The increasing use of 'Autistic' as an insult

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I don't know whether it's decreased or increased over the years, but I've seen Aspergic and autistic thrown into a thread to devalue or mock someone's contribution on a fair number of occasions.

It's very common on the internet, and forums. In some scenarios, I am legit not 100% sure if people are using it as an insult or if they are being serious which is really sad that the line has been blurred at all. We are legitimate people with struggles and we do not deserve this confusion. It's very demeaning being it's a condition that's held me back in life in many ways. I've overcome a lot, yes but still.

It's rampant in many forums and discord servers, I don't want to say anything about legit being on the spectrum because I don't want to step on any toes and be "that person" who kills all the fun. Or just people who use it in a way that's a bordeline insult.

When I was young we used to call each other "mong" or "joey".

Huh?

American grade school kids have been calling each other "spaz" since before my time in the early Sixties, and "ret*d" since at least my time. I have never heard "mong" or "joey". A 'joey' is a baby kangaroo AFAIK. What does "mong" mean?

Well I'm UK so its more than likely a cultural thing. Mong comes from Mongol which people used to call those with downs syndrome and joey comes from Joey Deacon who was a guest on a children's show in the 80's. He had some kind of condition. The very next day across the UK all the kids were calling each other "joey". It is the same as "spaz". This is a term we also like to use as well.

Here in Brazil the use of Mongol as an offense is very common.

Mongoloid was indeed the old term for Down's syndrome.

That's funny...that I said we American kids didn't say X, we used Y insults . And it turns out that your X and our Y insults meant the exact same two things! "Spaz" and "ret*d".

Or maybe its sad, and not funny.

Yeah. "mongoloid" was the old scientific label for what they later called "Down's Syndrome". The most common form of mental retardation. I lived across the street from a big Downs Syndrome kid. Though, unlike "ret*d", niether "Mongoloid" nor any variant like "mong" ever trickled down to the playground kid level of usage in America Afaik.

Kids are rather creative with insults/slurs

Growing up my classmates used the term "Cindy" to throw slurs at a special needs boy with Downs Syndrome. I actually found out they were using a double slur referring to him being gay and using a nickname for "syndrome" (Cindy) all at once.

"mongrel" (thats an insult from old man Alf in Home and Away

mongrel = street dog

Yes, there's a stupid insult that's seen oftentimes in online comments or comments on news articles, etc when there's an open discussion. Someone will say something like: "The autism is strong with this one." which I assume is riff on a Star Wars reference or something. Offensive.

It's a fair comment that those who use the slur are invoking rainman or some other similar misattribution to make what they think is a slur in the same vein as the r-word

I find that word, along with the "R word," and similar terms, offensive when used as a descriptive term.

I know I am in the minority on this, but things like this don't bother me.

I think it is possible to use words which are offensive without necessarily being a bigoted person.

Autistic people have certain characteristics which stick out, and people are going to notice this and reference it. It is just human nature to see and work in patterns (which is why we see 'faces' in certain fronts of cars, and see how clouds look like different objects).

Speaking of the word ret*d, it strikes me as really interesting how many words used to describe mentally impaired people have been invented over the years.

Words like idiot, stupid, ret*d, imbecile, etc have all at one time been objective medical term used to describe a certain set of symptoms.

People invariably then adopt the word as an insult, and then the word changes to reduce stigma. People then adopt the new word as an insult, and the cycle continues.

I think it is far healthier to laugh it off. Everyone has some problem that someone else is insensitive to. I choose to not take myself so seriously such that maybe I can enjoy the humor in it a little. It beats the hell out of feeling sad all of the time.

I actually did not know of this up until I started seeing "autistic" discord servers floating around