I got the following note from a reader the other day. I reprint it in its entirety, with my comments afterward:
Why did you feel it was appropriate to use the term “Down Syndrome” to describe EVs? I already understood what you were trying to say about electric vehicles, that they are not able to make it on their own. But why denigrate others who have nothing to do with the production of EVs? I am not big on controlling speech, and I don’t try to avoid using “micro aggressions” when I speak. We risk offending someone whenever we open our mouths or start typing. But it is good to stay away from certain terms like the “N Word.” Or”Down Syndrome” in a negative way, especially following phrases like “the illegitimate birth of…” And yes, I have a family member with DS – a beautiful child with a great sense of humor.
Oy vey.Â
Would you have preferred retarded?
The Left has been incredibly successful in controlling the use of language by controlling which words may be used – and how they are used.
Which amounts to controlling thought.
In this context, the Left’s tactic is to feign offense that the use of a word is “mean” – deliberately and gratuitously denigrating – rather than merely descriptive. The idea being that because someone may take offense, offense was intended. In order to shame the speaker/writer – and to alter objective reality to suit (and assuage) someone’s feelings.
And feelings are subjective.
Reality isn’t.
I used Down Syndrome to convey – essentially – retardation. Which is what the sufferer is afflicted by. They have IQs much below the normal and are physically as well as intellectually stunted.
Correct?
Just as a person in a wheelchair is crippled – or handicapped, if you prefer. Not “differently abled.”
Just as an obese woman is not “curvy.”
Just as Bruce is not she because he wishes to pretend he is.
No one is throwing rocks at any of these people – or jeering them. But their hurt feelings do not change objective reality. And that’s what’s at stake here, ultimately. The Left wishes to be the arbiter of an ever-shifting reality defined by them. They quite literally are demanding the power to insist that 2 plus 2 does in fact equal 5 . . . if they feeeeeeel that it does.
If someone objects, raises a question – they are “haters,” motivated by a desire to inflict suffering. In fact, they are sane – and moral. Because there is nothing more sane than acknowledging objective fact, regardless of whose feelings this may hurt. And moral, because it is reverence for truth over falsehood.
Is it true that GM will no longer be painting vehicles in the color “White” because it may offend certain ethnic groups?
EV’s are the downies of the automotive world, Tesla just being the least retarded looking of the retards
Eric wrote:
“plus lots of tats and fish tackle through the nose and ears and other things…”
LOL – Reminds me of that scene in Pulp Fiction:
“Lance:
Hey, whattya think about Trudi? She ain’t got a boyfriend. You wanna hang out, get high?
Vincent:
Which one’s Trudi? The one with all the shit in her face?
Lance:
No…that’s Jody. That’s my wife.”
Michael Malice always says something like “Anything preceding ‘but’ in a claim can be ignored.”
The fact that this person did this says a lot. This person is basically demanding you to adhere to PC Orthodoxy. Authoritarian, much? A real libertarian would’ve simply ignored it. After all, this is your website.
Anybody that has any desire to control speech is NOT a libertarian. I have always found PC Orthodoxy to be common among the followers of the Koch-funded fake libertarian organizations.
Amen, Handler…
Perhaps I am just getting old – but in my day, people weren’t so preposterously sensitive… and so much of today’s sensitivity is feigned; an excuse to virtue signal. Which means, show the left just how much you are in line with the orthodoxy. Who claps loudest for Stalin?
Not me.
Hi Eric,
Words and phrases are how humans think and communicate.
People who desire to ban words and phrases wish to ban and control human communication.
They are the worst racists. They are against the human race.
My favorite PC belief is where it’s somehow okay perfect to say “people of color” but rayciss to say “colored people”. Unless, of course, you are a person of color. In that instance it’s perfectly fine to use the term “colored people”.
Screw PC, always and everwhere.
Another Alinsky shaming tactic employed by the Left is the use – or, I should say, the misuse- of the suffix “phobic.” During the 2016 campaigns, we deplorables were tagged as homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, gynophobic, transphobic, etc etc. Because we may oppose government-mandated favored treatment for various victim groups at our expense and to our detriment, this somehow meant that we were hopelessly irrational and therefore feared them. We may feel disgust for a particular behavior or, for rational reasons, be wary of their behavior as a collective, but we do not necessarily fear them.
To manage society first one has to show it needs managing.
Hey Eric, Long time reader, never commenter, although I did try once, never got posted. Anyway, I don’t see where you said anything wrong.
My daughter is MMR (Mild Mentally Retarded), diagnosed in first grade, now 30 years old. She knows she is. Knows she is/has missed out on opportunities because of this. Sometimes she will get upset if she hears me on the phone having to tell someone she is retarded, then at the same time she calls herself retarded or me (which I am sometimes). The point is, she knows she is different.
