Why is it socially acceptable to call an autistic ret*d?

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Calling a Black a ''n****r'' is extremely offensive and unthinkable,doing so in public will forever put a big stigma on you and will make you lose any friend you have,calling a women a ''c**t'' is as offensive,if not worse,but why does calling an autistic a ret*d is socially and morally acceptable,even being borderline fun?Why isn't there the same stigma between the N-word and the C-word and the R-word?

I have my own theory.The people who call us ret*d probably think that someone who fall under the ''ret*d'' designation probably don't have the emotions or the mental capacity to be offended by it,thus there is nothing wrong in calling and autistic a ret*d.

Please note I just wrote the N-word and the C-word in order to give examples,I have absolutaly no intention to offense people.

It's more likely that the people who say these things simply don't have the mental capacity to understand why they shouldn't, unless they are threatened with punishments for doing so. These people have no problem insulting blacks or women, they simply know that bad things might happen if they do, because both blacks and women have protested through the years to have their position taken more seriously by the government etc. It is also more likely that the person making such a comment will get hurt.

These insulting people generally understand that someone may come to a woman's defence, trying to be a "hero", and that a black man may defend himself. They don't refrain simply because they understand that what they're saying is offensive, it's out of fear. Most of them aren't afraid of calling timid or awkward misfits "ret*ds" because no precedent has been set in the public eye that there is any risk in doing so.

Because it's acceptable where they live, and they can get away with it. They don't want to know the truth about the true potential of autistic persons because it will change their minds. It's like all other forms of prejudice, intolerance of difference and the refusal to expand their knowledge because of the fear of something they learned is wrong by hard evidence.

Just because it is done, does not mean it is socially acceptable.

Calling anyone a ret*d has not been socially acceptable for decades.

The one time it does seem to be overlooked is when it is used as self degradation. I have NEVER known the term to be acceptably used to describe someone else. It also does not seem to me that more people are using it today than when I was a kid in the Sixties.

Hopefully, over time, the r-word will become socially unacceptable. It really is the same as the n-word and the c-word.

believe it's just like calling a homosexual a fag or a queer. it's a way to show superiority or maybe it's a lack of education or social circumstances. i lived as poor white trash in a housing project with uneducated hillbilly parents. whatever i heard, i repeated. we lived with black people and used the word negro then. white trash/ black trash, equal. any other group, oh crap. all my childhood years i used the words fag or queer or dummy. i am very sorry about that. i wish i had had someone who would tell me....anything. no one would help me in any way.

as a teenager i read lots of...anything....so i learned about homosexuals and mentally challenged. i had never heard those words before. made me hate my parents and how i grew up even more than i already did.

can't do anything to change the past. if someone were to use ret*d or dummy around me now, i would say something even though speaking is very hard for me. not afraid of confrontation.

socially acceptable? not where i can hear it.

They call AU's ret*d because we arn't ret*d. It's more like a joke. You wouldn't fat person fat (to their face) and you wouldn't call a ret*d ret*d. Or a gay person a fa***t.

But you call your friends fa***ts and ret*d. It's like calling someone whos lactose intolerant handycaped. The arn't handycapped, but in a small way they kinda are.

Hopefully one day, it will be wrong to use the R-word.

Only very small minded, uneducated people use that word. I have been called that a few times, once it was shouted at me by someone at college, whose band I'd done quite a lot to help and was very hurt by the fact he called me that. Unsurprisingly a year later he joined the BNP

Call a Woman a c**t she will either slap you or start bitching at you and those who witnessed the name calling will be mad

Call a black person a ni**er and they will beat you up and those who witness the name calling will also become angry with the name caller

Call an autistic a ret*d they will walk away or take it with causing trouble not to mention the people who witnessed the name calling will laugh at the autistic. Start getting into people's faces and making a scene over it then the name caller will think twice about calling the next autistic a name.

Actually, this past year, my school as well as many around the nation, did a campaign known as "Spread the Word - To End the Word". It definitely caught attention throughout the school, many students pledged to not use the word. There was a video done by the film students (I know one of them, good person), interviewing the Special Education students on how they felt when they were called that word: It was put in the Public Service Announcements during our school's daily announcements. Many were touched - emotionally, some of those interviewed came close to crying, and by the end of it, I remember quite a few students in my classroom were in tears. I think I was too.

More information on "Spread the Word to End the Word" - located here.

Although months later I can recall some of the students started thinking the whole thing was BS, since others in the hallway called you out if they heard you say "ret*d", but didn't do anything when it came to other swears. Still, I think that in time, it's something that will improve.

"ret*d" is a turd word topic

I rarely get called that term. Instead, I am labelled a schizophrenic.

So eventually they're just going to change the label again until people start using intellectual disability as an insult and then they'll have to change it again and "ret*d" will have made it's presence for so long it will be the equivalent of calling someone an idiot now?

I don't rank insults higher than others (other than an unintentional one not mattering.)

I get annoyed when I hear young people calling their friends ret*d. Back in the day...(in the 1970s)...before the word Aspergers was used and autistic/autism was only rarely mentioned or diagnosed...teachers sent home notes to certain parents to let them know that their hyperactive misbehaving children were "ret*d." It was hard to be called a ret*d when I was an "A" student...but I couldn't throw a softball and I was otherwise uncoordinated. Now I just say that I am clumsy and I think differentl;y.

Well, I call myself a ret*d when I am frustrated with myself. I don't see it as that offensive of a term. Besides a word by itself is meaningless. Most people throw around insults to their closest friends

If you are bullied and harassed then you have to choose whether it is worth your effort to fight for yourself. If it some no-nothing idiots then just walk away, or just tell them "it takes one to know one" or something similarly stupid. If it is something that can affect you like a co-worker or a classmate that is going to influence your life or how others treat you, then you have to stand up for yourself. They are just looking to gain power over you, and you have to let them know it isn't that easy.

But naturally they'll end up saying "this ret*d just assaulted me for no reason" and they'll take his side and cart you off to the nuthouse.

I think it'll work out better to just shrug it off and attempt to get on with your life, in theory it shouldn't be hard to get your own back if you do better than they did. Aim to get a degree for every insulting loser you encounter, even through "distance learning" if not school, and find out which method works better at proving who's the ret*d.