San Francisco students push to end use of the r-word

[ChurchSoldier]

I didn’t think anyone still used it.

Changing words doesn’t really matter, if a word is stopped due to a certain connotation, the replacement takes on the new connotation in short order.

PAX

 

[abucs]

It is not common in Australia. I almost never hear it. I don’t think I have ever heard it used to describe the disabled and very very rarely is it used in a derogatory manner about anyone/thing else.

When I travel back to Australia I also rarely hear the word although I would still use it and not think of it as derogatory.

I have a cousin in the UK who I would describe that way without any sense of it being derogatory to him.

In truth he wouldn’t understand what ‘retarded’ means.

If someone did understand the term and was called retarded then in my thinking, he wouldn’t really be retarded and so it would be derogatory.

For example one of my mother’s 11 brothers and sisters could be described as mentally ‘slow’, mainly because of a childhood trauma but he clearly understands the medical term ‘retarded’ and so it would be incorrect and understandably derogatory to call him that label.

We often view things differently which is why I would not want government to enforce speech etiquette as speech is often political (perhaps not so much in this case).

(P.S. I have just asked my father here in Australia and he also doesn’t think of the word as derogatory. He says he can remember when such people were call sub-normal, but this is going back 50 years).

 

[mikekle]

I didn’t think anyone still used it.

Changing words doesn’t really matter, if a word is stopped due to a certain connotation, the replacement takes on the new connotation in short order.

PAX

You are right, this is just the PC police trying to further their agenda.

besides the R word, I still hear the term ‘deaf and dumb’ used frequently to describe people with hearing and speech problems, so, in the end, they are just words, history proves that eventually any term we come up with, will eventually be seen as negative and hateful.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Some organizations that serve the disabled are stuck with the “r-word”. In my area, they are very well served by “ARC of the Ozarks”. Guess what the “R” stands for. The full name is “Association for Retarded Citizens of the Ozarks”. It’s hard to change it now.

 

[commenter]

Actually words like “idiot” and “moron” were once neutral, technical terms, depicting a certain IQ range, not negative or hostile. I think it was the 3 Stooges movies that helped them become negative or abusive.

Any word professionals choose will become negative in time as long as they ignore the underlying issue, which is respect for life. They are focusing on the word “retarded” and replacing it with the term of the day, the future term of “abuse”.

I have worked alongside coworkers, and parents, who sometimes fell back on outdated terms for persons. But they cared for them. I am sure Holland, where 98% of babies with Down Syndrome are aborted, is on the *cutting **edge *with proper, up to date terminology.

I am troubled with the obsession with the transitory problem, and the very, very temporary replacement word; it distracts us from the long term, far greater problem - attack on prolife.

 

[Mary_Gail_36]

I’m 47. I had a childhood friend my age who had Down’s Syndrome.

I loved playing with her, I never thought her different. I was taught that she was special. And she was. Her mom and my mom were close friends.

One day some kids taught her a song.

The lyrics went:

“I am a r***d”

Thinking about it now is still painful. I’ve lost touch many years ago with her. But she was very sweet and very trusting. She didn’t deserve to be mistreated that way.

Her mom was always appreciative that I treated her as a friend.

My son has a brain injury. He has an IEP at school, he sometimes slurs. God forbid anyone ever calls him that word.

 

[mVitus]

I’ve never really heard the word that much. When it was used, it was usually used as an excessive way of saying idiot/idiotic. Sometimes as an insult towards a person, sometimes in calling some news idiotic, and a few times in jest where the person was a friend of the sayer. (This is going back to Middle/High school where one friend might do something stupid for example.) I also remeber from middle school some Channel 1 commercials where they’d be saying to replace r***** with respect. (An overall good message.) That was respo.ded to with, “You respect!” (Which was common for a little while as mocking the commercials.)

Overall people won’t change unwillingly and it’s better, IMO, to let it run its course as societal norms go on, while making awareness, than makes rules/laws against it.

 

[JanetF]

Had to read the article just to find out what the “r-word” is. Hasn’t been used in common everyday language in US in a few decades.

