There’s a clear campaign against the mentally ill with the global rise of fascism. Lots of it shows up in anti homeless rhetoric, but you can see it in the MAHA and anti vaccination movements.
There’s no reason to use the word “r-tarded” to describe someone. As someone who’s worked with the intellectually challenged, it’s an insult to them to compare them with people who are willfully ignorant.
There’s a historical cycle where the helping professions rotate the terminology out, as the wider culture overloads the old terms with insulting usage. Eventually the new vernacular leaks out into general parlance and the cycle cycles. “Retarded” was once acceptable clinical terminology because "idiot, “moron”, and “imbecile” had accumulated cultural baggage. The latter terms were, themselves, once politically correct alternatives to even older terms.
I think it’s naive to think that THIS time is special, and today’s politically correct terminology won’t ever leak out into common usage as a slur too.
If a group of people are telling me this word was and continues to be used as a dehumanizing slur, that’s enough for me to look into a vocabulary change. More importantly, the very existence of a euphemism treadmill shows that you can’t stop at language change, and that disabled people need to be much more fully accepted in society.
I got a lot of hate in this thread but I agree with you. We need to much more accepting of people in society disabled or just different. A word change makes you feel good but doesn’t actually do anything. A business with a curb should be required to have a ramp also, for wheelchairs. I wish there was a some sort of option for drive-thru for deaf people. A person with autism who gets overly stimulated by people close should be allowed to ask for personal distance.
Which gets to the larger problem - the dehumanization of people with intellectual and cognitive disabilities. Being such a person is considered such a bad thing that it can be used as an insult. Whatever terminology we use, people with cognitive delays are just as human, just as valuable as anyone else.
Being such a person is considered such a bad thing that it can be used as an insult.
I mean, yes? Ultimately that’s exactly what an insult is. Think of the other words we use as curses and insults. Asshole. Mother fucker. Bitch. Cunt. Dick. Shit(head). Dumbass. Pendejo. Cabron.
Do you want to be something stinky (asshole, cunt, dick, shit), or something disliked (bitch, mother fucker)? Do you want to be like the people who the terms moron, idiot, imbecile, retarded, handicapped, or disabled are describing? Hell, extend it to other things. If someone 6 feet tall was calling you, a 5’4" man, a midget, it’s not like your height suddenly will change if the term is accepted for you, it’s because you don’t want to be perceived as someone short enough to be termed appropriately as such.
And as much as we can all consider everyone human to be just as valuable as any other human, people aren’t suddenly going to want to be short, or have low intelligence / ability to learn/comprehend/adapt. This is why I ultimately have given up on policing the language in general. We are forever locked into the cycle of words becoming inappropriate, because the vast majority of folks genuinely abhor the idea of becoming something like those words are describing, whether its mental ability, height, likeability, worth, etc. You’re not going to change that, ever.
People with cognitive delays are just as human and just as valuable as anyone else
Precisely! 100% agree.
I also want to add that I don’t disagree with people who say that there’s a cyclical pattern with words becoming taboo and being replaced. That’s obviously a fact. But the fact that language evolves doesn’t give us license to be assholes.
Ultimately, the only thing that will improve things is educating the average person about the topic. But calling out ableist language - whether the person using such language intends that meaning or not - is often a good starting point for education (for those willing to learn.)
Also, what most people don’t understand is that developmental delays and cognitive deficiencies are a spectrum and can occur across different types of cognition. For example, I’m what today you might call “doubly special” - I was far ahead in some areas but far behind in others. I still am, to a degree.
So should people use the names for people like me to refer to assholes who intentionally hurt other people’s feelings? I certainly wouldn’t like it if they did. Regardless of how much I might accidentally piss people off or hurt their feelings, it’s rarely my intention to make people feel that way and and I’d rather not have someone else’s moral failing conflated with my struggle to communicate in ways most people understand.
Placing bets. 30 years from now “Autistic” is going to be on the same chopping block. It’s already making it’s rounds as a general insult with the kids, just like retarded did when I was growing up.
If anything isn’t using the currently still correct medical term as an insult more offensive than using the outdated one that has become a generic insult? At least as far as being offensive to people with the condition, rather than those offended on their behalf.
That’s a damn good point.
It already is.
I think it’s naive to think that THIS time is special, and today’s politically correct terminology won’t ever leak out into common usage as a slur too.
I think it’s naive to think that at those times in the past the people who used clinical terms as insults weren’t doing something bad so that we shouldn’t worry about it happening today.
Right, so then we rotate words again. This isn’t hard. We’re not trying to find the One True Politically Correct Term; we’re arguing that one (1) specific word has a negative bias and we need to stop using it.
Neurospicy
i’m austistic and love the word retard, really don’t understand peoples need to be offended for others. it’s not remotely close to the n-word, saying “r-word” just makes you seem like a tool imo
Look we can’t call each other retards because other people will get triggered for us…
Besides every sane person knows that in common speech this is just means “extremely stupid” with no derogatory intent.
“extremely stupid” with no derogatory intent.
I think you should look up the definition of derogatory. Calling someone stupid is derogatory.
