We used LOTS of words then that are now not ok to use. Growing as individuals and groups is a good thing, being attentive to others is a good thing, understanding that you see no offence to a word where others do and changing that behaviour betters everyone.
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Aermis@lemmy.world 3 weeks agoIs saying the word retarded without calling some it disrespectful? Is it now a trigger word? I’m genuinely wondering. Because when we were growing up we used the word EVERYWHERE. It was as common as saying “fricken”
lost_faith@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
HackerJoe@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
Nah, speech police is just a disguised form of fascism.
Cethin@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Dude, I don’t think you understand what fascism is about. Telling someone something is wrong isn’t fascism or saying murder is wrong would be fascism.
HackerJoe@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
So the nazis didn’t disappear people who said the wrong thing? And people wouldn’t say the thing out of fear something might happen to them?
How different is that really? Did I use hyperbole? Sure. I still don’t like it when people tell me how to speak my mind.
Gonkulator@lemm.ee 3 weeks ago
Why did you say fricken and not fucking? You do the same thing you critcise all in the same sentence. Its like a singularity of stupid. We gots ourselves a real stable genius here fellas!
Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Were the insults necessary or did they add anything useful to your comment?
As for the actual question in your comment, though your quick follow-up to insults suggests you meant it as a rhetorical question and just wanted to assume they were doing the same thing as they were criticizing, “fricken” (or “friggen”) was used in many cases by kids who were scared of getting in trouble for using “real” swear words. Which was the whole point of that comment: kids who were afraid to really swear casually used “retard” and many adults who would lose their shit over “fucking” didn’t bat an eye at “retard”. And even when they did, it was because of the insult to the one called “retard”. If anyone brought up mentally disabled people, it was more about furthering the insult rather than actually caring how they felt.
Aermis@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
The other said what needed to be said. Do you talk to anyone the way you do? You do realize you’re talking to real people with real life experiences. And if you used any critical thought you’d understand the innocence of using the word “fricken” or “friggen” in my comment was to illustrate that in our child community growing up, we used the retard word along with that. And it was almost never used to call someone that, it was used to call a situation that. Like “that’s retarded let’s not do that”.
And yeah I don’t use that word anymore as an adult.
Cethin@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
People used to use the n-word all the time, so it must be perfectly OK to say!
This is the exact same argument. It doesn’t work, right? Why would it here? Sure, there may be other reasons why it’s OK to say, but throw that argument out.
bitchkat@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
The n-word did not have any other definitions. Something is is retarded is merely delayed or slowed down usually in the context of some task.
Cethin@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
It did though? It was used for black things. The word literally means black.
Black_Gulaman@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
I’m not on any side.
But what happens if the word black becomes a slur, or blue or yellow?
Would we give way to those who misuse those words? Let’s not be complacent in letting others misuse language. Maybe it’s time that we corrected these.
bitchkat@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Yeah you’re not supposed to even say “my son’s reading skills are somewhat retarded but we hope he can catch up to his peers”. Or “Progess on Trump’s border wall has been retarded for various reasons.”
Aermis@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
No kidding
Sotuanduso@lemm.ee 3 weeks ago
It’s a slur, that’s why. Some slurs are major slurs that are considered offensive even when it’s not referring to someone, and I think this is one of them. They’re often forbidden because of it, and a lot of people find it easier to follow universal rules than to check the rules of each place they post, because the universal rules will keep you in the clear 95% of the time. And even if not, it’s still respectable to not want to use slurs.
And yeah, it did used to be a lot more common. And before that, it was a medical term. That’s the way it goes, we have a word to insult people’s intelligence, doctors deal with patients who have a disorder causing that, they don’t want to use the mean word to refer to the patients, they come up with a new word for it, the word gets out, and then everyone makes it a new word to insult intelligence. Though this one seems to be taking a different track because it hit modern sensibilities, and at the same time I think doctors now know better than to come up with a new word for mental deficiencies.
randy@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
It’s the euphemism treadmill in action.
Sotuanduso@lemm.ee 3 weeks ago
That’s what it’s called, okay. I didn’t remember the term.