on language that marginalizes (part one of possibly-more-than-one)

[hermionesviolin]

So, what I want to be posting about, and what I know you want to be reading about, is: WriterCon, church, and possibly the lectures from my extension school classes.

What I am actually posting about, apparently, is marginalizing people with the language we use.  (This is the shorter version of the "things that offend me/make me uncomfortable" post.)

***

One of the things I've been thinking about recently is the use of the word "lame" as a derogatory adjective.  Which gives me an excuse to link to a blogpost I read a while back -- "Why Not to Use the Word Lame: I Think I’m Starting to Get It" [Posted by Mandolin | June 16th, 2009]

Excerpt:

Let’s start with that point from earlier that it DOES suck — in this society — not to have the same freedom of movement an abled person. (Although of course, here, we’re already starting in with ableist assumptions, because a big portion of the reason it sucks is because society is set up for people with bodies we consider normal.) OK, so let’s rephrase. Having functional legs is useful. Therefore, the state of having legs which are not as functional as other legs is not as nice as the state of having normally functional legs. (Again, there’s some ableism around the concept of normal, but moving on.)

But even accepting that impairment to mobility is itself a sucky thing, MAYBE DISABLED PEOPLE DO NOT APPRECIATE BEING THE CULTURAL GO-TO FOR THINGS THAT SUCK.

The first commenter (Lexie) points out:

You are on the right track, but here is the thing about saying something like “the logic of having a mobility impairment totally sucks is self-evident.”

It’s not, really. People with disabilities most of the time do not go around saying, God! It sucks so bad that my legs don’t work! They are just who they are, a whole person with varying characteristics, some of which society has labeled as a disability.

Take being gay, for example. One could argue, and some have, that this is a form of disability and that it sucks. Gay people inherently have things to deal with, like fertility issues or the fact that they have to find different ways to socialize within a smaller range of people (the arguable 10% of the population that is gay). Or, to get really technical and TMI about it, they might have to find different ways to be intimate with each other. Doesn’t this inherently suck? Isn’t it logical to think that being gay is inherently inferior to being straight? Isn’t it easier to be straight? And that isn’t even counting the artificial attitudinal barriers of being gay. They can’t marry, or get on each others health insurance plan, or adopt as easily as straight people. It must suck so bad to be gay! Its logical that gay must mean sucky!

Right?

Well, no. What LGBT people have done exceptionally well (and are still working on) is to show people that their lifestyle and sexuality is on a continuum of normal. That gender does not have to be binary and people should be able to express gender in a way that feels comfortable for them and that is a normal part of the human condition. They are not mentally ill, or some kinds of freaks who have a horrible condition, they just are who they are…humans.

So, people with disabilities are the same way. The body comes in all shapes, sizes and conditions and all are part of the normal condition of human existence. Disability is a normal part of life. Do some things suck about a specific disability? Sure. Just like it must suck for LGBT people who want to have children and can’t go about it as easily or as cheaply as heterosexual couples can. Just like everyone on the planet has something about themselves that they can’t control that sucks. (Run faster, be better at math, sing better, not be bald, whatever.) It goes beyond saying that logically, being lame sucks but we shouldn’t hurt disabled people’s feelings by using that word. It goes to trying to get people to stop singling out one physical (or mental) aspect of ourselves as being sucky and having that thing define who we are–our entire life experience. To us, whatever characteristic we have that makes us disabled is just a part of our whole selves, and most of us are quite fond of our whole selves, thankyouverymuch. Many people will tell you that being disabled has given them experiences and opportunities that they wouldn’t exchange for anything.

In my case, my PC word peeve is “blind”. (I’m deaf blind) I’m not talking about the word “blind” itself. I’m fine with people calling me blind and prefer it to all the many euphemisms people come up with like “sight impaired” or whatnot. I hate it when blind (or deaf for that matter) is used in place of the words unknowing or stupid. i.e. She was blind to the fact that her use of the word “lame” was offensive. Blind people actually do not walk around in the dark completely unaware of what is going on around them. We actually know stuff. My point is, I think it is a matter of looking at the word (lame, blind) and really understanding what you are using that word to mean (sucky, stupid). Is that a fair use of the word? Does it really represent the people that are usually defined by that word? If not, maybe it is time to think of some better, more fitting words to describe things.

Ableism is something I really don't think about much, which is a problem.  (This also connects to conversations Ari and I were having tonight about church accessibility -- ASL interpreters, gluten-free communion bread, stair alternatives, bathrooms, etc. -- which is a whole nother topic.)

More food for thought (via coffeeandink's ableism tag): jesse_the_k's "(Color) Blindness as Metaphor to Racism"

***

Browsing metafandom, looking for posts from a while back about the problematics of the word "retarded," I was reminded of the "pimp" issue [e.g., saeva argues against the colloquial fannish use of the verb "pimp" and Zvi posts an Alternatives to "Pimp" poll].

***

This is hardly a comprehensive post on problematic language or even problematic insulting language or problematic ableist language, but I am giving myself permission to post things that are not comprehensive works of nigh-perfection.

Comments

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

I endorse this permission. I appreciate your social posts as much as your spiritual ones.

