Thanks for sharing a more personal story to cast some light on this debate, Pliddy. Your experience sounds awful. I hope it was a child that yelled that, and I hope they were admonished for doing so. I can't imagine too many people finding that acceptable. I hate how kids are so vulnerable to hurtful things.
What is the consensus on common use of other insulting terms, like "fat"? I Googled "somebody called me fat" and I ended up at
this blog. A couple quotes from the blog:
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Being called fat is something that is offensive and hurtful. It’s something I can forgive, but I cannot forget. Being called fat is a personal attack on your most vulnerable self. It’s a physical insult that leaves an emotional scar.
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I’m banning the word “fat” from my vocab, and you should too. That’s no way to describe a person.
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I don't really see the difference, to be honest. Isn't any insulting term going to be hurtful to somebody? I definitely think tightening up the context (at the very least) in which we use some of these words is going to be a good thing.
Also, I guess just because people still throw around the word "fat" doesn't mean we can't clamp down on other hurtful words. Who knows, maybe "fat" will be next on the list of words that are no longer appropriate to use.
I'll tell you what your post did convince me of - to never use the r-word here again (and I'm going to re-examine where else I use it). I went through some of my post history and found a few examples of when I had used it. It bothers me that it would have brought up a bad memory for you. Sorry about that.