365 Writing Prompts: No, thank you

June 22, 2015

If you could permanently ban a word from general usage, which one would it be? Why?

One word I always disliked is the word,”Retarded”. I’ve often heard kids in school calling each other ,”You are retarded “, I’m not sure a nine year old kid understands how derogatory the word sounds. I did try to make it clear to them it was not a word they should use for each other.

One time slow learners were described as retarded, when someone uses it to describe a child’s progress it sounds demeaning.

Some kids learn faster than others, it certainly is not appropriate to call a child retarded because he/she takes longer to learn something.

Yes “Retarded” is the word I want to ban from general usage.

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