Word police not necessary IMO as society tends to take care of these issues on it’s own.

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

I agree with not using the word ‘retarded’ in a derogatory way and support people demonstrating against this.

Where I would disagree is if the government or university would outlaw this word and impose penalties on any who do use it.

:yup::yup::yup:

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

From my POV, it is only offensive when you use it in the context of “retard.”

There is a difference between “retarded” and “retard.” The second one is intended as an insult and derogatory term, and I agree with its non-use.

Just saying '“retarded,” though, is not intended necessarily as an insult. it is simply an old-fashioned way of saying that one is “mentally challenged,” also developmentally challenged. A term used once extensively but no longer and without a necessarily negative connotation. It simply meant one was slower" in mental development than others.
I know people who have relatives or children who have mentally-challenged children and they occasionally use the term—in a non-derogatory context.

That one, though, is strictly subjective. I can imagine someone thinking the first word is offensive, no matter what context it is said on.

What bothers me both is the level to where we punish anyone who uses a certain word without taking into account the context and state of mind of the person uttering the word.

I know a Caucasian woman who was married twice—both times to black men----and she used the term “n-word” in regards to a relative of her second husband—and she said this while on the campus of a college which shall remain nameless here. Does that mean she is racist? And does that mean she should be kicked out of the college because of this?

It’s insanity, the lengths we go to avoid perceived offense in this country.

 

[lmachine]

People claiming the word isn’t common must not have a family member with developmental disabilities. Its use is a daily occurrence that attempts to strip the dignity away from people who aren’t “normal”.

 

[randomuser]

This is also a “pro-life” issue.

It’s not “pro-life” to insult people by suggesting they’re developmentally disabled.

 

[Lea101]

From my POV, it is only offensive when you use it in the context of “retard.”

There is a difference between “retarded” and “retard.” The second one is intended as an insult and derogatory term, and I agree with its non-use.

Just saying '“retarded,” though, is not intended necessarily as an insult. it is simply an old-fashioned way of saying that one is “mentally challenged,” also developmentally challenged. A term used once extensively but no longer and without a necessarily negative connotation. It simply meant one was slower" in mental development than others.
I know people who have relatives or children who have mentally-challenged children and they occasionally use the term—in a non-derogatory context.

That one, though, is strictly subjective. I can imagine someone thinking the first word is offensive, no matter what context it is said on.

What bothers me both is the level to where we punish anyone who uses a certain word without taking into account the context and state of mind of the person uttering the word.

I know a Caucasian woman who was married twice—both times to black men----and she used the term “n-word” in regards to a relative of her second husband—and she said this while on the campus of a college which shall remain nameless here. Does that mean she is racist? And does that mean she should be kicked out of the college because of this?

It’s insanity, the lengths we go to avoid perceived offense in this country.

It’s offensive when you use the word to insult someone for being stupid. Same thing as calling someone gay for idk, liking pink. People are angry because you are using a group of people as an insult, not the word itself.

I notice an increase of young people using “autistic” as an insult now, it’s quite sickening to hear.

And no, you don’t use the N word to describe a black person. It’s extremely rude even if it’s not her intention. I can’t imagine an instance where it would be okay to use it besides quoting someone or singing it in a song/etc

 

[Lea101]

This is also a “pro-life” issue.

It’s not “pro-life” to insult people by suggesting they’re developmentally disabled.

I agree. Respecting the dignity of people goes beyond begging for a ban on abortion.

 

[paperwight66]

It’s common in the Ireland and from what I can gather, Australia. Presumably that extends to the UK too. So I would not say that most civilised people stopped using it.

Good grief, no, people would be shocked to hear that word in the UK. It would be extremely offensive.

‘Special needs’ used to be the term used, and now there’s a new one in education, ‘extra needs’.

 

[abucs]

In the teaching profession students who were intellectually slow (however you want to say it) are referred to sometimes as ‘special’.

Only problem with this is that now students call each other ‘special’ in a derogatory slur to insinuate there is something wrong with one another.

We have to be careful with trying to use ‘nice’ words to refer to certain people because those nice words become slurs and are often removed from the language in its original meaning - special, gay, pious, devout etc.

