Is Reddit the new r word?

Yeah, It’s unnecessarily cruel. Hits like a gut punch ever time I see it now. Thanks for saying something.

The meaning of retard is to delay or impede the development or progress of; to slow up especially by preventing or hindering advance or accomplishment

Just something to think on

Thanks for pointing that out

A week or so on Lemmy and I've seen this slur on like 3 different occasions. It's disappointing. I guess I was just more familiar with what communities to avoid on reddit (wsb) if I didn't want to see it.

You know what, I appreciate your callout. As an 80s kid there was a LOT of terms we used and our vocabulary was quite robust when it came to offensive words. Although we never truly meant to hurt any person or group those slurs were associated with. I’ve done an incredible job of eliminating all that stuff from my lexicon, but this word in particular has been difficult for me and if I use it I’m always angry.

I’ll try and do better

Just keep in mind there are words you use today, oftentimes daily, that will be considered hurtful and maybe even a “slur” in a matter of years and at most a few decades. All we can do is try and be conscience of this and work hard to eliminate them from your vocabulary but it’s not easy when you’ve used a word or term for decades

Here’s a selection of words from a list that a Harvard group just recently deemed “harmful”:

American, You guys, Prisoner, Crazy, Victim, Karen, Walk-in.