:dito:
"retard":
-verb (used with object)
1. to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede.
–verb (used without object)
2. to be delayed.
–noun
3. a slowing down, diminution, or hindrance, as in a machine.
4. Slang: Disparaging .
a. a mentally retarded person.
b. a person who is stupid, obtuse, or ineffective in some way: a hopeless social retard.
5. Automotive, Machinery . an adjustment made in the setting of the distributor of an internal-combustion engine so that the spark for ignition in each cylinder is generated later in the cycle.
Let's face fact: Most people today who use the word 'retarded' do so without the thought of a 'mentally challanged' person in their mind. Why? Because it doesn't mean the same thing (What? A word in the English language with more than one meaning? Go on! No, really!).
Nowadays, when referring to someone with a mental disability, they are often referred to as 'special' - because that "S-word" has been so pushed over the last couple decades that now people find that using that "S-word" sarcastically actually sounds funnier than the old "R-word".
I can't remember the last time I've ever heard someone with a legitimate disability being called "retarded". I think George H.W. Bush was in his first term.
Yes, when people first started using the "R-word" in the context it is used now, they were loosely comparing that individual to a "special" person, but as so many expressions before it, it has gained its own definition.
The idea that the "R-word" is like using the "N-word" is just absurd.
