@DrunkCat disagree. When a word has been used to disparage and hurt people for so long, it has become a clear epithet for that group, using it in casual conversation isn't okay. Being willfully ignorant is just sad.
@Thumperchick I'm more of a pragmatic kind of guy. I'd rather speak of things with more impact and substance. Such as mentioning the fact that even as recent as the late 80s it was legally required to sterilize the mentally disabled. Even into 2003 there are articles attempting to convince others that we ought to not sterilize the (and I quote) "mentally retarded persons". Which is par for the course because it wasn't until the 21st century that we started taking mental disorders seriously. Even then we got longs way to go
The road is only made longer by word policing, which just serves to muddle the waters. Words are tools, not be all end all devices. Treating them like they're nukes just leads to someone taking "offense" to a word and wasting the next fives years arguing to use a new one, all while the actual problem stagnates from neglect. When you give undue weight on words you end up with rotunded situations.
As someone in the field it bothers me immensely that folks would rather get offended by the word "retarded" than by the actual mistreatment of our developmentally disabled community.
@DrunkCat the commonplace use of words that are disparaging to those with mental illness (or any other underrepresented or oppressed group) certainly doesn't help society give a shit about those bigger problems
@Lotsofgoats Erm, the point wasn't "there are bigger problems". The point was that debating words masks the actual problems. Think about how many people will star the simple "don't say retarded lol!" but won't star "look at this actual fucked up shit". If you want to talk about fallacies, you just non-sequitur'd.
@DrunkCat except that's exactly what you're saying, namely "don't concentrate so much on words because [actually important things]!" and I'm saying that words are more important than you're granting. public opinion guides treatment of groups, and you're right that we generally don't care about disabled folks. language is part of that.
I do agree that it goes around in circles, though. "idiot" and "moron" and "cretin" and a ton of other terms that are strictly insults today were once accepted psychological terms. so the problem isn't necessarily the specific words, but rather the willingness to use them as insults, to literally say "you are bad because you are like a disabled person" which is utter bullshit.
@Lotsofgoats No. I'm telling you what I'm saying, don't strawman me. Language is not a panacea. Acting like word policing is any more effective than those "like to cure cancer" posts on facebook is facetious. Language has nothing to do with the apathy towards the disabled. The lack of conversations about them is. Remember words are just tools. You can't just place a hammer on the ground and say "house should be built any minute now". Likewise calling it a nailpounder instead of a hammer won't change it, and it'll still build you the same house.
@DrunkCat nobody claimed it was a panacea (there's your strawman), but it is most certainly is a considerable part of the problem. that's where we differ.
@DrunkCat I see your point. People can and do get so caught up in the easier moral outrage over words and lose sight of the actual issue. However, the words matter, too. It isn't a one or the other thing. The real strawman here is the idea that saying horrible things as if they're okay isn't a problem. It absolutely contributes to the problem. Dehumanizing people with words is a step on that road to mistreatment. To ignore that is folly. To assume that anyone being offended at a term like retard is ignoring or uncaring about the "real" issue is faulty at best. You aren't the only person that cares. You aren't the only person that knows what really happens to people. You may work in the field, but other people care and have people they care about that have been demeaned by that word - and making it okay to say in xyz situation, but not TO a disabled person isn't going to help, it just helps normalize the idea that the word is okay to use to mock someone who isn't as "smart" or isn't behaving at a "normal" level, which lends credence to the concept that those who are developmentally disabled human beings, with hearts and minds and souls, are less than the "normal" people. While I understand your frustration and anger at a lack of real substantial conversation, push for change, and empathy you can see - your outrage seems misplaced to me.
@Thumperchick I don't agree. Words are powerless without context. I don't mind terminology shifts (every five years there's a new one anyway to feign progress), I mind shaming as a way to get people to care. (e.g. oohhh you said the word 'retarded' you must be the hitlerstalin) (Also a more general aversion to any type of censorship.)
But like Morty said, I don't think it's about logic here. You get more likes by public shaming than by being pragmatic. I don't want to hear about the problems, I want to click the like button and feel like I made a difference.
