Ableism in Everyday Speech
By Otto Do ’22
As beings who create, adopt and develop our vernacular on a daily basis, we are largely ignorant of all the ways that we can imbue harm into our language. There are many scenarios where we do this, but I would like to hone in on one that has yet to enter my social media feed: ableism.
In my Christian elementary school, one of my teachers read a verse of the bible to us: I was dumb, I opened not my mouth; because thou didst it, Psalm 39:9. Puzzled, I asked her, “Dumb? He was stupid?” She clarified that dumb means mute—unable to speak. “So there are two definitions then.” She opened her mouth to speak then paused. After taking a moment to gather herself, she nodded in confirmation.
Incredulous, I found out for myself. Meriam-Webster defines dumb as “of a person, now often offensive: lacking the ability to speak.” By its strictest definition, dumb means “lacking the ability to speak,” but long ago, someone used the word in a degrading manner. And this connotation has since spread, becoming a commonplace phrase.
At Exeter, we have participated in similar behaviors. Although not the official name, Prep Program, the default physical education program for preps was, and still is, referred to as “Prep Spaz.” While we might mean to say “unathletic,” spaz(ed) refers to people with cerebral palsy or similar neurological disabilities.
I have also observed that many throw around the word r*tard(ed) [r-word]. Someone might trip in the hallway, and they say, “That’s so [r-word].” I use brackets because believe it or not, retarded is actually a medical term, referring to people with intellectual disabilities or someone who might process and think at a slower rate. So this use not only connotes negativity, it is actually incorrect; when my friends use this word, they are inadvertently making a diagnosis when they do not have the license to do so.
Often when I inform my friends of the definition of the r-word, they apologize to the person whom they labeled just a moment ago. But we should not apologize to the person who we incorrectly named. Instead, we should apologize to the entire disability community for continuing the trend of binding negativity to something that is not in fact negative.
Even worse, our ableism has often been disguised. How many occasions have you seen advertisements or posters of people with disabilities, captioned or that suggest, “if they can do it, you can too”?
Many, myself included, might have called the people on those posters inspirational, but when an able-bodied person calls a person with a disability “inspirational,” we’re usually applauding them for existing. In turn, we pat ourselves on the back for realizing how difficult life with disability must be. This behavior is problematic for multiple reasons, but it chiefly reduces people with disabilities to their disabilities, making disability their defining characteristic.
We have leveraged the disability community in more ways than one—first, by using their disabilities as convenient jokes and second, to inspire ourselves to “wake up in the morning.”
This is a lot to take in, so what now? Although I believe that we should carefully reflect, ruminating for too long on the fact that we have been misusing words is not productive either. The choices we make are ultimately what defines us, so making new decisions, taking up the active effort of unlearning and revising our behavior is the only way that our being may bend towards justice.
So let us begin the process of unlearning — and lift the belittling subtexts we’ve placed on these words. And of course, let us educate each other, so that no human life will be viewed as lesser than. Let us bring conscientiousness to our speech.
These corrections require persistent and consistent effort, so I have compiled a running list of words that I aim to remove from my everyday speech:
Crazy: Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Cripple/Crippled (by ____): Refers to people with physical or mobility disabilities.
Deaf-Mute: Refers to Deaf or hard of hearing people.
Derp (also herp-derp and variations): Refers to people with intellectual disabilities.
Dumb: Refers to d/Deaf or hard of hearing people, people with speech-related disabilities, or people with linguistic or communication disorders or disabilities.
Handicap(ped): Refers to people with physical or mobility disabilities, and is usually a euphemistic phrase to avoid saying “disability” or “disabled.”
Idiot(ic): Refers to people with intellectual disabilities.
Insane or Insanity: Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Invalid (as a noun, as in “my neighbor is an invalid and never goes outside”): Refers to people with physical or mobility disabilities or chronic health conditions.
Lame: Refers to people with physical or mobility disabilities.
Lunatic: Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Madhouse/Mad/Madman: Refers to an institution housing people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Manic: Refers to someone with bipolar (used to be called manic depression); Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Midget: Refers to little people or people with small stature or a form of dwarfism.
Moron(ic): Refers to people with intellectual disabilities.
Nuts: Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Psycho: Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Psychopath(ic): Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Psycho(tic): Refers to people with mental or psychiatric disabilities.
Retard(ed)/[anything]-tard (examples: libtard, f*cktard, etc.): Refers to people with intellectual disabilities or someone who might process and think at a slower rate.
Spaz(zed): Refers to people with cerebral palsy or similar neurological disabilities.
“Sped”: Usually refers to people with learning, intellectual, or developmental disabilities, but can mean any person with a disability. Usually a euphemistic phrase to avoid saying “disability” or “disabled.”
Stupid: Refers to people with intellectual disabilities (i.e. “in a stupor”).