The derogatory intent is directed at the insult target, not an uninvolved group of people, is what they meant.
How else would you refer to people with below average critical thinking skills who perform actions without understanding or considering the consequences.
Please keep your answer non-derogatory.
I never said it’s wrong to call people stupid.
I meant derogatory towards disabled people.
Riiiiight, in the same way people used to pair it with motions mimicking cerebral palsy? Do you also believe that didn’t have derogatory intent towards people with disabilities and only meant “extremely stupid”? 🙄
motions mimicking cerebral palsy
I’ve no idea what that even is. Sounds like some pseudo science
You don’t remember when people used to imitate spasticity by curling their hands and whacking their chests while changing their voice? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spastic_cerebral_palsy It was extremely common to do when calling people that word.
You don’t remember when people used to imitate spasticity
I don’t. Never even heard about that disease.
BTW: People over internet don’t know who you are, what race you are, and what disabilities you have. If you get called a brain dead retard, it because some dumb shit you wrote. Nothing less, nothing more
You should look up context clues
It doesn’t take much literary analysis to understand that using that word to mean “extremely stupid” is ableist.
But OP worked with “intellectually challenged” ???
Jfc can’t even call myself retarded without offending an unrelated neuro-typical “standing up” for us.
These stupid wars on words IMHO is the reason why “liberals” were regarded as a joke prior to trump election
Like banning “master” in github as well as dumb, regex based words filters in chats. Oh you want to mention the “beta version”? Too bad, a social justice warrior decided that “beta” is now offensive, you have to change your language so that you wont affect the hypothetic easily offendable persons
Like banning “master” in github as well as dumb
Master wasn’t banned. The default name was changed from master to main. Literally nothing is stopping you from choosing to use master.
While this is technically correct, when you say “we’re switching the default branch name from master to main to be less culturally insensitive”, you kind of imply that people who continue using master are culturally insensitive. And nobody likes being called that (generally), so it still feels like a ban to people.
That implication is correct?
Look, if it’s pointed out that “x” makes some minorty uncomfortable, but you keep using “x”, you are culturally insensitive to that minority. You can choose to be, nobody would care if you’re not a person/company with milliona of followers.
That’s entirely assuming that there indeed is a sizeable minority that have reason to be offended and indeed are offended. In the cited example above, that wasn’t the case so there was significant controversy surrounding what was perceived as “performative activism” that benefitted noone.
“We’re switching from master to main” was controversial? My god, people must’ve been bored out of their fucking minds.
You know how a normal person would react to this? ‘k.’
That’s entirely assuming that there indeed is a sizeable minority that have reason to be offended and indeed are offended. In the cited example above, that wasn’t the case
A 1s websearch says this is false. BLM movement is definitely a “sizable minority” whatever that means.
You know how a normal person would react to this? ‘k.’
I reacted like this too. But you I don’t think the opponents had invalid arguments to be honest. It was mostly:
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Lack of an actual outcry to change it.
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‘Master’ in git did not have any connotations to slavery, so there was no reason to be offended by it (different from eg master/slave databases or something).
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The change was hamfisted through without the community actually finding consensus and agreeing with the change.
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It invalidates 15 years of git tutorials, which is confusing for newbies.
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The defaults for git mismatched with the default in github, which as a very large player put undue corporate pressure on the git project to go along with the change.
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Changing the branch name does have impact on users, which without a good reason to change it is unnecessary.
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And the big one: the rename is just performative. If you want to address inequality in tech, make sure people of colour get the same access and opportunities that white people get. Github in particular was ridiculed because they pretended to be so socially conscious, but as it turns out despite having black employees, not one of them had managed to promote into a management function at the time. They put up a smokescreen but did not make any actually impactful changes that improved the position of people of colour, and in doing so abused the BLM movement for PR purposes.
A 1s websearch says this is false. BLM movement is definitely a “sizable minority” whatever that means.
BLM didn’t advocate for this though! Microsoft/Github sort of assumed they would, so decided to change it. But I can’t find any actual outcry that it should be changed from those who were supposedly offended by the term.
Fair points.
Weirdly, that BLM source in wikipedia led nowhere. My fault for not checking.
However performative it may have seen at the time, I’m glad the terms are gone. Master/slave was particularly uncomfortable to use for me personally (I mainly associate it with BDSM)
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While they are incorrect about the specific term, their main point is correct. “Slave” was removed from the terminology. Same with Blacklist and Whitelist. They are no longer the preferred terms.
Wait, you’re not supposed to say blacklist and whitelist anymore? Shit.
Now it’s CaucasianList and AfricanAmericanList.
Where is the AsianList? I thought we were supposed to be inclusive now!
Nope. Blocklist and Allowlist I believe. Because despite having no racist origins, “black” being the “bad” list and “white” being the “good” list made some people uncomfortable. It’s the perfect example of meaningless surface level changes imo
I used to have a word for how ridiculous this is but the op said I shouldn’t use it anymore
Yeah I mean if that’s the standard I’m fine with it. But as I mentioned in a reply to somebody else, to make something black you don’t add darkness, you subtract light. So inherently black is subtraction and white is addition. Saying that addition is good and subtraction is bad is like a weird byproduct of “positive” meaning good and “negative” meaning bad, when they are just numbers on either side of zero.