Naive for example has a historical meaning of ‘not artificial’, that is ‘genuine’ or ‘innocent in its natural state’. Now it is mainly a criticism of being easily fooled and too trusting. Another ‘nice’ word that bit the dust.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

From my POV, it is only offensive when you use it in the context of “retard.”

There is a difference between “retarded” and “retard.” The second one is intended as an insult and derogatory term, and I agree with its non-use.

Just saying '“retarded,” though, is not intended necessarily as an insult. it is simply an old-fashioned way of saying that one is “mentally challenged,” also developmentally challenged. A term used once extensively but no longer and without a necessarily negative connotation. It simply meant one was slower" in mental development than others.
I know people who have relatives or children who have mentally-challenged children and they occasionally use the term—in a non-derogatory context.

That one, though, is strictly subjective. I can imagine someone thinking the first word is offensive, no matter what context it is said on.

What bothers me both is the level to where we punish anyone who uses a certain word without taking into account the context and state of mind of the person uttering the word.

I know a Caucasian woman who was married twice—both times to black men----and she used the term “n-word” in regards to a relative of her second husband—and she said this while on the campus of a college which shall remain nameless here. Does that mean she is racist? And does that mean she should be kicked out of the college because of this?

It’s insanity, the lengths we go to avoid perceived offense in this country.

Not calling black people the ‘n-word’ is an insane length to avoid perceived offense?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Not calling black people the ‘n-word’ is an insane length to avoid perceived offense?

That particular world is in a category all its own. Black people use it incessantly. (Remember Jesse Jackson saying he would cut Obama’s “N- Ns off”?) Whites used to say it among themselves.

Having been born in what was then a primitive, and a totally “white” part of the country, I was not aware for some time that there was any other term for blacks than the “n-word”. I think people of my time in the Deep South had the same notion. Then it gradually became offensive in favor of “Negro”. That became offensive over time in favor of “Black”. That sort of faded away in favor of “Afro-American”. That became verboten in favor of “African-American”, though I think “black” is still acceptable, or was the last I knew.

When one sees changes from something acceptable to unacceptable depending on who is saying it, I think the changes in acceptable terms is sort of manufactured.

There is really nothing inherently offensive in the word “retarded”. If a child grows slowly, one might say his growth is “retarded”, and precisely because it is. If his mental facilities do not develop according to most norms, his development is, indeed, “retarded” in the sense of “impeded” or even “arrested”.

But again, I think its being forbidden now is more a convention than anything else; a matter of people trying to find a term that fits without really being descriptive. “Special needs”, for example, could equally fit a slow child or a gifted one. Its only virtue is that it is not the word “retarded”.

 

[OrdinaryMelkite]

It’s offensive when you use the word to insult someone for being stupid. Same thing as calling someone gay for idk, liking pink. People are angry because you are using a group of people as an insult, not the word itself.

I notice an increase of young people using “autistic” as an insult now, it’s quite sickening to hear.

And no, you don’t use the N word to describe a black person. It’s extremely rude even if it’s not her intention. I can’t imagine an instance where it would be okay to use it besides quoting someone or singing it in a song/etc

At the very least, calling this woman “racist” for using a term that (for better or worse) she feels comfortable saying because of her being married to two black men and having biracial children by them I would say is just plain “assuming too much.” I guess she feels she has “earned” the right to use that word because of the special circumstances of her situation.

(Sort of OT, but it reminds of when Tarantino used the term in PULP FICTION in front of Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta------a short time later we the audience learn he’s married to a black woman. Better or worse, it reminds me of that. )

The thing is, many colleges would heavily censor here even if they knew the “context” in which she said it. Forgetting also the fact that blacks have reinvented the right to say it even as a term of respect, sometimes even to non-blacks.

I’m just saying that a lot of people are toot eager to pull the trigger in situations like this without caring to learn in what context it was said and without due process, so to speak.

 

[lmachine]

But again, I think its being forbidden now is more a convention than anything else; a matter of people trying to find a term that fits without really being descriptive.

No, its use is criticized because it is dehumanizing to people with disabilities.