(I guess another problem I have is that people treat words like religion. "How can you be a good person and not murder without God?" "How can you be a good person and not ignorant without the proper words?" Assholes and bigots will think the same regardless of the words they use to express it. The only thing flagging words as 'bad' does is empower them.)
@DrunkCat My aunt's clinical diagnosis was never anything more than "mental retardation". So, I've kind of made it a habit for the last three decades to ignore, those who use retarded in casual conversation as a disparaging term. Sometimes, I'll even call them out on it. If that gets your panties in a twist, so be it. Also, I got stars because my comment was on-topic in that it was directly responding to the OP. You were way off topic with an unrelated tangent.
@DrunkCat I know I'm dragging this back up after it died just so I could kick it around a bit, but this showed up in newsfeed tonight and it illustrates exactly why so many of us are bothered by 'words'. I don't have any idea how long ago it was written, but I assume it was pretty old even though it's making the rounds again.
"After Ann Coulter referred to President Obama as a “retard” in a tweet during Monday night’s presidential debate, Special Olympics athlete and global messenger John Franklin Stephens penned her this open letter:
Dear Ann Coulter, Come on Ms. Coulter, you aren’t dumb and you aren’t shallow. So why are you continually using a word like the R-word as an insult? I’m a 30 year old man with Down syndrome who has struggled with the public’s perception that an intellectual disability means that I am dumb and shallow. I am not either of those things, but I do process information more slowly than the rest of you. In fact it has taken me all day to figure out how to respond to your use of the R-word last night. I thought first of asking whether you meant to describe the President as someone who was bullied as a child by people like you, but rose above it to find a way to succeed in life as many of my fellow Special Olympians have. Then I wondered if you meant to describe him as someone who has to struggle to be thoughtful about everything he says, as everyone else races from one snarkey sound bite to the next. Finally, I wondered if you meant to degrade him as someone who is likely to receive bad health care, live in low grade housing with very little income and still manages to see life as a wonderful gift. Because, Ms. Coulter, that is who we are – and much, much more. After I saw your tweet, I realized you just wanted to belittle the President by linking him to people like me. You assumed that people would understand and accept that being linked to someone like me is an insult and you assumed you could get away with it and still appear on TV. I have to wonder if you considered other hateful words but recoiled from the backlash. Well, Ms. Coulter, you, and society, need to learn that being compared to people like me should be considered a badge of honor. No one overcomes more than we do and still loves life so much. Come join us someday at Special Olympics. See if you can walk away with your heart unchanged.
A friend you haven’t made yet, John Franklin Stephens Global Messenger Special Olympics Virginia"
If words couldn't carry more than one meaning then that couldn't be a sentence. Hell, there are innocuous words commonly used now that were just as profane as retard back in their day; which itself will be just as bleached in 50 years. I'll bet good money that then retard would be the politically correct term, just like the article linked prior showing the backtracking in the word alien.
@KDemo It probably happened years ago and then yesterday's vacuum write-up provoked the outburst. I'm sure she has fuchsia and magenta scars all over her psyche.
@christinewas - Poor thing. No one probably had the nerve to tell her they were really mauve. What's going to happen when she realizes today's khaki comforter is actually taupe?
@KDemo That is correct! Someone said "mawv" in my color theory class and the professor shuddered like someone was running their fingernails on the blackboard. He quickly corrected us all.
@jqubed - When I moved from the Bay Area, I first worked at a hospital in a backwards little town in WA. Culture shock! People there pronounced it Mawvay, and I don't want to tell you how they pronounced cognac (reading a cookbook).
@jqubed It's Pew-al-up. Just for the record. I love hearing people screw up all the Native American names we have. And that's just the towns, our rivers are much more difficult!
Cool now I have the name for the color I need to find a twin fleece blanket in - Fuchsia!! I knew it wasn't magenta but hadn't remembered the right name. Yea!
@Kidsandliz Lady Pink is helping the community one angry rant at a time. Today, it was you. Who will she help next? (I am just assuming this is a she.)