Colors are additive or subtractive depending on the medium, so you are entirely wrong here and just spouting nonsense, fyi. Paints are additive, light is subtractive. All colors of light makes white and all colors of paint makes black.
What does black paint do to light?
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Why does one automatically associate black with bad and white with good? Think about it.
Remember that we also do things subliminally. So black = bad rubs off on people who can be called “black”.
It’s almost like it’s a common theme that dark, dingy, places are associated with danger and bright warm areas are associated with safety, life, purity, truth, etc. and when you simplify that to a basic theme, you end up with black = bad and white = good. It’s a theme that springs up from nature itself.
Which further goes to my point: the words are just placeholders for feelings and emotions. So to change the words does nothing to change the feelings. If you remove all the hateful words, you won’t remove hate. You’ll just end up with “I hope you unalive yourself you bottom of the bell curve” instead.
Dark places aren’t inherently more dangerous. Light, bright areas aren’t inherently positive.
These are the subliminal ideas that were put into your head by literature, religion, popular culture, etc (that was often seeped in racism).
Just like numbers aren’t inherently good or bad, but certain numbers rise associations with “good” or “bad” 3, 7, 13, 666, 777, Etc.
“Nature itself” argument is completely BS, as many animals hunt and spring to life at night, while daytime and light means danger to them.
Dark cave vs open meadow.
Clear skies vs stormy clouds.
Clear still water vs murky turbulent water.
Death and decay vs life.
But nah, I’m just making up literary themes that have existed for centuries. For fucks sake, the vast majority of horror movies rely on darkness.
The fucking yin yang is literally the fusion of light and darkness, good and evil.
You’re just being intentionally obtuse or you’re really that dumb that you don’t get any of these themes.
I mean I get it, but I never thought of it that way. Like black is the absence light or color. You don’t add darkness to something to make it black, you subtract light, color, energy etc. So black is “negative”. White is the opposite of black. On a color slider, it’s all of everything all the way, it’s “positive”, and I don’t mean “positive = good” way, I mean like mathematically positive, like a “+” sign. Like do electricians need to stop using black cables for negative? It just seems like a reach unless it originally had some racist etymology. Like if the term" blacklist"was originally used by restaurant owners during segregation and they didn’t allow black people in, or anybody on the “blacklist” because anybody on that list should be treated as if they were black then I would be like “Oh yeah holy shit, we should definitely not use that term”. But I think saying black is negative and white is positive has both scientific and mathematical origins.
I’m fine with using blocklist and allowlist. I guess I just never got the memo that we weren’t supposed to use blacklist and whitelist.
You don’t add darkness to something to make it black, you subtract light, color, energy etc.
Except you do, when you’re using additive mixing (I.e paint)
I’m not saying it’s that it’s inherently racist. I’m saying that black people rightfully dislike that “black” is associated with “negative”
But I think saying black is negative and white is positive has both scientific and mathematical origins.
It has neither.
Also man in the middle changing to “on path”
Wtf?
New preferred term for MitM attacks is “on path” attacks, in pretty much every updated cert doctrine that discusses the concept.
Now that is dumb, way dumber than “blacklist/whitelist”, “master/slave controllers”. You could make it gender-neutral without even changing the acronym!
Man in the middle --> Monkey in the middle, Moron in the middle, Maggot in the middle, etc
If you want to be bureaucratic, you could just say “Attacker in the middle”.
The new term is more obscure and less specific, since it does not have the “middle” component.
“X in the middle” = there’s something between two points, in the middle of them.
WTF does “on path” mean? Something is on a path?
I agree. It’s dumb, and less intuitive as to what it’s describing.
“Morally banning”. But you got my point
Here’s the thing, the word doesn’t matter… It’s the intent. For example if I said “well aren’t you a fucking genius” and meant it sarcastically that’s just as insulting. I could also say “you gobflecker” in a aggressive tone that also bad.
An example is the old show red dwarf. The replaced every curse word with smeg. Smeg doesn’t mean anything. But in the show when one character calls another a “smeghead”. You know it’s not nice and meant to be an insult even though they never said or explained that in the show.
Banning a word won’t do anything. Ban the attitude and change people’s opinions and you can change the world. For example women, not saying they are treated well by everyone but compared to 200 years ago? Or even further back? For example there was a “treatment” for women who dared consider working. They were basically forced to bed and forced to stay there only hand few broth for 6 months. They literally just had to lay there, no talking no reading no such thing as a video. Today they are treated much better, it wasn’t by banning the world girl or bitch or vagina or anything it was by changing people’s perception.
Yeah. We’ve been down this road before. Believe it or not but all those african american navy seals with gay brothers who also were active duty military? Yeah, they were just shitty white kids who wanted to say nr and ft a lot. Who’da thunk it?
No. It is about showing the absolute bare minimum of human decency to change your vocabulary and avoid using slurs that people have to constantly hear from people who AREN’T actually african american navy seals with gay brothers and all that.
