Guest Post by Eric Peters
I got the following note from a reader today. I reprint it in its entirety, with my comments afterward:
Why did you feel it was appropriate to use the term “Down Syndrome” to describe EVs? I already understood what you were trying to say about electric vehicles, that they are not able to make it on their own. But why denigrate others who have nothing to do with the production of EVs? I am not big on controlling speech, and I don’t try to avoid using “micro aggressions” when I speak. We risk offending someone whenever we open our mouths or start typing. But it is good to stay away from certain terms like the “N Word.” Or”Down Syndrome” in a negative way, especially following phrases like “the illegitimate birth of…” And yes, I have a family member with DS – a beautiful child with a great sense of humor.
Oy vey.
Would you have preferred retarded?
The Left has been incredibly successful in controlling the use of language by controlling which words may be used – and how they are used.
Which amounts to controlling thought.
In this context, the Left’s tactic is to feign offense that the use of a word is “mean” – deliberately and gratuitously denigrating – rather than merely descriptive. The idea being that because someone may take offense, offense was intended. In order to shame the speaker/writer – and to alter objective reality to suit (and assuage) someone’s feelings.
I used Down Syndrome to convey – essentially – retardation. Which is what the sufferer is afflicted by. They have IQs much below the normal and are physically as well as intellectually stunted.
Correct?
Just as a person in a wheelchair is crippled – or handicapped, if you prefer. Not “differently abled.”
Just as an obese woman is not “curvy.”
Just as Bruce is not she because he wishes to pretend he is.
No one is throwing rocks at any of these people – or jeering them or anything like that. But to get offended when people describe objective reality factually is one of the reasons I find myself consulting with “Dr.” Jack Daniels almost every night!
My deep blue wife pulled this crap on me a few months ago. We went to a performance and I commented that I thought the black guy was very good. My wife was offended by my comment and thought it was inappropriate. Maybe she thought the black family sitting in front of us would be offended.
I tried to explain to her, to no avail since she has way too much liberal blood in her system, that describing a person by a physical trait is not racist. I could have said the bald guy or the tall guy or the short guy or the guy with big ears, but since this fellow was the only black guy on stage, using the term “the black guy” seemed like an appropriate way to easily hone in one the individual I was referring to.
This incident further reinforced to me that I will never, ever live by the PC police rules. I will not use the n word but I will say black, hispanic, latino, tall guy, bald guy, and down syndrome person whenever it is useful to use those discriptions. They are not racist or insensitive, they are descriptions of REALITY.
You shouldn’t use people’s physical handicaps against them. Your just making the rest of us out here look bad.
That is just retarded.
so, yer a fukkin drunk!
A co-worker (baby-boomer), of course, was telling me some anecdote about a client a few days ago. I asked him, Are you talking about the black girl?” He looked uncomfortable and said in his best old-people voice, ” I-I don’t know.” I said, “You don’t know!” He just looked uncomfortable and walked away. From now on when a situation like this comes up I’m going to ask “Is this person…I don’t know…sort of ‘blackish’?”
“Dusky” is the word I think you are looking for…
Liberalism is a mental disorder. And it’s epidemic.
What does this have to do with libertarians?
Fuck these nitwits who think THEY somehow have a superior sense of which words to use. If the dude or chick is the only black one in the crowd, what’s different iding the person that way than were it a redneck, or what if the race was reversed? Would it be accept were he/she the ONLY white person?
This conversation is utter bullshit. And so is the issue of which bathroom to use. Here it is, straight from the maker….if you have a ding-dong you’re male. If you have a front hole you’re female. Please use the restroom with the appropriate equipment.
GENDER???? That’s a totally separate subject, dependent upon a whole lotta shit that can be scrambled in your head. But mental conditions can’t change your SEX!