4 ms·

Idiot, stupid, moron, immature -- these terms are all much the same as retard in their origin as a neutral clinical label. These were terms referring to impairm

Idiot, stupid, moron, immature -- these terms are all much the same as retard in their origin as a neutral clinical label. These were terms referring to impairments that patients often had through no fault of their own. Why are some of those words still acceptably used negatively in a serious fashion, while others are taboo to be used even affectionately or in a neutral context? Why is your deliberately negative label of "shit-for-brains" any better?

georgeplusplus 6y ago
Those words you provided are all morally better suited for their use until the politically correct mob decides that too is distasteful. Suppressing speech is retarded.
- kungito 6y ago
  Twitch banned the word "virgin". That's even more sad
  - pbourke 6y ago
    There’s enough irony in that to power a small city for a month.
  - codesnik 6y ago
    no more mentions of Virgin Mary on twitter I suppose?
    - my_usernam3 6y ago
      or non-alcoholic cocktails
ithkuil 6y ago
Words change meaning, my dear egregious etymologist. By that reasoning every nice woman is an ignorant queen. (Nice comes from latin "ne scius", and queen was the general word for woman) EDIT: egregious also flipped it's meaning; I clearly meant the old meaning of "remarkably good" You cannot just pick and choose. We live today and we understand each other based on a shared under ding of what words mean and what they are are "meant to mean". A veiled insult is still an insult, and there are places where it's inappropriate
- Blueskytech 6y ago
  By virtue of the fact that numerous people disagree with your assessment. Should it not be obvious that you could be living in your own private Idaho sharing a belief that all humans experience your gestalt. People have been finding ways to call both themselves and others mentally handicap since communication began. The irony of the current cultural dialogue is that the real negative experience of an expressive and living word is assumed to negate substantial positive aspects which are well documented by those of good humor and cheer. Your line of reasoning attempts to censure peers much as a child would demand of a playmate when in disagreement.
  - ithkuil 6y ago
    I think your mixing up two distinct points here: a) whether it's ok or not to insult person A with terminology that currently insults group B as a side effect. (The topic here would be "to PC or not to PC, have we gone to far with it etc; which is a conversation that can and should be had) b) whether it's ok, while discussing point "a" above, to insist that some words mean something else than what it's generally understand in good faith, in order to apply ineffective whataboutism ("what about idiot, it used to be a medical term!") to the conversation. To what goal? Claim that you can use "retard" because you can use "idiot"? Let's not play etymological games, if you want to discuss about PC overreach, discuss PC overreach; there are plenty of good arguments to be had against extreme political correctness and censure that don't involve having your readers rolling their eyes at blatant attempts to clutching at straws.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  Words change meaning over time. They do not flip over in an instant. What I believe we're seeing is a society-wide disagreement on the connotations of the word. It will shake itself out, one way or another - but this process used to take decades and was barely noticeable. Now it takes months to years, which is catching people by surprise. Also: the flip side of "words change meaning" is that, during a period of change, you'll encounter people using a different meaning than you. The arguments favoring the updated weight of the word we're discussing here seem frequently of the form, "$word truly means $my-meaning; surely you do not really believe it means $your-meaning, you're just pretending, and in reality you're just a hateful person who hates $me and $mine" - which is essentially twisting logic and sanity into a pretzel. (For better or worse, I expect the "revisionists" to win over "conservatives" here, now that the updated connotations have institutional backing of big social media companies, in form of the ban policies.)
ohyes 6y ago
> Why is your deliberately negative label of "shit-for-brains" any better? It doesn't have as rich a history being used as a slur against people with intellectual disabilities. Also, I was pretty mad. Even if we determine I am a hypocrite that doesn't necessarily make me wrong.
- WillPostForFood 6y ago
  It isn’t that backwards? Retard isn’t a slur against against people with intellectual disabilities, it is a neutral description of people with intellectual disabilities, used to slur your buddy who said something dumb.
- ttt0 6y ago
  > It doesn't have as rich a history being used as a slur "Queer" does. And people use it today.

georgeplusplus 6y ago

Those words you provided are all morally better suited for their use until the politically correct mob decides that too is distasteful. Suppressing speech is retarded.

kungito 6y ago
Twitch banned the word "virgin". That's even more sad
- pbourke 6y ago
  There’s enough irony in that to power a small city for a month.
- codesnik 6y ago
  no more mentions of Virgin Mary on twitter I suppose?
  - my_usernam3 6y ago
    or non-alcoholic cocktails

ithkuil 6y ago

Words change meaning, my dear egregious etymologist. By that reasoning every nice woman is an ignorant queen. (Nice comes from latin "ne scius", and queen was the general word for woman) EDIT: egregious also flipped it's meaning; I clearly meant the old meaning of "remarkably good" You cannot just pick and choose. We live today and we understand each other based on a shared under ding of what words mean and what they are are "meant to mean". A veiled insult is still an insult, and there are places where it's inappropriate

Blueskytech 6y ago
By virtue of the fact that numerous people disagree with your assessment. Should it not be obvious that you could be living in your own private Idaho sharing a belief that all humans experience your gestalt. People have been finding ways to call both themselves and others mentally handicap since communication began. The irony of the current cultural dialogue is that the real negative experience of an expressive and living word is assumed to negate substantial positive aspects which are well documented by those of good humor and cheer. Your line of reasoning attempts to censure peers much as a child would demand of a playmate when in disagreement.
- ithkuil 6y ago
  I think your mixing up two distinct points here: a) whether it's ok or not to insult person A with terminology that currently insults group B as a side effect. (The topic here would be "to PC or not to PC, have we gone to far with it etc; which is a conversation that can and should be had) b) whether it's ok, while discussing point "a" above, to insist that some words mean something else than what it's generally understand in good faith, in order to apply ineffective whataboutism ("what about idiot, it used to be a medical term!") to the conversation. To what goal? Claim that you can use "retard" because you can use "idiot"? Let's not play etymological games, if you want to discuss about PC overreach, discuss PC overreach; there are plenty of good arguments to be had against extreme political correctness and censure that don't involve having your readers rolling their eyes at blatant attempts to clutching at straws.
TeMPOraL 6y ago
Words change meaning over time. They do not flip over in an instant. What I believe we're seeing is a society-wide disagreement on the connotations of the word. It will shake itself out, one way or another - but this process used to take decades and was barely noticeable. Now it takes months to years, which is catching people by surprise. Also: the flip side of "words change meaning" is that, during a period of change, you'll encounter people using a different meaning than you. The arguments favoring the updated weight of the word we're discussing here seem frequently of the form, "$word truly means $my-meaning; surely you do not really believe it means $your-meaning, you're just pretending, and in reality you're just a hateful person who hates $me and $mine" - which is essentially twisting logic and sanity into a pretzel. (For better or worse, I expect the "revisionists" to win over "conservatives" here, now that the updated connotations have institutional backing of big social media companies, in form of the ban policies.)

ohyes 6y ago

> Why is your deliberately negative label of "shit-for-brains" any better? It doesn't have as rich a history being used as a slur against people with intellectual disabilities. Also, I was pretty mad. Even if we determine I am a hypocrite that doesn't necessarily make me wrong.

WillPostForFood 6y ago
It isn’t that backwards? Retard isn’t a slur against against people with intellectual disabilities, it is a neutral description of people with intellectual disabilities, used to slur your buddy who said something dumb.
ttt0 6y ago
> It doesn't have as rich a history being used as a slur "Queer" does. And people use it today.