Ban the attitude and change people’s opinions and you can change the world.
And a huge chunk of that is to stop saying fucking slurs.
but compared to 200 years ago? Or even further back?
Homie… are you ACTUALLY playing the “You could be property so shut the fuck up if I want to say a slur” card?
Also, I strongly suggest anyone who thinks “history” was a no woman’s land or was all about racial purity to actually do some research. Shockingly, things were actually a LOT more “progressive” than they would expect with most bigotry and hatred being more oriented towards killing those Others across the channel. Most of the “We used to be a whole lot more racist and sexist” is, shockingly, from racist and sexist people who want to “make <insert country> great again”.
Nope, I am not saying you could be property so shut up. I’m saying the progress we made was not based on language.
Abraham Lincoln famously said “Free those fucking n****rs”, right? Okay, actually a LOT of the politicians and white people of that era were ridiculously racist but that is why things continued to boil over until the 60s… and then continue on since then.
But yes. A huge part of things IS behavioral. And the language people use is a huge part of that. Because when someone says “Hey, that word is a slur and is hurtful” and the response is “Fuck off, I am not treating you like property so be happy with what you’ve got”… the behavior is pretty abhorrent as well.
Ban the attitude and change people’s opinions and you can change the world.
And a huge chunk of that is to stop saying fucking slurs.
Thank you for this, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills reading some of these comments. I’m shocked how hard this is to grasp for people.
I mean… just look at elon musk.
conservatives (and, if your stance is that “I can’t change my language just because people decided it is suddenly offensive” then you are fundamentally conservative), think the pinnacle of humanity is 20-30 years ago. Generally when they were teenagers or whatever the fuck musk is doing with cultivating his entire life to be the kind of person who posts on 4chan about how LUE over on gamefaqs banned them.
And… 20 or 30 years ago the various funny people on TV were casually dropping slurs like r****d.
And then you just have the normal response to any pushback or criticism on The Internet. People spend 28 hours a day watching Content at 1.5x speed where they are constantly reinforced to their world view (or, more often, the world view of their favorite influencer…) because of The Algorithm. ANYTHING that is not telling them exactly what to do or think is met with scorn.
And when someone says something that goes against that worldview? It is “disingenuous” or “gaslighting” because it is not just a question on if they need to improve as a human being… it is actively opposed to their very existence. It is like they had been wearing red tinted glasses for years and someone said “Actually the sky is blue, not purple”.
Absolutely recommend you try this out with some slurs on people of various races and see if saying “the word doesn’t matter” stops them from beating the shit out you lol
lol, retard isnt even close to the n-word and it’s annoying as fuck when people try to compare the two.
there’s a joke (john mullaney, i think?) that goes if you got two words…and one word you won’t even say…that word is the worse word
Plenty of chuds will gladly say n****r…
Why not? If the goal is to annoy or insult, why wouldnt you use that word, or any word? You are supposed to be trying to annoy the person, to insult them. Why the fucking fuck are you trying to be nice during your insult??? The only reason not to use it, is because its easy. You want to be at least a little creative and get some colour into your insults.
Imagine if people just didnt say that word because they didnt want to, and not because there was a social stigma around it. Woudnt that make the world so much easier to navigate?
What’s up my nigga got widely used without insulting anyone
Yeah, just looking at all the banned words. It seems more like its the “R” sound people dont like…
The word doesn’t matter, it’s the intent.
Eh, maybe, but words communicate intent. By stigmatizing certain messaging - which can include both reserving certain words for only certain use cases and also shaming people who express bigotry regardless of what word they happen to choose - we communicate to third party observers that such views are not welcome in our society. Will it change the mind of the person using those words? Probably not, but avoiding hurtful words still has a great deal of positive social utility.
I don’t know, I don’t think the specific word is that meaningful. A new slur will likely be made for mentally disabled people, then it will get pushback and then another one will be made.
If I translated it to hindi or German or swahili it wouldn’t mean anything but if I walked up to you and yelled them at you you would probably be hurt. If I said them lovingly and softly you probably would be comforted.
The problem with having these conversations on the internet is there is no way to express that so… Maybe… I could see the point of banning potentially offensive words in text on the internet.
If I translated it to hindi or german or swahili it wouldn’t mean anything [to you]
Well, yeah. There may not be a word in those languages with the same connotations, and yeah, obviously I wouldn’t understand them if there were. But all language is contextual. We’re currently talking about english - and I’m specifically talking about United States English because that is what I speak.
Censorship wouldn’t be my choice - and in any case I believe what’s being advocated for here by the OP is social disapproval - but yeah, in the context of the internet I would refrain from using words that could hurt people when it was not my intention to hurt them.
Around strangers, coworkers, or really anyone you don’t know well a similar policy would tend to apply. Even with friends, I wouldn’t want to encourage a culture of being callous with the words I use.
There are so many other ways to express whatever sentiment you’re trying to express, why would you reach for a word that implies that some people are less than others? I’m referring to it in its use as an insult or derogatory word, of course, since technical language has its place and institutions will generally choose whatever language fits their needs. I can’t assess their situation because I’m not involved.