When she was in school she was picked on, ignored, etc. Now-a-days, kids with disabilities are ‘celebrated’. You will see frequently on the news a school celebrating the king and queen of homecoming are two of the token kids with some kind of disability. They will have physical and mental disabilities and they are paraded in front of everyone as their king and queen. Everyone at the school feels all warm and snuggly. The whole school gets a pat on the head.
The local school had a midget girl enrolled. Her mother is/was a high school teacher, so you saw the little midget girl at all the school activities. When she got in high school she got on the track team!!! Oh my goodness, you would’ve thought she hung the midget moon because she was on the track team! On the track team! How stupid. Then she got an opportunity to go on some Special Olympics team out of the country. Then…she got a scholarship to Penn State!! I never saw so many articles on that girl in the local paper. I figured if her mother hadn’t of been a teacher this would have never happened. In my small town if you are a teacher, you are a saint. Don’t get me started on teachers.
Saw an article recently where Andrea Bocelli (that blind opera singer), was talking about how he skis, drives?. I’m not sure what all he did, but it’s things only people with sight can do. It’s just like the high school football player that is blind, showing him ‘playing’ football. The obese people doing bathing suit shoots. The Down Syndrome teenage girl wanting to be a model.
I’m sorry, these people are different. A blind person can’t do things a sighted person can do. A fat model is not pretty. At the same time, all ‘normal’ people can’t be models, can’t play football. People are all different! No one, normal or not can do/be everything. Call it what it is, quit sugar coating everything.
Back to the school situation. Years ago before I had children, when I heard people talking about ‘mainstreaming’ the kids with disabilities, I thought that sounded so good. No! Bad idea. Basically, kids with disabilities need to be in their own school. Some of these ‘kids’ (they are allowed to go until age 21), need to be in a daycare environment. A lot of them will be in wheelchairs, have frequent seizures, wear diapers, so even the kids with minor learning problems have a hard time learning. They have no business in a regular school. These kids slow down and impede the regular kids. That is not fair to the regular kids.
Off topic. I do enjoy your blog. I am so sorry about your divorce. You seem like a very nice person. I don’t understand these women that get divorced. Seems like the minute they do, they are on the prowl again looking for another man—or already have one before the divorce. My husband (mechanical engineer) of 31 years died in April of 2016. What I wouldn’t give to have him back. If he couldn’t fix or make something, it didn’t need to be done. Mechanical, electrical, plumbing, computer, etc. I was always so proud of him, as some women had men that couldn’t wipe their butt without help.
One more thing, then I will be quite. I go to another blog frequently too. Adam Piggott, Gentleman Adventurer. Don’t know if you have ever heard of it. Think you and your readers would enjoy it. He is just now going through a divorce. He moved to Holland (where his wife is from) from Australia (where he is from) and that was his downfall. He seems like a nice guy too. He is also a libertarian.
Schools being able to label children is highly destructive. If I was a child now I am sure I would collect at least one very destructive label that would have prevented me from entering mechanical engineering or any other field I’m good at.
Women do not appreciate men who are independent any longer. Well old women from other generations do but women from the generation Eric and I are in don’t and the younger ones are even worse. They are completely reliant on the array of services what’s left of the free market offers them. Competent, useful, prudent men just aren’t worth much to modern western and westernized women as mates.
Not only are millennial women unsuitable as wives and mothers, they aren’t even really attractive to real men.
My parents were discussing how millennial women have noticeably boyish figures as if they’re stunted. I thought I was the only one. You really cannot find a true hourglass figure in young women. Something is not right.
I’m not sure about the hourglass thing that, but it could be my sampling though. A big problem with women these days for the lack of a better term is they are hitting the wall rather young these days because of bad habits and making themselves ugly.
Modern western women don’t care about pleasing men. Even the pretty ones. It’s all about them.
Hi Handler,
It is all about them. But what most of them don’t seem to grok is the limited shelf life of what they have to offer. A woman’s sexual market value is at its peak from – roughly – late teens to late ’20s. By the time she is in her mid-30s, her sexual market value is beginning to depreciate rapidly.
A woman can compensate for this to some extent with a winning personality but the granite-hard biological fact is women’s appeal to most men is tied up with their youth, which is another way of saying their fertility. Men never have to worry about a biological clock – in terms of their reproductive capacity. That infuriates feminists, of course – who insist (contra reality) that women can play the same game as men.
But they can’t.
If a woman wants children and a family, she must line that up before she hits her 40s and if she is smart, before her 30s. A man can do that practically any time during the course of his life.
And if a man does want kids and a family – as most men under 50 do – he will want a woman capable of being a mother. That almost automatically rules out most women 35 and older, regardless of the man’s age.
