5 ms·
Call it what it actually is: short sighted, greedy, foolish, etc. Don't use a word that puts down people with disabilities.
by minikites 11y ago
Call it what it actually is: short sighted, greedy, foolish, etc. Don't use a word that puts down people with disabilities.
- jacquesm 11y agoI'm sorry, I did not mean to offend anybody but my reading of the word is that it has two meanings, one of which is 'stupid or dumb'. I'll update the comment.
- Anderkent 11y agoYour reading is correct. But there's always going to be people complaining about word choice even if your meaning is perfectly clear and inoffensive.
- jacquesm 11y agoThat may be true but it does not cost me anything at all to change the text so that it does not offend and in that sense it is an improvement. At the same time I see HN slide towards reddit just one little bit more with all the 'you insensitive clod' comments lately and that is sad too.
- minikites 11y agoIt's less about HN vs. reddit and more about society at large. What sorts of rude and derogatory words do you feel the need to say where you can't pick a synonym?
- jacquesm 11y agoI speak quite a few languages, and most of them badly, good enough for communications needs but not precise enough to win me any literary prizes. If we were having this discussion in Dutch I would definitely not pick on you for using words that may not be precise enough or that might be offensive to you simply because I'd assume that you must have learned your Dutch from other people speaking it and using it in your vicinity, coupled with media such as movies, books and so on. I've seen the word 'retarded' used in the exact way I used it above in many places and I've checked the dictionary and it has a simply secondary definition ('Dumb, foolish') which is roughly what I intended to convey. Since giving offense is not one of my pet hobbies I edited my comment but had the situation been reversed I would have definitely afforded you more leeway. To me 'retarded' did not seem rude or derogatory until you pointed it out, judging by the number of other people that are actually native speakers that use it in that exact same way it seems to me that you have your work cut out for you.
- minikites 11y agoI can appreciate the language barrier and I thank you for changing it when I pointed it out. As for having my work cut out for me, I definitely expected this to happen (maybe not to this scale). HN tends to attract the kind of person who thinks that anything is fair to say any time, regardless of who it might hurt, because HN tends to attract people of massive privilege, many of whom have never been the victim of societal discrimination.
- jacquesm 11y agoThis could go two ways. One way would be where people appreciate your efforts and change their tone. Another way this could go is that people will stop participating. Either way you will likely get what you want.
- Luc 11y agoI think it's worse than that, it's sliding towards Metafilter, where half the conversation is derailed by meta comments and whether it's appropriate to talk a certain way. Screw that.
- userbinator 11y agoAt the same time I see HN slide towards reddit just one little bit more with all the 'you insensitive clod' comments lately and that is sad too. If you don't want HN to slide that way, then I suggest you not give in and change it back. After all, I think offense is entirely in the mind of the beholder.
- jacquesm 11y ago> After all, I think offense is entirely in the mind of the beholder. Especially when the beholder is not himself or herself part of the group.
- baddox 11y agoOf course, you'll only be changing text to accommodate people who are vocal about what offends them.
- minikites 11y agoIt's certainly isn't as bad as an ethnic slur, but I feel strongly that it shouldn't be used in polite conversation. It's a matter of being considerate to your audience.
- venomsnake 11y agoAnd sugarcoating speech show disdain towards the audience. Anyway - how is the political correct way to retard a dough in a fridge?
- DanBC 11y agoRetard has two uses. If you're talking about watch mechanisms or dough in the fridge the word retard is perfectly fine, no-one cares about that use. The word retard is hate speech, linked to actual real world violence. And that violences is very common. https://www.mencap.org.uk/sites/default/files/documents/2009-10/Livinginfear.pdf https://www.mencap.org.uk/sites/default/files/documents/2009... > A survey by Mencap of people with a learning disability has found that nearly nine out of ten respondents have experienced bullying in the last year. Two-thirds are bullied on a regular basis and almost one-third are suffering from bullying on a daily or weekly basis. People with a learning disability face prejudice and widespread discrimination that often makes them feel like outcasts and prevents them from taking a full part in society. Public attitudes in the United Kingdom towards people with a learning disability remain discriminatory. The Mencap survey suggests that the bullying of people with a learning disability is institutionalised throughout society. How they described bullying: > The following behaviours were most frequently cited: kicking, biting, name-calling, teasing, stealing, pushing, threatening, having things thrown at you, being told to leave a building, hitting, being shouted at, swearing, demanding money, hair-pulling, throwing stones, spitting, poking, being punched, being beaten up, having one’s head banged against the wall.