I think we are arguing the same thing. Don’t be mean or an asshole. Don’t look down on people. People regardless of ability should be treated as people.
Of course you shouldnt use it as an insult or derogatory word. I was totally not arguing for that. I was just saying that if you wanted to be insulting or derogatory the word itself doesn’t matter. The change to r-word doesn’t change anything. The question “are you r-worded?” should be just as offensive.
We have down this many times. Stupid, invalid, ibecil all had similar meanings and then were made offensive and a new word was made up, then that became offensive.
The word itself is meaningless, it’s the context and intent.
One thing I just thought of that I would agree with is changing it from an identifier to attribute. What I mean is a person should not “be r-word-Ed” but should be do you “have r-word-ism?” it shouldn’t define a person, but a description of an aspect is different. Like you may have the flu but your not a “fluer” or you might have epilepsy but you may also be a mechanic or pianist or physicist it’s a part but should not define you.
Well then I think we’re pretty far off topic from what the OP was talking about. Lots of people use the r word, and other similar words, as general insults or derogatory words. And that’s not OK, since it implies that it’s bad to have a condition you couldn’t control and didn’t choose.
As for clinical settings, I’m sure they have their own rules about how to talk both to and about people. I can’t speak to that, as I’m not in any of those settings.
And when in my personal life I refer to people with mental disabilities, I’m sure there are both kinder and more specific ways to describe someone’s situation.
Of course you shouldnt use it as an insult or derogatory word. I was totally not arguing for that. I was just saying that if you wanted to be insulting or derogatory the word itself doesn’t matter. The change to r-word doesn’t change anything. The question “are you r-worded?” should be just as offensive.
[…]
The word itself is meaningless, it’s the context and intent.
This feels pointlessly pendantic. I don’t think anyone here has argued in favor of using a censored version of the word in place of an uncensored one in speech as an insult but has been talking about using it all versus not using it, so in that context, yes, the word very much matters. Choosing to use a censored version of the word is still choosing to use the word.
I mean the word will still be used as a slur by those who are rude and want to be offensive. I see this whole conversation to be about people who may have casually used the word but they generally try to be a good person who doesn’t insult and attack others. They may not have known certain words beyond some of the famous race slurs that everyone knows are bad. Non racial slurs have been more a grey area.
I’m unaware of an existent group of people for whom the term “smeg” is or historically was thier actual designation?
It isn’t about not insulting someone, it’s about using language that refers to actual people who haven’t done anything wrong.
It’s like if suddenly everyone decided to call a pedophile a Vrek. You maybe wouldn’t love that suddenly people are invoking YOU to talk about pedophiles.
That’s the kind of collateral damage people are trying to avoid.
I’ve for sure said things are retarded. I’m no saint. I’ve got mixed feelings… but I think your take on the subject is poorly informed. I think you’ve missed the entire premise of the argument against using the word.
So it seems like we are going to have to wait until impaired, challenged and disabled are turned into slurs by the overly-sensitive so removed can achieve the neutral status of idiot, dumb, stupid, moron and imbecile - words that removed used to be considered the politically correct alternative.
I don’t think anyone is saying that clinical language doesn’t have a use. If anything, it’s the use of these words as general-purpose insults that makes them unfit for clinical use, not the other way around.
I think the argument is whizzing over your head too.
The logical breakdown here is pretty simple:
Argument #1 (OP): It’s probably not good to use disadvantaged groups as a slur.
Argument #2 (You and most others): Well if we do that then I don’t have words to degrade people.
These are completely orthogonal arguments, and I sincerely have sympathy for both. I genuinely do think there is communicative value in having words that illicit the intended response of calling someone’s argument “retarded”. I know what I mean. You know what I mean. It actually has nothing to do with people who are actually handicapped. It’s effective communication… it just has an unfortunate BYPRODUCT.
But not having slurs isn’t a counter-argument to the thesis that using disadvantaged groups as slurs is bad.
Strawmanning it as “PC gone mad” is just a convenient way to avoid actually addressing the concern head on.
Like, just be a fucking man: “Yeah, it probably isn’t good to use disadvantaged groups as slurs, but I’m at a loss for language that satisfies that while also effectively getting the content and TONE of my communication across, so I’m going to use it anyways. Not everythingi do is ideal.”
As soon as you abandon the ego-sheltering delusion that you don’t do things that are probably not great, you can actually think about things objectively without hitting a mental panic button the second you’re forced to evaluate a legitimate position in which your current behaviors would be evaluated as bad.
This post was probably the first time I used the word “removed” as a swear word in a long while. As I mentioned somewhere else around here, in my language it’s an actual word that means delayed, and I do prefer other swear words for the exact same reason I avoid using swear words that are rooted in sexual moralism - like judging someone for sexual behavior, even though I might not actually be doing that or even considering that person’s sexual behavior when using that word. However, if you want to use a word to describe someone as being “not-intelligent”, it is very hard to disassociate it from a group of people who actually have a clinical condition causing that, ESPECIALLY when people forcefully make that association.
