Florida Donation Support calls special ed people retards openly?

I agree. And if he said "fellow retards", then it implies that he is, or considers himself, a "retard" as well.

It DOES get confusing though. Look at blacks! Or how about "Little people"! Can you imagine a child, who is QUITE LITTLE, being told that he or she isn't a little person? CONFUSING!

Steve

Words in themselves aren't evil or good - it is the perceptions that we use them to label that makes them that way. If you had never seen or heard of a Black person and heard one called nigger - you would have no clue (other than the tone of the speaker's voice) that the word had a bad connotation.

Same with retard - if you never heard the word before and heard someone use it to describe someone with downs syndrome, you'd have no clue in heck (other than the tone of the speaker's voice) that it was anything other than a description of downs syndrome. They would not recognize the word as degrading.

You can legislate words - but you won't get the effect you want. All you will do is make people transfer their negative connotations to new words. People have to change their mind about a group before any social acceptance takes place. Once a group is accepted by mainstream society, you can continue to use the same words that have always been offensive and they will lose their derogatory meaning over a few generations.

If any of you are around 25 years from now - remember you heard this here first. The only races in America that do not use the word "nigger" now are the white races. That's understandable because of history - but....in about 25 years you will see whites using it again, too - but it won't be derogatory, it will be just another word. This is going to happen because the word is still in frequent use - used by blacks for the same reasons given in other posts - to own it. Younger people in our society (of ALL races) don't remember the days of segregation and real get down and dirty prejudice and suppression. Once the older generation that is still familiar with racism and segregation starts to die off and young generations start getting older - people will forget. They might see it in history books and intellectually they will know it used to be like that -- but they won't be able to actually FEEL it anymore. The word will begin being used again by the young in races who don't utter it now - but there will be no stigma attached to it anymore. If the rare odd person were to actually try to use it to insult someone by that time, nobody would even recognize it as an insult. A more generic insult would have to be flung for people to know someone was being insulted.

These kind of changes take time/generations to take place - but it is the same in all tongues and it has been happening since the beginning of society. Language is nothing but labeling for our concepts. It evolves linearly with society. The changes always reflect the ethos of the culture.

There is a new stigma word developing now. This time it's not racial. The word is "poor". People in a few generations will either have money or be called "poor". Sure, it is today, too - but you never hear the poor calling themselves that anymore. Today's culture is becoming very condescending to the poor and the the term "poor" is taking on a very negative connotation. The mindset is becoming elitist and evolving in a direction that when someone is called "poor" the word is used as a classist slam. All the "civilized" people will deny that is true - but you can bet your donuts I'm right on this one. Either the word "uneducated" or another will form derogatory connotations and will be used against people who aren't college educated, too. These changes will be a little more subtle for the next ten years or so than some because you can't always look at someone and see money and education but the youth are buying for status already. We are in a migration of social status right now, coming out of racism and moving toward polar classes.