There’s a clear campaign against the mentally ill with the global rise of fascism. Lots of it shows up in anti homeless rhetoric, but you can see it in the MAHA and anti vaccination movements.
There’s no reason to use the word “r-tarded” to describe someone. As someone who’s worked with the intellectually challenged, it’s an insult to them to compare them with people who are willfully ignorant.
And honestly that’s fair. If I’m sitting in a meeting and you’re trying to browbeat me into calling something a slave in front of some African American co-workers, or you’re talking about retarding something while someone explains they don’t like that term because their child has Downs Syndrome, you are welcome to think we’re foolish for caring - but I can’t imagine that Any Given Person would walk away thinking you’ve gotten the upper hand there
Oh look, somebody else is trying to cast me as a monster because I refuse to be politically correct in a technical context. You should probably also demonize me for the fact that I live my life in a wheelchair and will occasionally refer to myself as gimpy
I’m not trying to cast you as anything, I’m extrapolating real world events from your theoretical responses.
The term “politically correct” is a thought terminating cliche. it’s meant to detach real world experience from hypothetical situations. “Political” here is meant to cast the discussion on what the government is doing, I am not talking about the government, therefore whether this is politically correct or not is irrelevant.
If you’re going to correct someone, at least understand the phrase first.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/politically-correct
And I will point out again that I’m talking about using traditionally technical terms in a technical context. With that understood, feel free to continue demonization.