Men and women are different. It’s not evil or even unfair. It is nature.
Feminism, on the other hand, is extremely evil.
Once a girl graduates high school, they’re off to Debt World to start their career. There is no time for being a mother. Most career moms stick their kids in a daycare or with a grandmother. I’ve witnessed career moms bully women that choose raising a family over a career. Women attacking women for being women. It’s sick.
Our society forbids adult men to court teenage girls. So, there goes their chances of meeting a successful, independent man to raise a family with. College is their only option. They don’t want girls to even think about homemaking.
Also, the notion that both spouses must work full-time jobs to be considered middle class is utter rubbish. That’s only true for people that are bad with money and/or live life in quantity. The average middle class home of yesteryear was only 2000 sq. ft or smaller. There weren’t any McMansions. And maybe 1 or 2 cars per household. A kid’s first car was a used one that was saved up for.
Morning, Handler!
Well-said. Especially your observation in re younger women being effectively placed “off the market” – until they have committed to a career and debt. The presumption is that a woman (just like a man) must go off and develop a career/go to college… before she contemplates marriage and family. Which, of course, makes it harder to achieve marriage and family.
Amen also in re the two income thing – though I am softer on this one because of the ripe tide effect of other people’s addiction to debt. For example: It is very hard to find a modestly priced home in many areas, because they don’t build them. Because most people want something more than they can really afford – and are willing to go into debt to get it. This inflates the market and carries everyone along with it.
Still, it is possible, Especially if the woman can agree with the man on a simpler lifestyle and – especially – not buy into (literally) the bottomless pit of insurance for everything…
Looks like some of the down syndrome leaked into the comments..
Why such a high premium on homemaking? C’mon, at the rate America is headed, who can shamelessly condone popping out more useless people and throwing away ones own freedom just to serve someone else til they die, leaving them to put up with the garbage heap of a country that’s gonna be left? Homemaking solves nothing.
Hell with that, I chose the debt, the single income to barely scrape by on, the property in my name and my name only and given the chance I’d choose it all over again and I regularly make it a point to encourage any other man or woman to do the same, to hell with tradition and to hell with yuppie child rearing, nobody needs to be tied down in this already miserable society, if you’re living for somebody else then you’re doing it wrong, and if you’re still selfishly spawning humans in the year 2018 you’re definitely doing long-term harm, ironically negating ones libertarianism.
And ya can’t complain about usery if you’re gonna turn around and also complain about people having the gall to embrace their independence. Everyone on here oughtta know better than anyone out there that there is no value in perpetuating such an antiquated lifestyle that only serves to keep everyone down. If less people were spending their days at home picking up after others or shitposting about their dumb families on fakebook, there’d be time for them to wake the hell up and read about all the ways that their freedoms have been disappearing by the second and perhaps finally give way to the intellectual revolution this society so desperately needs. Instead they wanna shit out more babies so they can brag about their trip to Disney. Picture of success they are.
All that shit you mourn is the same tired shit that’s at the root of the Clover epidemic. Rampant codependency, overpopulation, undereducation, a glimmering Stockholm syndrome. The preoccupation with the nuclear family, it’s shit, and nothin’s gonna get any better by finding any man or woman to settle down with. It’s more retarded than whatever faggy thing Eric was pointing out the gayness of to begin with. I don’t like other humans in general, but I really don’t like other humans in fruity costumes making me follow rules at gunpoint, the same guys representing the government that’s actively getting off on your unattainable yesteryear fantasies while their thugs do their dirty work for them.
I guess my point is, cops are the down syndrome of America, and men and women are equally bad because they’re humans, and they’ve got rights, but they routinely take advantage of the wrong ones, and we’re all doomed because of it.
Moose, A system that would allow a mate for every productive man was very effective at moving society forward. The old ways may not have been perfect but they worked. Look at what is happening now. Productivity is breaking down as the encouragement for men to be productive goes away.
The family is the loyalty the state seeks to destroy.
Cloverism is that virus or bacteria in all human societies. A good immune system is needed to keep it down. If we had a paradise of individual liberty the cloverian disease could appear and if not kept down it would spread and destroy it.
It is human nature to want to control other humans apparently. An affliction that a small percentage don’t have.
Eric, there is no profit in building new small houses. The regulatory burden and all the fees, charges, etc by government make it such that there is no way to make money on small homes.
Hi Brent,
If you get into the MGTOW thing, there is something called the “cock carousel.” It refers to today’s women behaving like men behaved in the ’60s (according to the stereotype). That is, having as much sex as possible with as many people as possible and avoiding commitment to the extent possible.
The problem – for women – is the delusion that their appeal at 35 or 40 will be the same as it was at 25.
It isn’t – simply because of the biological clock and leaving aside the used-up vagine that hangs like sleeve of wizard!