@christinewas No idea...there have been other rants? Now I need help finding an affordable twin fleece blanket in fuchsia because googling it the color that google comes up with is magenta!
@nadroj when you spell it correctly (fuchsia) google doesn't try to correct you at all. When you type in fuschia into google, it asks if you meant fuchsia.
I had to replace the fuchsia toner in my color copier the other day. All I could find was magenta, so I put that one in. It worked, and both my pie charts and counterfeit twenties all look normal. So I think they're interchangeable.
I really wish this had come up in that color theory class my college advisor tricked me into taking. Magenta is a primary color of pigment but also a secondary color of light. There are actually two sets of primary colors: light and pigment. Light's primary colors are red, green, and blue, which may come as no surprise to you if you've done computer graphics (RGB). Pigment's primary colors are cyan, magenta, and yellow (but adding black and white makes things a lot easier; neither are technically a pigment, IIRC), which might not be a surprise to you if you've ever done print graphics or used a color printer (CMYK). You can create every possible color in either system by combining the primary colors in various proportions. Combine two primaries equally and you get a secondary color. Where things really get fun is that the secondary colors in one system are the primary colors in the other. Red + green = yellow, green + blue = cyan, blue + red = magenta. Cyan + magenta = blue, magenta + yellow = red, yellow + cyan = green. It seems almost crazy, but it works. Anyway, if fuchsia is also equal parts red and blue, then fuchsia would be the same as magenta.
@jqubed The pigment primaries and light primaries are also negatives of each other: Green/magenta, blue/yellow, red/cyan. Because of what @Al_Coholic said.
@Al_Coholic Indeed! In fact, light is referred to as additive color because it adds spectrum to create the color, while pigment is referred to as subtractive color because it is removing spectrum to show the color.
@Dweezle Also true! That's why the background on sets for TV shows, especially newscasts, are blue. It turns out no matter what race you are, your skin color is really a variant on yellow (to orange, maybe). Since blue is its opposite, humans skin tone stands out more against a blue background.
@Teripie TIL: "Puce is the French word for flea. The color is said to be the color of the bloodstains remaining on linen or bedsheets, even after being laundered, from a flea's droppings or after a flea has been crushed."
WHY ARE YOU SO FUCHSIANG MAD ABOUT SHADES OF REDDISH COLORS?
http://colors.findthedata.com/compare/130-758/Magenta-Crayola-vs-Fuchsia
Ok, why are we worrying about this again? I am confused.
@mfladd Pink and pink are very important to some people.
You lost me at "retards".
@PurplePawprints Yep. Anytime someone kicks that out, I end up tuning out anything they say as ignorant jackassery.
@Thumperchick Well that's retarded.
@DrunkCat disagree. When a word has been used to disparage and hurt people for so long, it has become a clear epithet for that group, using it in casual conversation isn't okay. Being willfully ignorant is just sad.
@Thumperchick I'm more of a pragmatic kind of guy. I'd rather speak of things with more impact and substance. Such as mentioning the fact that even as recent as the late 80s it was legally required to sterilize the mentally disabled. Even into 2003 there are articles attempting to convince others that we ought to not sterilize the (and I quote) "mentally retarded persons". Which is par for the course because it wasn't until the 21st century that we started taking mental disorders seriously. Even then we got longs way to go
The road is only made longer by word policing, which just serves to muddle the waters. Words are tools, not be all end all devices. Treating them like they're nukes just leads to someone taking "offense" to a word and wasting the next fives years arguing to use a new one, all while the actual problem stagnates from neglect. When you give undue weight on words you end up with rotunded situations.
As someone in the field it bothers me immensely that folks would rather get offended by the word "retarded" than by the actual mistreatment of our developmentally disabled community.
@DrunkCat the commonplace use of words that are disparaging to those with mental illness (or any other underrepresented or oppressed group) certainly doesn't help society give a shit about those bigger problems
@Lotsofgoats Erm, the point wasn't "there are bigger problems". The point was that debating words masks the actual problems. Think about how many people will star the simple "don't say retarded lol!" but won't star "look at this actual fucked up shit". If you want to talk about fallacies, you just non-sequitur'd.
