Right on. There are some words that I'm on the fence about (fuckwit is okay, but what about dimwit?), but crazy, dumb, retarded, and so forth? I've removed them. I still have a tendency to use "dumbass" in my head, and I'm tempted to start an "ableism swear jar" to remind me to be nice.
I was rather surprised, when I started editing -ist words out of my vocabulary (I'd done a lot of it anyway, but there's always more to learn) just how many insulting terms have to do with race and gender and so forth, but especially disability. Crazy, dumb, retarded, lame, spaz, idiot, moron, turn a blind eye, turn a deaf ear, dumbass, and so on. It's been ingrained in our language for so long that it's hard to edit stuff like that out.
I've been an atheist since I was ten and even now I've realized that I couldn't quite work out all the idiomatic stuff like "thank God" and "God only knows" and so on that I've just replaced God with the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
With insults...I'm still working on it. "Fuckwit" and "dipshit" work in comfortable company, though I'd like something better than "dunce" (which is entirely neuryotypical IMO) as the noun for stupid-ignorant-person. Hm. I should make a post asking for ideas.
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I was rather surprised, when I started editing -ist words out of my vocabulary (I'd done a lot of it anyway, but there's always more to learn) just how many insulting terms have to do with race and gender and so forth, but especially disability. Crazy, dumb, retarded, lame, spaz, idiot, moron, turn a blind eye, turn a deaf ear, dumbass, and so on. It's been ingrained in our language for so long that it's hard to edit stuff like that out.
I've been an atheist since I was ten and even now I've realized that I couldn't quite work out all the idiomatic stuff like "thank God" and "God only knows" and so on that I've just replaced God with the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
With insults...I'm still working on it. "Fuckwit" and "dipshit" work in comfortable company, though I'd like something better than "dunce" (which is entirely neuryotypical IMO) as the noun for stupid-ignorant-person. Hm. I should make a post asking for ideas.