When did it become wrong to be right?

Somehow, political correctness has morphed into political incorrectness. It has become wrong to be right. Consider Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. During an open house gathering in Edmonton, early in February, he suggested that a woman refer to “peoplekind” rather than “mankind” — “because it’s more inclusive,” Trudeau explained.

It was a good-natured exchange. The speaker laughed and agreed. The audience applauded.

Surely by now we know that masculine is not feminine. That a reliance on masculine pronouns and male-based titles demeans and subordinates half of the world’s population. That the supposed rule that “the masculine includes the feminine” never was a rule, until it was invented two centuries ago by some self-appointed grammar police.

And that even if it was accepted as a rule for a while, times have changed. Distorted definitions no longer apply. As Trudeau said, when asked why he wanted his cabinet to include equal numbers of women and men, “Because it’s 2015.”

But commentators on three continents ridiculed Trudeau for wanting to use “politically correct” language. Among them, of course, was Donald Trump’s favourite network, Fox News.

Don’t we get it yet? “Politically correct” language is not a fad. It’s the way we learn and change. The ideas, the concepts — and yes, the prejudices — lodged in our brains do not, will not, change until we learn to use different words to express them.

Slavery only began to end in the U.S. when Americans switched to “black” instead of “nigger.” Stokely Carmichael pushed the Black Power movement. Malcolm X popularized “Black is beautiful.”

That was “politically correct” language at work.

Helen Reddy sang “I am woman, hear me roar.” Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique. Carol Gilligan wrote In a Different Voice about women’s moral development. That was “politically correct” language at work.

I admit that I initially resisted gender-neutral language. I didn’t like changing my thinking patterns. I got converted only when my friend and business partner Ralph Milton saw the light sooner than I did, and pushed me into revising my attitudes.

The two of us made inclusive language mandatory in all the books we published, whether or not our authors liked it. We learned to avoid awkward phrasings that drew attention to themselves so successfully that, ten years later, a reader congratulated us on “not using that silly inclusive language.”

Trudeau, to his credit, did not treat the Edmonton woman’s unintentional use of an outdated term as her right to freedom of speech.

But it would seem, now, that one may not express views that conflict with someone else’s views.

Let’s go back, a little farther, to one of the first speeches that Julie Payette made as Canada’s new Governor General. (For non-Canadians, the Governor General is the Queen’s representative as head of government.)

As the CBC reported it, “Addressing a science conference in Ottawa, Payette argued for the need for greater public acceptance and knowledge of science. In doing so, she made dismissive references to astrology, the notion of ‘divine intervention’ in the creation of life, and those who doubt the scientific consensus that humans are significantly responsible for the warming planet.”

Immediately, people protested. The Huffington Post huffed that Payette “went way over the line with her speech.”

Conservative party leader Andrew Scheer objected, “It is extremely disappointing that the prime minister will not support Indigenous peoples, Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, Christians and other faith groups who believe there is truth in their religion.”

In other words, you have a right to be wrong. And it’s wrong for anyone to tell you you’re wrong.

Even if pursuing your wrongness can have catastrophic consequences for life on this planet.

Even if you believe that the lives of every person on earth are governed by the motions of planets crossing imaginary constellations in the night sky, constellations visible only from this one viewpoint in space.

Even if you prefer theories written by superstitious patriarchs 30 centuries ago to endlessly tested scientific explanations.

And even if you believe that global warming and climate change is a conspiracy, a fraud foisted on a gullible world by a minority of scientists.

Julie Payette has a huge advantage over all the rest of us — she has actually been to space, has seen this small blue planet floating in the void.

And she should shut up about what she has seen and learned, because it might offend some people’s beliefs?

That is, to my mind, the ultimate political incorrectness.