The main argument here against that word seems to be that you can’t say “removed” because mentally impaired people are removed. If we were to agree that mentally impaired ≠ removed, as has already been done for all the previous words associated with them, then “removed” is not a word used to degrade them. It only becomes one if people like OP keep insisting they are removed - which is quite ironic, and we just keep repeating the euphemism treadmill cycle.
How hard is it to stick to idiot, dumb, stupid, moron, and imbecile?
If you think “removed” is wrong for degrading people with an actual clinical condition, except for “stupid” which seems to be something like calling that person drunk, I think you shouldn’t stick to those either, because they do the same thing.
No, they used to. Nobody cares about them anymore.
I agree entirely, you cracked the code: stop caring, and “removed” won’t be associated with the mentally impaired. People like OP, who care too much, are what keep it a slur used to degrade people with an actual clinical condition.
As someone who grew up with a very close friend with a sister who has down syndrome who really disliked people using the word as an insult I strongly disagree with you.
My point with smeg was that it was a made up word. But you could figure out the intent purely by context.
Again it comes to context, if you intend to hurt a person the word is meaningless.
That dude’s a fucking Vrek, goddamn.
“Smeg” does mean something. Its the white crap that forms under your foreskin if you never wash your dick.
Its also an upmarket brand of kitchen appliance. But you are thinking of smegma, not smeg.
Smeg is short term slag for smegma. Yes, its also kitchen brand. But the context of the show, and the popular slang term of the time, it meant smegma.
this is very likely true and it is fair to assume from your username that you’re familiar with uk slang/slurs. also probably fair to assume that grant/naylor would deny it if asked
smeg certainly means dickcheese but i’d guess before being popularised by red dwarf it wouldn’t have replaced other four letter words in constructions like smeg head, smeg off, smeg you etc
on the subject, with ‘gimboid’ they were ahead of their time in using the -oid suffix for insults
For example there was a “treatment” for women who dared consider working. They were basically forced to bed and forced to stay there only hand few broth for 6 months
Yeah, I’m gonna need a source on this because it sounds like a wild facebook post.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bed_rest look under the history tab.
Here’s the thing, the word doesn’t matter… It’s the intent. For example if I said “well aren’t you a fucking genius” and meant it sarcastically that’s just as insulting. I could also say “you gobflecker” in a aggressive tone that also bad.
That’s how I insult here: write scathing vitriol that replaces derogatory words with equivalent meanings, condescendingly disparages generalities about the insultee without referring to them specifically. It offends them more & makes a better insult.
I’ve stopped using it as people have pointed out it’s hurtful, but I’ve never fully understood why. To me it’s in the same group as idiot, fool, lunatic, imbecile and cretin. Words that aren’t used to describe conditions anymore, only used as insults. While they can be used with hatred, they can also be used in a teasing way with friends. To me it doesn’t reach the level of racist, sexist and homophobic slurs.
I wanted to learn more and found a paper that makes the case that ableist insults are slurs. Download it here
I think it’s more about the idea that it’s shameful to be less able than someone else. The core idea here is that there’s nothing wrong with being less intelligent than average, and calling out people’s choice of words is only one part of that.
It’s like when people make fun of Trump’s weight/diet or RFK Jr.'s voice. I dislike those two just as much as the next person, but there’s nothing immoral or shameful about having a vocal condition, being overweight, or having a monotonous diet. And any health concerns (e.g. weight) should be left between a person and their doctor.
If you choose to make those things a subject of your ridicule, all it does is mark you as a shallow person, and I’m probably going to tune you out as someone who doesn’t have anything of substance to say.
I think it’s more about the idea that it’s shameful to be less able than someone else. The core idea here is that there’s nothing wrong with being less intelligent than average, and calling out people’s choice of words is only one part of that.
That argument isn’t specific to any particular word though. You could say it about any word that insults intelligence, not just the one in question here.
That’s a great point, but I don’t see how that would justify using this specific word.
To me it’s in the same group as idiot, fool, lunatic, imbecile and cretin.
Because it is: look up the origins of those words.
Honestly, it’s not a word in my vocabulary but I think this opinion is moronic, idiotic even.
The only reason it continues to be offense to those living with mental disabilities is because there are people like yourself who keep attributing the word to them.
Oh oh do the n-word!
The n-word isn’t going through a continuous euphemism tread mill, unlike how r word variants continue to go through. That, I think, makes it substantially different — though in truth it’s the same for it as well
almost like ones an actual slur and the other is just something people with too much time on their hands like to pretend matters
So the solution to mean people co-opting medical language to be bullies is to …move to another term and change the vernacular we accept from doctors so they use different words the bullies can then co-opt?
Have you tried an approach that isn’t running and hiding?
The euphemism treadmill. It’s pretty…uhhhh…dumb
Have you tried an approach that isn’t running and hiding?
How brave and courageous of you to checks notes use slurs.
Hi, healthcare worker here. The r-slur hasn’t been used in the medical profession for decades. But hey, feel free to come up with more justifications for why it’s totally fine for you to call people slurs.
