Does the Word "Retard" Offend You?

[Gawain 0]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080812/ap_en_mo/film_tropic_thunder_protest;_ylt=AtVhtmkhJGIwsZP9bqmGnEVX24cA

I'm pretty much sick and tired of every little splinter of society telling us what to say or not say. It's a movie. It's entertainment.

Having said that, it's not for everyone. If you're sensitive, maybe you should see it. You should also grow a thick skin too.

I probably won't see the movie, but if anyone does, please let me know if they make fun of amputees, because I need some new material.

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[Darius11 12]

No. I have a sense of humor

I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." - Kurt Cobain

[warpedskydiver 0]

OK stumpy!

Hey Max, everytime someone asks you if you lost your leg, tell them no, I was born with one, that is my cock you are staring at!

[Gawain 0]

Quote

OK stumpy!

Hey Max, everytime someone asks you if you lost your leg, tell them no, I was born with one, that is my cock you are staring at!

Actually, my nickname on the parachute team is "Pogo", because I made a joke about one of my legs was kind of like a pogo stick...

Oh, and the word "retard" is required content when in the Army. It's practically a technical term.

So I try and I scream and I beg and I sigh
Just to prove I'm alive, and it's alright
'Cause tonight there's a way I'll make light of my treacherous life
Make light!

[AWL71 0]

Society has gotten so tender. People need to lighten up and learn to laugh at themselves.

The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.

[Skyrad 0]

Generally no, but it depends on the context its used in. Unless someone is saying it with malice at or about someone who has learning difficulties (which is a stupid term if ever there was one) then no, it wouldn't offend me at all.

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[shropshire 0]

I don't understand...

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[Shotgun 1]

It doesn't offend me personally, but I can understand why it is offensive to some people, so I generally avoid using it.

And I see you've been taking lessons from JohnRich in how to make a poll. I'm not going to vote because neither answer works for me.

[klingeme 0]

Does the "N" word offend you?

Why is it ok for one group to find something offensive, but not another group, and do "challenged" people have the same rights?

[grimmie 173]

Retard is the most frequently used word with rookies on the fire dept.
Of course I call them "Speds", special education...

[DanG 1]

I'd be offended if someone went up to a mentally retarded person and called them a retard. The act is offensive, not necessarily the word itself.

Would you be offended if an able bodied person came up to you and called you a cripple?

- Dan G

[warpedskydiver 0]

Is calling a Mexican, a Mexican, an insult?

Some people think it is.

[Unstable 8]

Yes, Society is tender and they do need to laugh at themselves....Even if it is while wearing a special helmet out in public.

=========Shaun ==========

[Andy9o8 0]

It seems in Speakers' Corner there's no grey-shade of P.C. that isn't automatically deemed bad, or too sensitive, etc. But of course, convention in all language evolves, and just as what's inappropriate yesterday can be OK today (my grandmother, born in 1903, used to think "crap" was a filthy curse-word; and "jazz" was once used as crude slang for "copulate", just as "screw" is today), often the converse is true, also.

So, too, have commonly-accepted names for congenital mental disability evolved. There was a time when "idiot" was a commonly-accepted clinical descriptor, and not a pejorative. The term "retarded", common when I was a child (especially when my sister was referring to me), has now pretty much moved into obsolescence, especially for people under age 35ish and clinicians. I'm not really bothered by the word, but my teenage kids don't like it and chide my wife or me if we use it. And my acquaintances who are raising children who used to commonly be called "mentally retarded" strongly dislike the word. So, I try to respect that. There's nothing namby-pamby about accommodating current social convention, even if it's new-ish and different from what you may have been used to for most of your life. It's just part of keeping up with the times.

P.S. - I voted "yes" just because I think push-polls are crap. Ow! Sorry, Grandma.

[nerdgirl 0]

Quote

I'm pretty much sick and tired of every little splinter of society telling us what to say or not say. It's a movie. It's entertainment.

Having said that, it's not for everyone. If you're sensitive, maybe you should see it. You should also grow a thick skin too.

(With respect to the broader issues)

Offend – no.

Response depends.

In the kind of specialized circumstances that you cite, that’s part of camaraderie.

If someone outside one’s circle of friends/colleagues/team/family demeans something one values or one’s family/friends/colleague one frequently doesn’t think it’s “funny” any more.

