Political correctness can be like a nagging cold.  It's bothersome and a little painful, but it won't put you in the hospital or kill you. 

Take the recent news out of Princeton University, the elite Ivy League institution attended by Woodrow Wilson, James Madison, and Jeff Bezos, to name just a few. 

Princeton has just created a new position – "Interpersonal Violence Clinician and Men's Engagement Manager."  The job holder's first task will be fitting that unwieldy title on a business card.  

After that, he or she will seek out and try to eliminate "toxic masculinity" on campus.  You know, as opposed to "wholesome masculinity."

Most people just shake their heads at this college nonsense. It probably won't do much lasting damage.  Unless, that is, you're a tuition-paying parent of a Princeton student.  

The school estimates that it will set you back about $67,000 a year - perhaps $67,150 after this latest hire. 

Not to be outdone, the University of Iowa's student newspaper has discovered a heretofore unknown and unfair privilege – intelligence.  

The paper theorizes that "cognitive privilege" is kind of like white privilege, conferring unearned benefits on people who were blessed by accident of birth.  

Again, this is relatively innocuous, and it's pretty obvious that whoever dreamed up "cognitive privilege" has not been affected by that particular malady. 

In the adult world, at this very moment progressives are incensed at the Department of Justice.  That's because the DOJ is using the term "illegal alien," which is a highly offensive expletive in some circles. 

Unfortunately for the easily offended, "illegal alien" is the very precise and official term for people who are in this country without permission. 

They are aliens, and they are here illegally.  

Hence, "illegal aliens." 

But the Chicago Tribune, as one example, claims that the term implies that all illegal aliens are criminals.  That's one of those "dog whistles" that can only be heard by the Tribune writer and his fellow travelers on the far left. 

So, yes, political correctness can be almost comical when it dictates which pronoun is acceptable in polite company or how an illegal alien should be described.  Just hearing "personhole cover" can bring a smile to most of us.

But there are far too many cases where P.C. is downright deadly, as it likely was in the death of Justine Damond.  As you know, the 40-year-old Australian woman was shot and killed by a cop in Minneapolis.  He was the shooter, but political correctness almost surely was an accomplice.

Ultra-liberal city leaders, desperate to find and hire Somalian cops, pinned a badge on Somalia-born Mohamed Noor, who seems to have been temperamentally unsuited for the job.  Noor, who killed the pajama-clad woman as she approached the squad car, has yet to explain why he opened fire. 

Then there is Sergio Martinez, the illegal alien who had been deported 20 times and returned to allegedly  sexually assault at least two women in Portland.  The feds had asked Portland authorities to hold Martinez in jail so he could be deported once again, but that sanctuary city doesn't think much of federal law.  The meth-addicted thug was released, Portland officials and many residents were able to feel virtuous, but two women's lives have been altered forever. 

Of course, the poster boy for P.C. madness is Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, accused of killing Kate Steinle in the sanctuary city of San Francisco.  Like his pal in Portland, Lopez-Sanchez was deported time and again before being released back to the streets of San Francisco. 

People died at Fort Hood because Major Nidal Hasan's colleagues were reluctant to report his erratic behavior and radical sympathies, lest they be called "Islamophobic."  

Similarly, Omar Mateen, who slaughtered 49 people at an Orlando nightclub, had been questioned by the FBI about his ties to terrorism.  We will never be sure whether the hyper-P.C. of the Obama administration played a role in the agency's decision to remove him from the terror watch list. 

The same thing has happened time and again throughout the USA and Europe, where P.C. has pretty much replaced God in the hearts and minds of the cognoscenti. 

So, yes, we can enjoy a chuckle at the P.C. police, who rigidly try to enforce their laws and punish any malefactors who refuse to play along.  But political correctness all too often leads to genuine human suffering. 

Actor and director Clint Eastwood recently said about political correctness, "We are killing ourselves."  He didn't mean it literally, but in fact people have died because of this scourge. 

And more will surely die unless we stop the P.C. madness.  It is way beyond being a laughing matter.