I love the word retard. I care about people with intellectual disabilities. I don’t mean them when I say it.
Imo idiot should be considered just as offensive to people who want to ban the word retard. It’s pretty much got the exact same history and stigma connected to it. Although I’m sure there are some who also want to ban the word idiot.
Wasn’t there someone on lemmy that loves to explain this one? Something like idiot, retarded, stupid, and moron corresponding to approximate mental ‘ages’ that were used in the early 1900s?
I have certainly encountered that on Lemmy.
There are a ton of people who think idiot is ableist yeah.
I mean I respect the dedication but my line is drawn before I get that far. And if me not thinking the same as them is a line for them, so be it.
Policing the hell out of language, while well intentioned, creates a backlash effect that I think actually hurts us more these days. Look at how they originally attacked “political correctness” in the 90s - because we were trying to code some improvements into language. Now people openly laugh at us for not having a solution to homelessness besides renaming them “unhoused.”
Be far easier to just let the R word become the word it has become, which doesn’t describe mental illness or disability anymore, much like “idiot” and “moron” and “imbecile” were once used as medical terms, and now they have none of that meaning.
Languages evolve. It’s a very common thing for descriptors of negative things to become slang for insults. Not to say we should be encouraging this behavior, but rather that policing it is ineffective at best.
Effective solutions address the underlying issues
(Destigmatization of ailments is a good thing, but doing so by stigmatizing the words themselves often has a Streisand effect)
No dude, the PC mob in the 90s were pricks trying to police language. The result came in the 2010s when the UK enacted Section 5 of public order act. Which say a kid arrested and actually in fucking court for calling a horse “gay”. And other for saying “woof” to a fucking dog!
The problem is that all those people who wanted that shit, were just thin skinned little bitches. And now that virtue signalling is all the rage, everything is offensive now. “Sticks and stones and may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”. Yet here we are, and everyone is clutching their pearls over anything that will get them a worthless up arrow.
Part of free speech is about being allowed to offend people. You are totally free to criticise the person, and whatever he or she might be saying and who they are saying it too. But the fundamental right to offend is something that should be protected by all of us. Or one day, you might just find yourself in trouble with the law, because someone claims to be offended at using the word “fascist” because what you called fascist, didnt rise to horrors of history attributed to that.
And now we have the online safety act in the UK, which is spreading to other countries where you have to show ID to use social media among other things, when it was only ever supposed to be used for porn sites.
But dont take my word for it. Mr Bean said it much better than I ever could:
I get what you are saying but if idiotic and imbecile are still available as insults and are further from medical definition than retard then why not just use them instead? The point being is that retard still has the bite of comparing the person to the mentally disabled and the others don’t.
Wouldn’t it be nice if all pejorative terms of mental incapacity went the way of idiot & imbecile? Why shelter derogatory words[1] from ameliorating?
When a term begins as pejorative and eventually is adopted in a non-pejorative sense, this is called melioration or amelioration. One example is the shift in meaning of the word nice from meaning a person was foolish to meaning that a person is pleasant.
perpetuating stigmatization ↩︎
Now people openly laugh at us for not having a solution to homelessness besides renaming them “unhoused.”
As long as one ignores all the solutions that capitalists dont like, sure. We also cant figure out why people starve while we’re at it.
If you’re serious about helping the homeless, don’t spent scant attention antagonizing potential supporters over vocabulary.
You’re comparing apples to oranges. Attempting to change “homeless” to “un-housed” is different from just not using a slur — you’re assuming that non-derogatory terms don’t exist for neurodiverse people; there are no “improvements” to be made, just exercising some discretion. You shouldn’t be using slurs just because it’ll turn acceptable soon or because everyone else is using it; if there are people that feel hurt by it and have a history of being marginalized by such usage, you don’t have the right to use it; that is if you are a morally sound person that doesn’t care about BS buzzwords like “political correctness”.
you don’t have the right to use it
So you are about language policing.
Go pound sand.
You aren’t being “policed.” The point is the problem is the dehumanization of people with intellectual delays, who are a group currently being target by the fascist government of the US, and probably other fascist governments at the moment. Disability rights are fucking invisible, and language like that goes with that problem.
It’s not about being “offended,” it’s pointing out that words mean things. Some people are hurt by your language. Why isn’t that enough to consider what you are saying and why.
they mean things to you.
they don’t mean those same things to other people.
just like if I say the word sabaka, it doesn’t mean anything to you, but since i speak russian, it has meaning to be.
you find the word retard upsetting. Cool. I don’t. I find the word heteronormativity upsetting, also emotional intelligence. maybe you don’t.
Ah yes, let all those white kids say “the rapper word” (as it was known in my time), slavery is over, segregation is over, those who still discriminate are just jerks, and being black is a nice filter to know who your real friends are. /s
What’s the next euphemism we should switch to?
For a while there in the 90’s, “differently abled” looked like it was next on the treadmill.
Words for stupid or crazy are always going to be used as insults.
My nieces introduced me to “short bus” as an insult instead of retarded.
Short bus has been a thing for a long while.