@DrunkCat except that's exactly what you're saying, namely "don't concentrate so much on words because [actually important things]!" and I'm saying that words are more important than you're granting. public opinion guides treatment of groups, and you're right that we generally don't care about disabled folks. language is part of that.
I do agree that it goes around in circles, though. "idiot" and "moron" and "cretin" and a ton of other terms that are strictly insults today were once accepted psychological terms. so the problem isn't necessarily the specific words, but rather the willingness to use them as insults, to literally say "you are bad because you are like a disabled person" which is utter bullshit.
@DrunkCat I can get offended at both, I'm a multi-tasker.
@Lotsofgoats No. I'm telling you what I'm saying, don't strawman me. Language is not a panacea. Acting like word policing is any more effective than those "like to cure cancer" posts on facebook is facetious. Language has nothing to do with the apathy towards the disabled. The lack of conversations about them is. Remember words are just tools. You can't just place a hammer on the ground and say "house should be built any minute now". Likewise calling it a nailpounder instead of a hammer won't change it, and it'll still build you the same house.
@DrunkCat nobody claimed it was a panacea (there's your strawman), but it is most certainly is a considerable part of the problem. that's where we differ.
@DrunkCat I see your point. People can and do get so caught up in the easier moral outrage over words and lose sight of the actual issue. However, the words matter, too. It isn't a one or the other thing.
The real strawman here is the idea that saying horrible things as if they're okay isn't a problem. It absolutely contributes to the problem. Dehumanizing people with words is a step on that road to mistreatment. To ignore that is folly.
To assume that anyone being offended at a term like retard is ignoring or uncaring about the "real" issue is faulty at best. You aren't the only person that cares. You aren't the only person that knows what really happens to people.
You may work in the field, but other people care and have people they care about that have been demeaned by that word - and making it okay to say in xyz situation, but not TO a disabled person isn't going to help, it just helps normalize the idea that the word is okay to use to mock someone who isn't as "smart" or isn't behaving at a "normal" level, which lends credence to the concept that those who are developmentally disabled human beings, with hearts and minds and souls, are less than the "normal" people.
While I understand your frustration and anger at a lack of real substantial conversation, push for change, and empathy you can see - your outrage seems misplaced to me.
I have no opinion on this, but I did see this discussed in a recent Rick & Morty episode, and everyone likes videos.
@Chops - @DrunkCat linked that video in their first reply.
@Thumperchick I don't agree. Words are powerless without context. I don't mind terminology shifts (every five years there's a new one anyway to feign progress), I mind shaming as a way to get people to care. (e.g. oohhh you said the word 'retarded' you must be the hitlerstalin) (Also a more general aversion to any type of censorship.)
But like Morty said, I don't think it's about logic here. You get more likes by public shaming than by being pragmatic. I don't want to hear about the problems, I want to click the like button and feel like I made a difference.
(I guess another problem I have is that people treat words like religion. "How can you be a good person and not murder without God?" "How can you be a good person and not ignorant without the proper words?" Assholes and bigots will think the same regardless of the words they use to express it. The only thing flagging words as 'bad' does is empower them.)
@DrunkCat My aunt's clinical diagnosis was never anything more than "mental retardation". So, I've kind of made it a habit for the last three decades to ignore, those who use retarded in casual conversation as a disparaging term. Sometimes, I'll even call them out on it. If that gets your panties in a twist, so be it. Also, I got stars because my comment was on-topic in that it was directly responding to the OP. You were way off topic with an unrelated tangent.
@DrunkCat So, I take it you're comfortable with the n word, then?
@Thumperchick I think it's hilarious
@DrunkCat My point is clearly that words do have power.
@DrunkCat I know I'm dragging this back up after it died just so I could kick it around a bit, but this showed up in newsfeed tonight and it illustrates exactly why so many of us are bothered by 'words'. I don't have any idea how long ago it was written, but I assume it was pretty old even though it's making the rounds again.
