Stanford Retards
Holy crap. Sorry. I just got a missive from Stanford University which has generously offered to rectify the many offensive language problems we are having.
It comes to us entitled “Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative” which apparently was created by a bunch of retards. “Retards” is on their list of words that if we're good people should never utter. They suggest that instead of “retard” we should replace it with “a person with a cognitive disability, person with autism, neurodivergent person.” Yeah, that just rolls off the tongue and would certainly make the retard feel much better about himself or herself.
Besides, when most folks who are not neurodivergent use the term “retard,” we are not referring to an actual retard. We are referring to folks who created the “Elimination Harmful Language Initiative” or done something else equally stupid.
I imagine that when members of the committee that created this…well, stuff, told their daddies what they were doing, their daddies responded with the following or something very similar: “Sweety, you must stop doing stuff like this…and telling everyone you're doing it if you ever hope to acquire a real job…unless they just want to add a freak to the staff.” Or he might have said, “Knock that crap off or I'll quit paying for your worthless college degree.”
Just for giggles, let's take a peak at their list of objectionable words: spaz, tone deaf, tribe, balls to the wall, abort, American, circle the wagons, Hispanic, master, slave, beating a dead horse, killing two birds with one stone, more than one way to skin a cat.
Now, they give a reason not to use the word or phrase and an alternative. For example, “spaz” should become “clumsy,” “tone deaf” should transform to “unenlightened,” and “tribe” should change to “friends, network, family, support system.”
Okay, the committee gives a reason for each change: for example, “spaz” is ableist-language that trivializes the experiences of people living with disabilities; “tone deaf” is also ableist.
Fine, I now have a new word, “ableist,” that I'll never use again…ever.
“Tribe” is historically used to equate indigenous people with savages.
I think you get the picture.
My favorite suggested change is the word “American” which should become “US Citizen” because this term often refers to people from the United States only, thereby insinuating that the US is the most important country in the Americas (which is actually made up of 42 countries).
The Stanford crew has had the temerity to ask people to contribute to their list of objectionable words. I suggest the mother of all vulgarities followed by “you.”
We should build a very tall wall around Stanford, plug the entries and exits and keep these folks in a safe place away from our stressful language.
By the way, if you would like a complete list of objectionable words, their replacements, and the reasons for the changes, go to https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/stanfordlanguage.pdf. Enjoy.
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