- venomsnake 11y agoI did not contest the facts. But not using the word retard won't help any way. They face prejudice and discrimination because of their condition, not of the way said condition is called. And if we change the word with other - the other word will still be used as an insult. Because the condition itself is highly undesirable. No one wants to have it.
- Yver 11y agoBy the way, "dumb" means unable to speak, or mute. Using "dumb" as a synonym for stupid is as offensive as using "retarded" as a synonym for idiotic. Which, in my opinion, is not at all.
- ninguem2 11y agoThe words idiot, imbecile and so on used to have a technical meaning of someone landing in a specific IQ range. Idiotic is a synonym of retarded.
- sp332 11y ago"Mentally retarded" used to be a medical term too. They just renamed it to "intellectual disability" after "retarded" became more widely used as a slur. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_disability https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_disability
- im2w1l 11y agoThey don't want you to be able to say stupid or dumb either
- evook 11y agoBut you have to be a little disabled to find such an idea worth to be executed?
- minikites 11y agoNo?
- ddorian43 11y agoHow much downer can they go?
- mppm 11y agoDid you just say short sighted? Not everybody has perfect eyesight, you know, but that doesn't make us stupid. You hater, you.
- chris_wot 11y agoIronically, you just helped him make his point.
- Anderkent 11y agoReductio ad absurdum.
- minikites 11y agoAre people with myopia discriminated against in society?
- integraton 11y agoAbsolutely. There are jobs that discriminate against people with eyesight disabilities (some aircraft pilot jobs, for example) and there are many products that don't account for people wearing glasses. People with glasses are widely stereotyped as nerds or geeks and often experience bullying. People wearing glasses were also reportedly targeted in mass killings by the Khmer Rouge due to that same stereotype.
- niccaluim 11y agoIt's not discrimination if the ability in question is a bona fide occupational qualification. If you can't see well, you can't fly safely.
- integraton 11y agoPhysical ability and job qualifications are a central issue in the debate about discrimination in hiring. It's not just limited to disabilities, since the same debate has repeatedly taken place around the issue of whether women are physically qualified for certain jobs, as can be seen in the current debate over whether women are physically qualified for special operations roles in the US military.
- 6d6b73 11y agoDoes fire retardant put down people with disabilities? He used a normal word in a right context. He did not write "retards".
- minikites 11y agoBut that's not the same definition as the word he used. Fire/flame retardant basically means "fire delayer" Run that through the original sentence and it becomes nonsensical: "It's totally 'delayed' that a functioning phone is bricked by an update".
- 6d6b73 11y agoIn my dictionary it coild also be It's toally backwards that.... Does it make sense now? Fire retardant example was to show you that the same word can be used in many context and not all of them have anything to do with offendong handicapped people. oh wait that word is now also politically incorrect.
- _cipher_ 11y ago> Call it what it actually is: short sighted, greedy, foolish, etc. Don't use a word that puts down people with disabilities. No. Language is a liging thing and the meaning of a word can change overtime. "Greedy" is not the word that applies in this case. Nor is "short sighted". This is a retarted and dangerous behavior, and you should not be afraid to call it for what it is. See above example with the car and try to imaging is the following happened: you have to drive immediately to a hospital and your car doesn't start because your tire was changed by a non-authorized service. "Greedy" and "short sighted" are not the words that come in mind. It's a trully retarted and dangerous decision, initially driven by greed (because let's make computers like black boxes, no-one can open it, no-one can mess with it).
- zepto 11y agoWhat makes you think it's driven by greed?There is absolutely zero evidence for this assumption, and the alternative explanation - that it is a poorly implemented attempt to keep their promises about the security of Touch ID makes perfect sense.
- eertami 11y agoHe wasn't disparaging the differently abled. You have just failed to understand what was said and in the process have made a retarded comment.
- kolbe 11y agoWow. It's 2016, and you're still saying bigoted words like "fool." My great grandfather was a court jester, and he was a very intelligent man. Why don't you read up on the history of tyrants and entertainment before you go throwing around such hateful speech.
- tamana 11y ago"Short-sighted" is a visual disability.