re: #76 WindUpBird

Like Windy said, we refer to people as “brain damaged”, “blind”, “lame”, “deaf”. I don’t think I insulted all blind people by hollering at the ref during a Sonics game when he clearly missed a travelling call in the 4th quarter.

I think it’s partly because most people realize a blind person is more than just blindness, or a deaf person is more than just hearing impaired - they’re not the same as their disability. Somebody already mentioned Helen Keller. But when you call someone “retarded,” to me it’s very different - it limits them to being just that and nothing else, as if they weren’t even the complex human beings windsagio rightly says they are.