It was over 25 years ago.
So yeah, insults have already moved on and people complaining about using “retarded” sound like boomers.
Err, that’s no better, it’s possible worse …
“I’m not using the word that means the bad thing, I’m just saying you ride the same thing as them” 🙄
‘trumped’ works for me
The fact that it’s still currently used as a euphemism for people with actual conditions like down syndrome is precisely why it’s problematic to use it as an insult. Previous words used in decades past are only insults now and no longer used as a euphemism for the condition.
The *r slur is intentionally cruel in a way that stupid can’t match, since stupid is more generic and versatile.
Maybe the *r slur doesn’t need a replacement, we can just hold ourselves to a higher standard, and drag things without comparing them to someone with a disability.
The “r” word used to be the correct medical term used to avoid words like stupid and idiot that were considered cruel slurs, now the “r” is considered a slur, and the cycle goes on and on.
Just because words have a lifecycle doesn’t excuse you from using harmful ones during the time of the life cycle when they’re harmful.
Accurate.
Except “stupid” was just a word, not medical terminology.
This page has great examples, including toilet and shit.
I find it difficult to imagine a future in which humans aren’t making fun of impaired cognition.
I think the context is what’s most important, if anyone actually directs such language (be it retarded, idiot, etc) towards people with genuine mental impairment, that constitutes a slur. But the word ‘retarded’ literally means ‘slow’, and is still regularly used (including by myself) in scientific and technical contexts (compared to racist or homophobic slurs, which are only ever really used in a ‘slur’ kind of way).
I wouldn’t really have a problem with calling people ‘slow’ in jest, and I don’t think many would. Imo if not ‘retarded’, it’ll be something else with the same meaning.
Also commonly used in timing of internal combustion engines
Literally nobody is saying it can’t be used in that context.
So it’s fine to say that ICE is retarded?
That doesn’t really work as an argument when slow is also used as a euphemism for people with mental disabilities. Saying “it literally means slow, I’m calling them slow” just makes it sound like you’re still being ableist. I don’t believe calling someone slow as an insult is ableist, I’m only saying that the train of thought feels goofy. Like, “oh? You weren’t trying to use the slur usage of the word and were using the technical usage? The technical usage that means slow? Another word people use as an insult and a euphemism for the exact same kinds of people and scenarios as the other one?”
There’s no reason to use the word “r-tarded” to describe someone.
Seeing how upset it makes some people it’s very clear that it makes an excellent insult.
No you can’t insult retarded republicans, you can only listen to their insults!
A lot of slurs make people upset.
If you have to resort to slurs to insult people it just shows a lack of imagination.
The point of insults is to be insulting, not being imaginative.
This was always my issue with /murderedbywords. It was always someone saying a lot of flaff and rarely ever ‘punched’ the target. The few good ones threw out ‘creativity’ and just flat out insulted the other. Imaginative often just makes others think of you as silly, and when you’re at the point of being insulting, it’s all about feels and influencing others quickly.
In my language removed is used in several contexts and it means delayed - and although a non-native speaker, I thought the same rule would apply to English.
lol that censorship, pathetic.
It does mean delayed. In car engines the spark is advanced or retarded.
I certainly support not using it as describing a person as “delayed,” but there are non-offensive uses such as vehicle ignition timing can be advanced or rétarded. (Accent used here only to bypass the filter)
Alright I’ll finally ask: In my Lemmy app (“Boost for Lemmy” on Android) your post’s first sentence shows “In my language removed is used”. I’m assuming the word you originally typed has been censored, but I’m not sure if this is a Lemmy thing, a lemmy.ml thing, or some app setting I missed.
Can others view the uncensored version of your post? Because then it’s probably something to do with the app I’m using.
Been bugging me for months.It’s because .ML is retarded.
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/1464
Instances can choose words to go into a slur filter. They get auto removed. If it’s your home instance doing it then every instance will see the removed version.
Thanks you, makes sense!
It’s probably a lemmy.world censorship - I’m also from .ml but I don’t think it can control what we can read on other instances, and this post is on .world.
It isn’t .world. I’m on piefed.social I show your first message with removed and a couple comments down I see the actual word, so it’s something on .ml
Well, if it’s .ml and not .world, it’s easy to test as you are from neither. Type the real word r*tarded and you should be able to read it - if it’s .ml, perhaps I won’t be able to read it. Above a guy from .ca posted a wikipedia link containing the word and it’s censored for me.
Does the link still work?
Edit: I found it at the bottom- no.
Here goes nothing…
removed
Edit: Well I’m certainly not able to post the word, but I’m still unsure if this is a Boost, .ml, or thread instance thing.It’s .ml
It’s the most censored instance I’m aware of.
It’s a ml thing. They’re not big on free speech.
Wrong r word but I see what you mean
Ironically, the term “mental retardation” was introduced by medical and educational professionals as a less derogatory and more objective replacement for older, highly stigmatizing terms like idiot, moron, and imbecile, which themselves were previous medical classifications.
Retarded isn’t a slur.
N*****, Wet****, K*ke, G**k are slurs.
