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this post was submitted on 27 Feb 2024
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I don't like either and have been mobbed over my opinion, despite being a caregiver for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
One of the reasons I speak up as a caregiver is I have known ASD 1 people who admitted that it bothers them that people use that term, but they feel like they can't make the argument themselves. Because they're disabled.
Out of touch assholes are the only ones still dug in over this.
I mean I'm autistic and adhd. I've been called retarded pretty much my whole life. To me it's like the nword at this point. The only difference is I'm not black so I'm not gonna be throwing that around.
I'm pretty sure you were downvoted by someone angry that you referenced the nword, even though you were literally equating the use of the word as a slur to your own experience. Which is a bummer, because as a neurologically atypical person, it can be difficult even to speak out to address your own lived experience, and can also be difficult to know what to say to have neurologically typical people grasp what you're trying to express.
Which demonstrates why I bitch about people using the word "retarded" as an insult. When people with that lived experience do speak up, sometimes it can be difficult to make the point you're making in a way the greater population understands and BAM! Now you've pissed off everyone!
It's so ridiculous to me that there are people out there so proud, so attached to the words they use as insults that having someone else say, "You might be hurting someone other than the person you intend with that word, could you maybe pick another one?" outrages them.
And, let me just say, if you're too dim-witted to think up a better, more appropriate insult, you might be as stupid as the people you're trying to insult.
I'm sorry that you've been mobbed for sharing this view. That's shitty.
I feel like ableism, especially against people with intellectual and personality disability, is the one sphere where nobody seems to take the objections of the targeted group seriously, and simultaneously dismiss people speaking up for the targeted group for being "virtue signalers" or as whiners. So it's like the only solution is to just not say anything.
(Tangential but I have similar feelings about people calling others narcissists and attacking them for it, though I don't feel like that is going to change anytime soon. Still, if the person targeted is actually a narcissist, then I feel like it's bad to attack them for a diagnosis and symptoms they have no control over. And if they aren't actually a narcissist, then why further stigmatize people with narcissism? It's more complicated than the r-slur since abuse by narcissists happens and victims shouldn't feel restricted from sharing their experiences accurately, but similar in how it's disproportionately used to disparage and nobody takes objections to that usage seriously.)
I agree completely with your entire reply. Thanks for stopping by to share it!
I say it every now and then, but only for normally abled people acting like idiots. Is that an acceptable use?
The problem is, you're using someone else's diagnosis as an insult. That's the part that sucks.
Luckily we've been able to phase out most of the people who still have "mental retardation" as their diagnosis. The disappointing thing is we still have (mostly older) people who will never be reclassified.
As long as you get offended over the use of the word, you are giving that word power. Do what the LGBTQ community did and defang words like "f*g" and "qu##r"
I don't have the ability to explain to the mentally disabled why, when someone says a word that they associate with themselves in a mean way, that they shouldn't be hurt.
I have a woman in her late 60s who will tell anyone who listens about the time some kids called her "handicapped." And she'll cry over it. And it happened more than twenty years ago. So instead I have to advocate for the discontinuation of it's use. My hands are kind of tied here.
So I'll keep reminding people, "Please don't be an asshole if you can stop yourself." And for the ones who either choose not to stop themselves, or gleefully continue to be assholes (like a troll, or the entitled prick who insists that since they don't mean it "that way" everyone else should just accept that and understand it) I'll do damage control. But even one less instance of damage control is a blessing.