In light of Obama's recent slip-up on Jay Leno, the Special Olympics is wisely using their time in the sun to help promote something that needs to be called attention: the (over)use of the word "retard". Retard, like "faggot" and other words that fly off the tongues of a lot of us, is something they feel needs to be re-thought, so on March 31st, they are calling for a national day of awareness for America to look at their use of the r-word, just like people look at the use of nigger/nigga or fag, and try to curb it. They've even set up a website, asking for people to pledge to stop their use of this slur, which is every bit as offensive as other slurs out there.And I'm all about it.
As a Black man, I get where my people are coming from when they say "stop using the 'n-word'", but cats won't think twice about terms like retard or faggot. Maybe they hold race closer to them than developmental disabilities, or sexual orientation, but you have to look at the whole picture... if we're truly striving for one human race, we have to show respect to all humans, not just those who look and speak like us.
Defeating racism is one step, but we as a nation, we as a people, we as one... we have a LONG way to go before we can break down those barriers that define us if we are truly to act like one united front.
Think on it.
Shouts to wifey for the heads up.
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