"After Ann Coulter referred to President Obama as a “retard” in a tweet during Monday night’s presidential debate, Special Olympics athlete and global messenger John Franklin Stephens penned her this open letter:
Dear Ann Coulter, Come on Ms. Coulter, you aren’t dumb and you aren’t shallow. So why are you continually using a word like the R-word as an insult? I’m a 30 year old man with Down syndrome who has struggled with the public’s perception that an intellectual disability means that I am dumb and shallow. I am not either of those things, but I do process information more slowly than the rest of you. In fact it has taken me all day to figure out how to respond to your use of the R-word last night. I thought first of asking whether you meant to describe the President as someone who was bullied as a child by people like you, but rose above it to find a way to succeed in life as many of my fellow Special Olympians have. Then I wondered if you meant to describe him as someone who has to struggle to be thoughtful about everything he says, as everyone else races from one snarkey sound bite to the next. Finally, I wondered if you meant to degrade him as someone who is likely to receive bad health care, live in low grade housing with very little income and still manages to see life as a wonderful gift. Because, Ms. Coulter, that is who we are – and much, much more. After I saw your tweet, I realized you just wanted to belittle the President by linking him to people like me. You assumed that people would understand and accept that being linked to someone like me is an insult and you assumed you could get away with it and still appear on TV. I have to wonder if you considered other hateful words but recoiled from the backlash. Well, Ms. Coulter, you, and society, need to learn that being compared to people like me should be considered a badge of honor. No one overcomes more than we do and still loves life so much. Come join us someday at Special Olympics. See if you can walk away with your heart unchanged.
A friend you haven’t made yet,
John Franklin Stephens
Global Messenger Special Olympics Virginia"
@PurplePawprints Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
If words couldn't carry more than one meaning then that couldn't be a sentence. Hell, there are innocuous words commonly used now that were just as profane as retard back in their day; which itself will be just as bleached in 50 years. I'll bet good money that then retard would be the politically correct term, just like the article linked prior showing the backtracking in the word alien.
@Barney also tells me that Fuchsia isn't fucking purple.
@dashcloud Maybe Fuchsia and purple have a thing on the side?
@dashcloud Tsk, tsk. I did not say "fucking" purple. I said p-u-r-p-le.
Who are you, and why are you so hostile?
@KDemo Bridezilla, perhaps? One bridesmaid too many got a magenta dress instead of a fuchsia dress?
@christinewas -Ah, totally understandable reaction, then.
@KDemo It probably happened years ago and then yesterday's vacuum write-up provoked the outburst. I'm sure she has fuchsia and magenta scars all over her psyche.
@christinewas - Poor thing. No one probably had the nerve to tell her they were really mauve. What's going to happen when she realizes today's khaki comforter is actually taupe?
@KDemo Quick quiz, how do you pronounce mauve?
@jqubed - mauve.
@jqubed - Sorry. I say mowv.
@KDemo That is correct! Someone said "mawv" in my color theory class and the professor shuddered like someone was running their fingernails on the blackboard. He quickly corrected us all.
@jqubed - When I moved from the Bay Area, I first worked at a hospital in a backwards little town in WA. Culture shock! People there pronounced it Mawvay, and I don't want to tell you how they pronounced cognac (reading a cookbook).
@KDemo Who can blame them, really, when their place names have such crazy pronunciations? Puyallup is pronounced pyoo-AL-oop?? Really?!?
@jqubed Haha - It's a test to identify outsiders.
@jqubed I make a point of not saying it.
@jqubed It's Pew-al-up. Just for the record. I love hearing people screw up all the Native American names we have. And that's just the towns, our rivers are much more difficult!
Cool now I have the name for the color I need to find a twin fleece blanket in - Fuchsia!! I knew it wasn't magenta but hadn't remembered the right name. Yea!
@Kidsandliz Lady Pink is helping the community one angry rant at a time. Today, it was you. Who will she help next? (I am just assuming this is a she.)