Add to this that more women than men seem to be smokers today – and then add to that “curvy” (i.e., morbidly obese) plus lots of tats and fish tackle through the nose and ears and other things…
Yeah I’ve learned the MGTOW language as I tried to understand various things I had experienced and seen starting in engineering school.
For me I went into engineering school at 18. 1 woman for 10 guys and these bad behaviors immediately showed up in women. Then I leave engineering school and the whole society quickly becomes the same.
In the big city here smoking isn’t as big of an issue but the fat, tats, piercings, blue hair, feminist attitude, etc are. And that’s before children and/or carousel riding behavior.
As to ‘how men behaved in the 1960s’ I think that was all movies and the top 1%.
BrentP-For me I went into engineering school at 18. 1 woman for 10 guys and these bad behaviors immediately showed up in women.
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Shoulda gone to RN school.Then its 8:1 female/male.I didnt have to play any games to meet women,thankful for that.The bar/club scene sure wasnt for me.And for sure I knew how their minds worked when its 12 days with em.Got me a good wife out of it.
`12 hour days that should say
Elaine,thanks for the Adam link.Reading him I thought his marriage stuff was just a bit too caveman,and sure enough it bit him.But good stuff there on what a man needs to do,especially financially.
Fred, you’re welcome. He has some pretty good articles. Uh oh, now I have to recommend two others. Raconteur Report and Chateau Heartiste. I have to skip reading some of CH’s articles, to me kind of nasty, but they do appeal to men.
About the skiing. It’s a team situation. I happen to help disabled people to ski (and ride bikes). Skiing with a blind person is a matter of assisting them with their limitation so they can perform the rest of it. A lot of skiing is feeling the snow under foot and hearing the wind and things around you, so losing your eyesight isn’t necessarily full stop. The guide is providing input helping them “see” what is down or up slope and keeping them going basically in the right direction.
When you get in sync with a blind skier all you really need to do is ski within voice range in front of them giving them a running commentary of what you see. The athletic part of skiing they really are doing. Since this is a car forum the best comparison I can give is how a driver and navigator work together in rally cars. The driver trusts the running stream of directions from his navigator down to the second to know turns and shifts.
Now not many teams will progress to the point of being able to ski slaloms or in trees like Danelle Umstead does but many blind people with trusted and experienced partners can achieve quite a lot. For more inspiration read about Erik Weihenmayer and his climbing partner Jeff Evans have accomplished over the years.
Well, you didn’t use “mongoloid”.
So many offenses. So little time.
I am so old, I remember when a properly retarded spark was a good thing.
But it’s okay to say that all white men are terrorists….
If a negro is parsimonious, alliteration dictates that one characterize such a negro as a niggardly nigger.
Apparently “Sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never harm me” is no longer the case.
Those who are easily offended should be, and often.
Hi Bill,
Agreed. It’s cloying. Also dangerous in that it gives primacy to feeeeeeeeeeelings over facts. I’m sure the Offended Reader’s child with Down Syndrome is very sweet (most Down Syndrome kids – and people – are; I’ve volunteered with them). But DS is a birth defect, not something to “celebrate” or pretend isn’t a defect. I understand making the best of a bad situation. But it is still making the best of a bad situation.
It is becoming not only difficult – but treacherous – to speak and write freely out of fear that someone will take offense (i.e., their feeeeeeeelings will be hurt) and that is becoming almost equivalent to a physical assault, even if the context shows no malice, that the word/phrase was used in a general way according to a general definition that had been accepted for generations in many cases.
And the potential for victim-claiming is endless because anyone can claim they were “hurt” by a statement or use of a certain word. Hell, my feelings are hurt when a good looking woman turns me down!
I have no doubt that if this pernicious business isn’t stomped, it will be considered offensive merely to write “If the prospective buyer wants to take the car for a test drive, ask him to leave a deposit and be sure to jot down his driver’s license info…” because the use of “he” (rather than “he or she” or maybe “they”) “marginalizes” women… I’m sure there are Feminists who would consider the use of just “he” an attack by the Patriarchy on women, an offense demanding punishment.
It is time to stop all this. The coming elections may be our last shot.
The one that always makes me laugh is the use of the word ‘Gay’. Is it their excessive cheerfulness that causes homosexuals to have suicide rates three or four times the rate of normal peopl?
Yeah… and don’t ever use the term ‘niggardly’… I can see this as soon to be redacted from the dictionary.
Even been told by a clover that actually knew what it meant that I should be using ‘miserly’ or ‘stingy’ instead… But, of course those words don’t quite convey the same meaning that I wanted to convey with ‘niggardly’.
And then the same ‘intellectuals’ tell me how inferior the English language is to others because it’s not precise enough…
My head aches.