'Gay' and 'ret*d'

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Says the guy with "spook" in his S/N.


That's so offensive.

How the heck is spook offensive?? It means a ghost. In the Halloween type way.

Unless I'm missing some cultural thing. It's certainly not an offensive term in the UK.

Racial slur.

I always thought spook was a disrespectful term for someone in the employ of the the CIA or any such organisation?

That, too. My cousin is in intelligence. He always says, "I'm not a spy, I'm a snoop."

I always thought it was used to refer to a spy or something, but I understand it can also refer to a black person and is taken to be exceptionally offensive when used in this way.

Well, I will admit that I haven't heard of that before- it must be an American slang term. In the UK yep, spook is also used to describe a spy or intelligence agent. There's even a TV show here called "Spooks", and it's about MI5. The term isn't seen as derogatory here in that usage, either. *shrugs*

Back on topic:

What about 'gaytarded'?

Another generation
Another planet!

Words become insults. So the public health and scientific community make up clinical euphemisms for those words. Then the euphemisms leak out into the public and then themselves become insults. Insults that need to be cloaked in euphemisms which need ...and so and so on.

I get that.

In the 1930's the stern white coated professionals realized that words like "idiot" and "imbecile" were much too emotionally loaded to be used as scientific classifications for degrees of developmental handicap. So the used the fancy French word "ret*d" as a euphemism.

By the Fifties that term had not only escaped academia but was on the lips of every grade school kid on every playground as an insult. Gradeschool kids like me and the rest of us boomers.

So the euphemism "ret*d" is now itsself a bad word.

Okay. I get that.

In the late sixties came the "Gay Liberation Movement" ( they called themselves that).
You could no longer call homosexuals queers or fa***ts or homos. The word homosexual itsself, though not derogatory, is long and unwieldy ( kinda like vegitarian got shorten to vegan).

So the proper word became "gay". In the 70's you were considered a peckerwood if you DIDNT use the word "gay".

But aparently now its the opposite. you're considered archie bunker if you DO use the word.

So apparently "gay" has gone through the same curve as "ret*d". But how exactly is that possible? Surely even today its better to call somebody "gay" then to call them a "queer" or "a fa***t"?

So- young folks- how exactly do you all use the word "gay" these days? I mean how is it used as an insult? Its hard for me to wrap my head around this !





B

Vegetarians don't eat meat. Vegans don't consume any animal products. It isn't a case of truncation, they're actually two different things.

They use the shortened word vegan because not all vegans have the energy to say vegetarian.

Vegetarians consume dairy products, vegans do not. There is a difference.

I don't think it's offensive to call a gay person gay...I think that word is still used to describe homosexual people. The problem is when you describe something as "gay" that has nothing to do with sexual orientation. (Implying that it is a derogatory term rather than a descriptive one.)
Same with the word, "ret*d". If that term is still clinically appropriate (I'm not sure that it is), then that's fine. But if you're using the word synonymously with "bad" then that's not cool.
But that's just my input, clearly lots of people don't think that's the case.
*edited for stupid grammar

What about vegans that eat vegetables growing in manure?

They spontaneously combust.

Is there evidence, or should we just accept it as so?