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.
That’s a retarded opinion.
Changing words doesn’t change the emotions the person is feeling. They’ll just find a new word to put those emotions into and the cycle starts again. It’s the Euphemism Treadmill. You need to change people/society. Acting like removing a word solves the whole problem is well, retarded.
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.
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.
Retarded isn’t a slur.
N*****, Wet****, K*ke, G**k are slurs.
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
If you have an issue with a word then you should suggest an alternative.
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.
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.
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’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.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retard_(pejorative)
For context, until the 1960s, the terms moron, idiot, cretin, and imbecile were all genuine, non-offensive terms used, including by psychiatrists, to refer to people with mental intellectual disabilities and low intelligence. These words were discontinued in that form when concerns arose that they had developed negative meanings, with “retard” and “retarded” replacing them.[6][7] After that, the terms “handicapped” (United States) and “disabled” (United Kingdom) replaced “retard” and “retarded”. Disabled is now considered a more polite term than handicapped in the United States as well.
And then in a decade or two people will have started to use the word disabled with a derogatory meaning and we can no longer use that word either.
It has already started. It will start immediately with whatever word they come up with to replace it. If someone is being particularly stupid, someone else will find the strongest word they can to insult them. This will never change.
The same with “mentally challenged”
“Special needs”
Already happening, and already being railed against. You can read a great many arguments from certain communities that decry anyone calling them disabled or handicapped.
My uncles were retarded due to Rh incompatability before they understood about Rh Factor. They called themselves retarded, our family called them that, it doesn’t sound wrong or deragotory to me.
Not sure what the word ®etard has to do with people with mental challenges. I’ve always known it to be a reference to Republicans, hence the little ® next to their name.
Removed by mod
R-tard? Is that like something about Republicans?
Don’t be stupid, retard means to reduce the rate of flow
I didn’t realize the hyphen was meant for censorship instead of conjunction
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.
isn’t it kind of divorced from the mentally ill at this point? it just means that someone is slow, which is exactly what retardation is.
I don’t particularly care one way or the other, but I know it really bothers some people, so I avoid using it. Best case scenario, I avoid making fun of a disability, worst case scenario, I had to go to all the trouble and effort of thinking of and using a synonym, such a terrible effort.
As someone who isn’t differently abled I try not to use the word. Though, it’s a shame I came up with an insult for Republicans that uses the word that I’ll never be able to use. Republicunts works instead.