@christinewas No idea...there have been other rants? Now I need help finding an affordable twin fleece blanket in fuchsia because googling it the color that google comes up with is magenta!
@Kidsandliz BRICK is not fellating RED!
@nadroj and neither are fuchsia LOL
@Kidsandliz Well... not that I've seen. But a far-fetched positive interpretation felt like the way to go.
@nadroj yeah well close enough LOL
@nadroj Spell check just changed Fuschia to Fuchsia... so whom do we believe - google or whatever program manages spell check?
@nadroj when you spell it correctly (fuchsia) google doesn't try to correct you at all. When you type in fuschia into google, it asks if you meant fuchsia.
Wow! Kiss your Mom with that mouth, Mister?
@margot Only if they use full tongue action
What are magenta assholes, and why won't fuchsia fuck them?
@pitamuffin Fushia has a headache from color psycho using all caps ;-)
@pitamuffin Magenta is neither brilliant nor warm enough. Fuchsia has standards.
@pitamuffin I will fuck them. I am fucking magenta assholes.
I had to replace the fuchsia toner in my color copier the other day. All I could find was magenta, so I put that one in. It worked, and both my pie charts and counterfeit twenties all look normal. So I think they're interchangeable.
I really wish this had come up in that color theory class my college advisor tricked me into taking. Magenta is a primary color of pigment but also a secondary color of light. There are actually two sets of primary colors: light and pigment. Light's primary colors are red, green, and blue, which may come as no surprise to you if you've done computer graphics (RGB). Pigment's primary colors are cyan, magenta, and yellow (but adding black and white makes things a lot easier; neither are technically a pigment, IIRC), which might not be a surprise to you if you've ever done print graphics or used a color printer (CMYK). You can create every possible color in either system by combining the primary colors in various proportions. Combine two primaries equally and you get a secondary color. Where things really get fun is that the secondary colors in one system are the primary colors in the other. Red + green = yellow, green + blue = cyan, blue + red = magenta. Cyan + magenta = blue, magenta + yellow = red, yellow + cyan = green. It seems almost crazy, but it works. Anyway, if fuchsia is also equal parts red and blue, then fuchsia would be the same as magenta.
@jqubed
@jqubed Actually if you think about it, it makes a lot of sense, because one is emitting light and the other is absorbing/reflecting.
@jqubed The pigment primaries and light primaries are also negatives of each other: Green/magenta, blue/yellow, red/cyan. Because of what @Al_Coholic said.
@Al_Coholic Indeed! In fact, light is referred to as additive color because it adds spectrum to create the color, while pigment is referred to as subtractive color because it is removing spectrum to show the color.
@Dweezle Also true! That's why the background on sets for TV shows, especially newscasts, are blue. It turns out no matter what race you are, your skin color is really a variant on yellow (to orange, maybe). Since blue is its opposite, humans skin tone stands out more against a blue background.
@jqubed As an added bonus, since blue is blue, it's a really awesome color.
@jqubed Reading this made me realize I need more caffeine.
The official T-Mobile color is magenta, do you also hate T-Mobile? Not that I really care...
@robson the un-care-ier
@robson those tmobile stores at night, it's like a radioactive kirby exploded in there.
That's Mr. Asshole to you mofo.
He's right about this. Fuchsia is not magenta. I would not have posted this if I didn't have strong feelings.
This ---><--- is the number of fuchs I give.
Fuschia is magenta in every context but a Pantone swatch book.
How about puce? Is there no love for puce?
@Teripie Nope, no love.
@Teripie TIL: "Puce is the French word for flea. The color is said to be the color of the bloodstains remaining on linen or bedsheets, even after being laundered, from a flea's droppings or after a flea has been crushed."
lol poor puce
@Lotsofgoats Ewww, that makes me wanna puce!
@Teripie Walt Kelly has enough puce love for everybody.
Are you sure that's not my picture from a bridesmaid dress gone wrong in the header? How can I expand it? Eeks.
@Pamtha
@brhfl OMG, that's a mashup of two dresses I own. One in that color, one in that style. Thankfully, though, that's not me.