[wisdomeagle]

Elizabeth: I also endorse this permission, since I am so excellent at giving it to myself. *rolleyes* But in all seriousness, my [filtered] flist feels empty without your posts on it.


The social is the spiritual!

Or at least, how we welcome and include people with our language (and our church buildings) is a spiritual issue.

Chewing on the rest, Elizabeth. Maybe more thoughts later (possibly emailed, so I don't have to redact the hell out of Disability, My Thoughts On It.)

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

The social is the spiritual. Thank you. Yes.

good thing

[onwingsofeagles.livejournal.com]

"I am giving myself permission to post things that are not comprehensive works of nigh-perfection"
And a good thing -- because otherwise we might never hear from you.

It certainly gets complicated. And there seems to be a range of how differently-abled people themselves feel. While it's true that we all have challenges, some challenges are more normative than others, which makes it easier. And how much adapting do you have to do to accommodate people who might be extremely few in number? I generally think it's best to learn from people who are actually in the position -- such as the post you quoted. Or better yet, from friends in your own community. Unfortunately, few of us have a wide range of conveniently different friends (varied ethnicities, races, orientations, abilities, etc).

Kudos for broadening the diversity discussion :)

[callmesandy.livejournal.com]

It is really one of those moments of privilege - there are words where the problematic nature of them never occurred to me. And more suck on my part, I am not very good at not saying/writing them. Lame being the worst of the bunch that I frequently write without thinking.

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

Retarded is the one that bit me in the ass. I didn't even realize until I used, hmmmm, fucktarded I think in a comment on someone's journal and she, I believe, has a family member who is mentally impaired and was extremely offended. I was so embarrassed. Because duh. Suckass!Lorraine. Now I am very conscious about those sorts of words. I'm sure many slip through the cracks for me all the time.

[wisdomeagle]

Yeah, that's one of my problem words too. I never use "retarded" but "fucktarded" is hard to purge.

"Lame" and "spaz" are also hard for me to part with.

But I think it's a good (spiritual, even!) exercise to be contentious about our language and whom it might marginalize and whose experience it belittles.

[wackinessensues.livejournal.com]

I admit that I am someone who uses 'lame' all the time, and I have to say, I have never once even put it together that someone would think it insulting to a certain part of the population. My brain doesn't go there. It's like looking for an insult when none is to be had. I understand that people are very keen on talking about marginalization in both fiction and the real world, but I just think this takes it too far. 'retarded' is another bad one of mine, and that I get. That I can look at and go 'yes, bad Tania, correct thyself', but lame is a wholly archaic term that has no meaning in the traditional medical way for 99.99% of the population.

I just think there has to be a point at which we evolve our language and there so very few words left in our collective vocabulary for displeasure at a situation that *aren't* offensive to someone, 'lame' seems to be the mildest and least offensive one left.

Of course, that doesn't mean I don't find your brain sexy and your ability to engage in a conversation about this and other pejoratives to be be completely awesome, but there's got to be a line as to just how 'P.C.' we are all going to get.

[wisdomeagle]

Ableism is something I really don't think about much, which is a problem.

fixed! (not that we can't always do more thinking and learning and acting re: ableism)

(I went looking through your journal for a post about "'crazy', why it is problematic," and checked a bunch of tags before I found this. I am amused but not surprised that there is one tag that has the world "disability" in it and about seven that have the word "language.")

I don't really have any disability icons :/

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

♥

One time in the kitchen at our SANS house I said, "Can we not use words like 'crazy' as a dismissive perjorative? My disability politics is showing."

Marla asked, since we're not supposed to use words like "crazy" and "insane" for people who are actually mentally ill, why we can't -- I forget how she phrased it, but basically "retain the negative connotation, but not retain the 'mentally ill' connotation, and just use them as insults for e.g. politicians who are way out of line." It sounded slightly less ridiculous the way she said it.

I didn't bring up the issue of actual mentally ill people using those terms for themselves (a la "nigger" and "queer" -- though of course "queer" has largely been reclaimed for mainstream usage). I did say that those words still have those connotations, and so we're still perpetuating negative stereotypes about mental illness. I definitely didn't feel like I'd done a very good job of making the argument, though.

And then I came home and read "The Madman In the Woods: Mental Illness As Boogeyman" (http://tigerbeatdown.com/2011/08/30/the-madman-in-the-woods-mental-illness-as-boogeyman/)

And now I'm remembering faith-sharing visioning last night and how I kept saying that I'm really not that into social justice, and feeling a twinge like I was lying because hi fat pol and disability and mental illness and and and ... And how I feel like I'm pushing against the current with those -- that I get pushback rather than buy-in when I express discomfort with talk about weight-loss [as an inherent good] or about casual use of the term "crazy" or whatever. (And yes, I really wanted to find a less ableist term than "visioning," but I couldn't think of one and didn't feel it would be an optimal use of our time to get into that conversation.)

I've been wanting to do a brief writeup of SANS -- about what energized me, what I'm excited about moving forward -- and I think I very much want to do a post now being like, "Okay, here are the social justice issues that are important to *me.* I am telling you this so you know, and I am also using this as a commitment mechanism for myself, because I want to be more intentional about bringing about the kin-dom."