thedriveintheatre

Oh he’s special alright!

The following was a critique on a thread title on P Planet called ‘Who’s here’s Special?’:

I actually have find it strange that we are using a euphemism to describe what is essentially a mental condition.

Please bear in mind that I am not discriminating against people with mental disorders. One of my closest friends is a girl with cerebral palsy, and I fully empathise with such people. I myself used to have OCD during my teens (and to a mild extent, I still do).

But the use of ‘special’ to describe mentally-disabled people is as patronising as saying ‘vertically-challenged’ for short people, or ‘big-boned’ for fat people, or ‘African-American’ for Black people or ‘hearing-impaired’ for deaf people.

It is positive-discrimination in a sense. We shouldn’t be using fancy words to make people feel good about themselves if we want to treat everyone equally. We can be honest and forthright in our descriptions without being insulting.

If someone takes offense at calling an apple an apple instead of ‘a delicious sweet red fruit’, they are probably being too sensitive.