Spread the Word to End the Word

This week at Edina High School is anti-bullying week. Along supporting the LGBT (Thursday wear pink or purple) and minority (Friday wear black) communities in our school, we are using the national campaign "Spread the Word to End the Word" to support our special education community.

Spread the Word to End the Word is a national organization whose missions is to "combat that inappropriate use of the R-word in common usage.

For some reason, people want to hang on to the r-word. I hear very often that "it is a clinical definition" or "its no big deal, I am not hurting anyone." But, the reality is, you are. Last year, at Minnetonka High School I had the older sister of one of my students come to me in tears because her peers were throwing the r-word around casually to put down one another. Be careful, you never know who might be within ear shot....mom, dads, sister, brother and friends. And to argue the "clinical definition" argument, straight from their website:

"When they were originally introduced, the terms "mental retardation" and "mentally retarded" were medical terms with a specifically clinical connotation: however, the pejorative form, "retard" or retarded" have been used widely in today's society to degrade and insult people with intellectual disabilities. Additionally, when "retard" and "retarded" are used as synonyms for "dumb" or "stupid" by people without disabilities, it only reinforces painful stereotypes of people with intellectual disabilities being less valued members of society."

On October 5, 2010 President Obama signed the bill "Rosa's Law" into federal law. This law now removes the terms “mental retardation” and "mentally retarded" from federal health, education and labor policy and replaces them with people first language “individual with an intellectual disability” and “intellectual disability.”

So people, it is time to let go to the r-word. You are just making a fool of yourself by hanging on to it and arguing that is your "right." We teach our children not to use the words "nigger" and "homo" but why not "retard"? Wear blue this coming Wednesday (October 26th) and show your support to the special needs community and put a stop to the r-word.

For more information concerning "Spread the Word to End the Word" visit www.r-word.org.