For a illustrative and highly incendiary example recall the uproar over the “General Petreaus or General Betray Us?” ad – I did not think that was funny, witty, or appropriate, and I highly doubt you (or many of the posters here) did either. Again illustratively, did you think all of the folks who objected to that ad should just “have had a sense of humor” or "grown a thick skin"?

I find that intentionally inflammatory or derisive language choices – because they are choices after all; part of personal responsibility is being responsible for your personal choices – generally says more about the imprecision of the speaker, the baseness, or intent to appeal to lowest common denominator.

Another example, 5 years ago when I was out in Monterey – > – two of my colleagues/friends were offended by an image circulating near Thanksgiving in which President Bush’s face was Photo-Shopped over a soldier’s body in a picture taken at an Iraq FOB. It wasn’t a derogatory image. It appeared to have been based on a private image taken by someone there. And it didn’t make sense to me why they were offended initially. He was an active duty Army Major (now LTC) and she was a former enlisted soldier. They found it offensive that someone – even the President, who they support(ed) strongly – who was not a soldier was portrayed as being as soldier.

There are times when harsh, aggressive language is appropriate; those tend to be the exceptions rather than the more frequently encountered examples.


(With respect to the specific movie being protested)

Protest is as American as archetypal ‘mom & apple pie.’

The more curious reactionary response to me is folks who seem offended that folks are offended/protesting/peacefully exercising 1st Amendment rights in a way that does not interfere with anyone else’s exercise of legal rights. If someone wants to spend their money watching that movie or spend their time protesting it, c’est la vie. Neither behavior is illegal, illicit, or immoral as far as I’m aware.

I highly doubt I'll go see the movie or protest it -- just got a 3 volume set of books that I'd much rather spend my time reading.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[NWFlyer 2]

Nicely put, and I'm inclined to agree with you in general, and if this were a "straight" movie - I'd be more inclined to support the groups protesting it. But it's a satire of some pretty self-absorbed actor-types, none of whom would be expected to use or care about the appropriateness of terminology or behavior, and to have the characters do so would actually weaken the movie. From what I've read of the movie, none of the characters is particularly "PC" in any way that we would expect ... but that's part of the fun of the movie.

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[millertime24 8]

What a bunch of fucking retards.

Muff #5048

[masterrig 1]

Quote

Society has gotten so tender. People need to lighten up and learn to laugh at themselves.

You are sooooo right about that! It's all this 'political correctness' crap. Whoever started it needs to have his ass kicked and called every derrogatory term imaginable! I think that any more, some folks just look for something to take offense at. I think, it's just another way to sue someone in court and make a quick, enormous settlement. We as Americans are just getting too many knots in our ropes over 'political correctness'. Whatever the reason, we need to end it!
Some derrogatory words do offend me but, in a certain context, those same words can be funny as hell. Just depends on how they are used. I think, we all just do what the 'shrink' on the old M.A.S.H. series said; "Sometimes, you just need to drop your pants and slide on the ice!"


Chuck

[billvon 2,396]

>It's just part of keeping up with the times.

I'd go a step farther and just call it courtesy. If someone finds the term "retard" or "asshole" or "spic" or "nigger" offensive, I don't use it with them. Doesn't matter if it's PC or not.

[shropshire 0]

You're not allowed to call them Political Correct terms now - that's offensive you need to say

Non-erroneous words motivated by partisan, self-serving objectives

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[DanG 1]

Quote

Is calling a Mexican, a Mexican, an insult?

No, but calling them a spic is.

I don't see your point, unless it is to point out your ignorance of the fact that the term "cripple" is not looked upon favorably by many in the disabled community.

- Dan G

[Amazon 7]

Nah... it does not offend....except when its one retard calling someone else a retard... to make themselves feel better about being a retard.

[BillyVance 34]

No, it doesnt bother me. I too am sick of society's trend toward PC language. Remember the uproar when Tiger Woods described a moment when he messed up a shot saying "I'm a spaz"?

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[livendive 8]

Of course not. I want retards as my tandem catchers and eventually as my pall-bearers.

Sorry coach.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[SpeedRacer 1]

I grew up near Boston.

The word is "Retahd."



As in, "Bush is a fockin' RETAHD!"

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Speed Racer
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