We are all guilty of this. Especially if you don’t think so, you are.
I don’t really think it’s difficult to avoid ableism in our language.
Look at this cowbee, so easy for you but think of how hard being reasonable and empathetic is for bigoted assholes? In avoiding ableism you’ve become a participant!
<Exceedingly dripping sarcasm emoji>
<Exceedingly dripping sarcasm emoji>
i need to get into the habit of adding tags like these because i’m almost never serious and it never fails for someone to miss the sarcasm/snark each time i do it.
I still have such dissonance about this. I want to say “Look at this idiot” and point out something unintelligent that an objectively evil person does. But because intelligence is an inherited trait, we can only use negative language when referring to a person for evil that they do by choice? Or something? So, evil people bumbling can only be mocked for the evil intent and not for their inability to be evil with skill and intelligence?
I dunno. Trump is a numpty and if that offends the numps or whatever group that term was originally a slur for then I apologize.
edit: to be clear, the r word seems objectively shitty to use and I don’t. I just have yet to find an objective litmus test for where the line is between that and “silly” cuz I swear there’s always someone there to explain the etymology of “silly” and how it’s origins were shitty in some way
But because intelligence is an inherited trait
I don’t think this is true, practically speaking. Intelligence is like endurance running speed in that there are heritable components to it, but at the end of the day environmental factors dominate on who is or isn’t faster than another.
I can make fun of someone for being dumb in the same way that I can make fun of someone for being a slow runner. It’s only problematic when their slowness is actually caused by something out of their control, like some kind of health issue.
The ableism is coming from inside the house - it’s not a bad thing to be intellectually disabled. The problem with Trump is not that he’s stupid, it’s that he’s a selfish, careless, thoughtless, cruel, ignorant asshole.
Using words like “stupid” as an insult implies that all people lacking in intellect or wisdom are also bad people.
Right. This is what I was talking about. I (and I suspect others) oftentimes want to name call a person and not only point out their evil but also point out their incompetence and inability. Both of which usually have some intelligence component.
It seems reasonable to berate an evil person when they can’t even be evil competently.
But we can’t (or shouldn’t) because it indirectly (or directly) makes fun of people who are perfectly good people who are unintelligent.
Again. I get it. Probably just showing my bias and yet another fuckin thing to unlearn.
I’m guessing it’s not just cognitive abilities either? “Tripped over his own dick” is offense to folks with motor control problems. Etc etc.
Therefore the only thing you can make fun of is a person’s evilness. Not their incompetence (because all incompetence is presumed to be from natural causes that aren’t their fault)
I don’t even believe in free will, I can’t talk shit to anyone
Or homophobia, sexism, racism, etc. Then they get banned and complain about being censored.
Also goes for body shaming
Maybe an unpopular opinion:
It would be nice if the r word was not a medical condition and just a word, the word has a good sound to it in my language. I would trade easily the r word for dumb or something like that. Dumb in Portuguese is awful
No i feel you. Honestly we do need a woke slur that isn’t homophobic, racist, sexist, ableist, etc.
Many of the bad words have that nice ring in my language, if only they weren’t offensive… I would totally trade 'em
