I have a couple of guy friends of mine who have lost a limb or two in the armed services.
They refer to themselves as gimps. They would definitely call BS on this type of malarky.
It just comes off as patronizing. I’m reminded of the similarly tortured and stilted phrase ” differently abled” which used to be all the rage for awhile. Puh-leeeze. Give me a break.
I have a niece with Downs and I cannot come up with a more accurate phrase to describe her functioning than the simple English word “retarded”.
Unfortunately, some dimwits chose to shorten it to “retard” and hurl it as an insult.
The simple meaning of it is “slowed down” and if you read cookbook instructions you still encounter references to retarding the action of the yeast, literally slowing it down.
Even tho she is on the higher end of the scale for Downs kids, compared to average kids it takes her 3 to 4 times the amount of time to learn something. Thus she is slowed down. Not stupid or unable to learn, just much slower than the average bear. In other words, retarded. But of course I’m not allowed to use that word regardless of the fact that is the most accurate way to describe her functioning. In the purest sense of the word it is simple and direct but nowadays that’s politically incorrect.
Instead of campaigning for the PROPER USAGE of the word, somebody decided it was more e pedient to just drive it out of the language altogether.
Has this been successful in eliminating the hurtful (as well as grossly inaccurate) term retard from being hurled as an insult. Well just spend some time hanging around a playground listening to kids nowadays and judge for yourself.
It’s only the rest of us who use the word retarded in an accurate way who must be stifled at all costs.
What’s wrong with this picture?
End of rant. I’ll get down off my little soapbox now…