Schools, one can’t help but be concerned that the almost reflexive use of the word by so many in this day and age might not lead to the same sort of paralysis somewhere down the road.

One can easily conceive of a situation where a bully might not be able to be properly addressed due to a fear by school officials of being called racist. (Add into this the recent push for addressing the disproportionate discipline issue, and it’s even easier to see such a situation.)

Political correctness is designed as thought control and therefore, people control. And in England, 1,400 young lives were shattered because of political correctness’s terrible influence.

This is the horror of political correctness, of thought and speech control, and it’s closely-related cousin, anarcho-tyranny.

All this leaves one wondering: what exactly have we created here?

Contact Greg Allmain at gallmain@fedwaymirror.com.