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The reason it is offensive is because their are many people actually diagnosed with mental retardation. It is a clinical term! When you call someone or something retarded you are in essence insulted those who really are “retarded.” Which by the way, is not used very often anymore because it became an insult. Please dont use it!
why do people need to explain themselves to you? If someone says they are offended by something, why don’t you just respect it? You don’t have to give a whole arichus about it, just respect it. And why the mods don’t care about this topic has always been beyond me.
Now that “retarded” is an insult, it is no longer used to describe low intelligence; we use the term “developmentally disabled”. Since we no longer use it to describe people with limited intelligence, nobody should take offence if it’s used.
how far did you have to reach to formulate that response?
If someone is offended by poor grammar, should we stop using it?
DY – 🙂
I think the PC term should be develop-Mentally retarded. That way we can use the word root mental in a respectful, yet not misleading way.
Saying “you’re mental” is an insult too. You just can’t win. 🙂
Develop-mentally is not a word.
fkelly:
Why is calling something or someone “retarded” any different than calling it/them “crazy”?
Technically, there is little difference.
“Insanity, craziness or madness is a spectrum of behaviors characterized by certain abnormal mental or behavioral patterns”
There are many negative terms that were originaly clinical terms (mental, idiot, dumb,etc.)
The difference between saying retarded is that mental retardation is an actual diagnosis. Imagine if someone you know was diagnosed with MR and then you heard people throwing around the word retarded.
This btw, is the same thing as people saying I’m so OCD or ADD. It is very offensive to people who actually have those or know those who do!
“bump”
It’s a stirah, BTW.
When you call someone retarded, you’re not calling them mentally retarded, just retarded. And just plain “retarded” (as far as I know) was never used as a clinical term.
Popa is just “slow” just like Forest Gump
I’m enjoying the cerebral acrobatics. By us, we have an old yesod, if you say something to insult someone and he’s not insulted, its not an insult. By the same token, if you say it to insult him and he is insulted, it is an insult, whether it is an insult or not. If his being insulted is based on it being an insult, he should never be insulted, being a its not an insult until he is insulted. Accordingly, being as there is such a thing as an insult, which would be impossible if it would be dependent on the insult being an insult, we are forced to say that you can be insulted irrespective of whether or not its an insult. Therefore, it is an insult. Anyone following?
So when I’m writing a music score and I want to direct the performer to slow down, what do I do? Specialdando? Challengando?
HaLeiVi shout at them till they are submit
Bump
So I thought about the difference between calling someone blind and calling someone retarded:
The nafka mina is as follows. When you call someone retarded, why is it offensive? It is offensive because you are using the word retarded to say they are stupid and in so doing you are implying that retarded people are stupid, and since retarded people would get insulted if they heard that you consider retarded people to be stupid, therefore it is offensive to retarded people.
Now you are probably thinking: Obviously retarded people are stupid, so what’s the problem? However, I was at a friend’s house who has a daughter who is retarded. My friend’s husband asked his daughter if she knew a certain fact. The daughter’s response was, “Of course I know; I’m not stupid.”
This goes to show that even retarded people consider it offensive to be considered stupid and they do not consider themselves to be stupid, and they would be very offended if someone else called them stupid.
And when you use the word “retarded” to mean that someone is being stupid, if a retarded person were to hear you, they would be highly offended as you are implying that retarded people are stupid (and they don’t think so since everyone considers “stupid” a bad thing to be).
On the other hand, no one considers it an insult to be blind. It is negative to be blind but it is looked at as something bad that happened to the person as opposed to a negative reflection on them. So why is “blind” used as an insult if no one thinks that being blind is a negative reflection on a person?
It’s because when the term “blind” is used as an insult, what it really means is “stupid”. When you say to someone, “How did you not see that? Are you blind?” You are not trying to imply that he has poor eyesight; you are actually telling him that you think he is stupid and you are using the word “blind” to mean stupid. After all, when is the last time you hear someone say to someone “What, are you near-sighted or something?” (If someone said that to me, I’d just say yes).
The difference is with the blind person, even though you are using the word “blind” to mean stupid, you don’t really think that blind people are stupid. If you did, then it would be offensive to blind people. You are actually using the word blind to mean something completely different. Basically, it has two entirely different meanings.
I guess the idea is that it’s stupid for someone with vision to not see something, but no one considers it stupid for someone who is blind to not see something.Therefore, you are not offending blind people by calling someone with vision blind. On the other hand, if someone who is retarded is retarded they are considered to be stupid, so you are offending retarded people when you call someone who is acting stupid retarded.
I hope that my long explanation is clear, because if it’s not, then that might mean that you are _________ (fill in the blank as you wish).
PS to previous post: I would have trouble following it myself if I hadn’t written it.
I’m myopic. I’ve heard it used as an insult and never once had the urge to stab the speaker in the chest with my pencil.
Another nafka mina is that no one considers it a negative reflection on someone if they are blind. No one wants to be blind, but no one thinks badly of blind people and blind people are not embarrassed that they are blind.
On the other hand, it is embarrassing to be stupid, and no one wants to admit that they are stupid.
In general, if people makes fun of an attribute that no one really considers a negative reflection on the people who have it, then it’s not offensive, but if it is an attribute that people really consider to be one that reflects negatively on those that have it, then it is offensive.
For example, I don’t get offended by blonde jokes because I don’t think there is any reason to associate being blonde with being dumb. On the other hand, I do get offended when people make fun of fat people, because people really do think that it’s bad to be fat.
The word “idiot” used to be used in a medical context to refer to someone in much the same way “retarded” was, and now it’s out of date and no longer used to mean that. The word “retarded” is also outdated in that context in much the same way.
people should not use the words developmentally disabled. it may be offensive to those that may have a developmentally disabled relative.
RY – Maybe it depends on one’s age, but I don’t think that’s true. There is a reason that people are getting insulted by the term and they don’t get insulted by idiot (unless they are the one being called idiot – come to think of it, why does anyone think it’s okay to use these kinds of words in the first place? Isn’t there a halachic issue in any case with calling someone names?)
Even if you’re old, the word does not belong to you anymore.
PBA & DY, I answered your question. Would like to know what you think of my answers (I gave two in two different posts above). Thanks!
Tldr. The beginning says it is an insult to call someone retarded. I agree. The discussion was about using the word being inherently insulting even when not directed at an individual.
What is TLDR? Really? I had no idea that’s what the discussion was about! I was wondering why you seemed to change your mind.
I don’t have time to go back and reread all the posts in all the threads, but I am wondering if that is clear to everyone reading these threads.
In any case, I’m glad to know that is what you meant.
Too long didn’t read.
so I’m confused -are you saying the discussion was about referring to a developmentally disabled person as retarded (as opposed to if you were to call PBA retarded)
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