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Comment by aogaili | Hacker News Reader

I'm guessing it's also the culture and I'm reading about the history of the word "retarded". In my mind, it means slow/delayed, or slow comprehension. Which, I can comfortably use on myself sometimes.

But it seems since 1998 it has been used for diagnosis and people are shunning the word, but that is mostly in western culture.

But I think it was clear from my post what I mean when I said this, I don't know why I'm defending words, I don't know the author, I'm merely expressing my dissatisfaction with the author's position and broad generalizations.

What would someone coming to tech think when they read articles like this?

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You looked at an article, didn’t like what it said, and called somebody “retarded.” I’m not going to sit here and let you attempt to dress this up as some casual description after the fact. It is a personal attack that depends on commenting on someone’s cognitive ability using a word that is clearly controversial and offensive to many.

If this is new information to you, then you should go look more into the subject and try to understand where I am coming from rather than simultaneously saying “English is not my first language so how could I know” and digging in your heels

I understand.

But then you sat their reading a published article labeling an entire domain/knowledge workers as useless/sad and you took it, so that sits alright with you?

I don't know the person, I can see the work that produced and the cognition behind it, and in my mind it was lousy thinking dressed in uniform published and shared that could lead to damage, just imagine young people at university reading this..

And are you their lawyer? you took offence at the word because it is sensitive to you. Just like I took sadness personal to me. Again, I don't know the person, but I think their work was weak. Perhaps I didn't use the right adjectives but that was my point, it was a weak article and poorly reasoned, that stigmatized an entire domain.

And yes English is not my first language and the definition and perception of this word changes in the west with the last 20 years as you noted.

I'm sorry to break your bubble but if you step out of this forum and the culture you are in, you will be offended every day.

> if you step out of this forum and the culture you are in, you will be offended every day

You're not alone, there's just a weird culture in the West at the moment of signalling empathy without demonstrating it. Calling out the usage of a specific word is just an example of it that you've just experienced - don't put too much stock into these people's opinions, even if you get them to "approve" of you all it will take is a slight change in the direction of the wind and they'll burn you at the stake for something else.

Not to mention over time the meanings of these words shift and change because - and repeat after me - language is just an expression of internal thought processes. Eliminating and banning language does nothing to limit the thought processes: people will still want to express the feeling of something being "retarded" even if they cannot use the word "retarded" - eventually the new word being used will be considered "offensive" and the word will shift again but the meaning will stay the same.

Say what you want and stand behind it. Don't let these cry-bullies police your language.

You’re right. I’ll start calling your family slurs regularly since it’s all meaningless.

Go for it, if you need suggestions just ask

Thank you, I appreciate the advice and perspective. I agree with you.

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