A bit more on Tropic Thunder and Language

[Guest guest]

Hi everyone,

 

Here is a recent article that goes back to the issue of Tropic Thunder.  The

article is quite long, but very interesting, especially for those on this list

deeply connected to issues of language, as they relate to our community and

disability.  Toward the end of the article, there is a direct reference to the

dwarfism community. 

 

thanks,

 

Arnold

 

The " retarded " renaissance

" Never go full retard " was the catchphrase of the summer. Activist groups aren't

laughing. Should you be?

By Lynn

 

Sep. 18, 2008 | When I was in fourth grade, someone you liked was a " good kid. "

Someone you didn't like was a " retard. " (Or, in the colorful patois of my native

Boston, a " wicked retahd. " That, or this withering shorthand: " a wicked re. " ) We

did not use the term for the special-needs kids. They were " the special-needs

kids. "

Basically, we used the word to describe any annoying person (or rule or homework

assignment). There was also the timeless " loser, " of course, and the more

ephemeral " dink " -- " douche bag, " for its part, came later -- but " retard, " and

" retarded, " with all their variations, packed the most playground punch.

 

And today, pop culture and the Twitterati, tirelessly mining those formative

years for irony pay dirt, have spurred -- for descriptive better or for

derogatory worse, depending on whom you ask -- a " retard " renaissance.

 

You've probably read, heard or even said the word (and/or its " 'tard " -based

spinoffs) if you watched this year's MTV Video Music Awards; saw " Napoleon

Dynamite, " " House Bunny " or the trailer for the new Cera movie ( " I love

you so much it's retarded " ); listened to the Black Eyed Peas; heard Stern

on Gov. Palin and work-family balance (according to a listener, he said,

" For the sake of that retarded baby, I'm not going to vote for her " ); discussed

McCain's plan for health insurance reform; or visited, like, any blog

comments section ever.

 

Oh, or if you've read word one about the most recent Stiller-tacular, " Tropic

Thunder, " whose vast coalition of detractors -- including the Special Olympics,

the National Down Syndrome Society and the American Association of People with

Disabilities -- are currently leading the " for worse " troops, protesting the

use, and use and use of the word " retard " in the movie. The coalition has also

objected to the portrayal of the " retard " in question, Simple Jack, played by

Stiller's Tugg Speedman in a film-within-a-film, which itself spawned the

straight-to-novelty-tee catchphrase of the summer. " You went full retard, man, "

Downey Jr.'s character -- in blackface -- admonishes a deflated Speedman.

" Never go full retard. "

 

The catchphrase factor is part of what has advocates up in arms. Yes, they say,

wearily, we know the bit, in context, is satire. (And clearly it is: Not of

Simple Jack, but of movies like " I Am Sam " -- that is, of maudlin, " serious, "

-bait film portrayals of the intellectually challenged.) But the thing

about catchwords, coalition members note, is that they don't stay in context.

 

" When kids see the movie and then use that word to tease someone -- or call

someone 'Simple Jack' -- they're not making fun of Hollywood, " says Plank,

founder of WrongPlanet.net, a prominent online forum for people with autism and

other neurological differences, and a member organization of the " Tropic

Thunder " protest coalition. Or, in the words of one blogger whose son has Down

syndrome, " When we award tacit acceptance to a term such as 'retard' or

'retarded' in casual conversation -- or worse, when millions of people watch a

movie that also awards that tacit acceptance -- it most certainly will gain even

more acceptance, " she wrote last month. " My son will be going back to school in

a couple of weeks. And all around him -- I guarantee it -- kids will be telling

other kids not to go 'full retard.' And everyone will think it's OK to say

'retard,' or that this or that is 'retarded.' And my son will walk through the

halls, and more people will think

of Nick as a 'retard' than did a few months ago. Nick deserves better than

that. "

 

But do we need to ban the word entirely? Not necessarily, says Gail on,

mother of a working actor with Down syndrome and executive director of the Down

Sydrome Association of Los Angeles (which also successfully hounded Fox to pull

" Napoleon Dynamite " pens that said, " You guys are retarded " ). " But we do have

moral and societal guidelines that limit the use of other derogatory words.

We're just saying this word needs to be added to that list. It is hate speech. "

 

So it's because of " Tropic Thunder " that the current " hate speech " vs. " irony! "

controversy has exploded. But in the broader view of this particular culture

war, Stiller & Co. were hardly the first to have dropped the R-bomb. Todd

Solondz trivia experts may note that the working title of his 1995 outcast-fest

" Welcome to the Dollhouse " reportedly was " Faggots and Retards. " And back in

2000, Tina Fey said she had to haggle for permission to use the word on " SNL " --

in a Sully-and--from-Boston sketch, natch. The final word from NBC's

standards and practices division: Yes in late night, no in earlier promos. " The

network is very skittish about the word -- and rightfully so, " Fey told the New

York Observer.

 

So what's behind the R-word's most recent surge -- in visibility and, depending

on where you look, acceptability? And, really, should it go away for good?

As for pinpointing the term's reemergence, there's certain linguistic detective

work that just cannot be done. No one can say for sure which cheeky blogger

first thought, for instance, " Hmm. 'Idiot'? No. 'Loser'? No, too soft. 'Tool'?

Close. But I need something more pungent, more staccato, even more deliberately

juvenile. Oh, look, someone from fourth grade just found me on Facebook. Man, I

always thought that kid was such a ... [light bulb] RETARD. "

 

But it's not hard to hypothesize about the term's recent proliferation, or its

unique descriptive appeal. It is at least a safe bet that -- as feminist blogger

Marcotte suggested to me in a separate analysis of the term " douche bag "

-- the full-on deployment of " retard " and (perhaps even more so) " retarded " was

at least accelerated in the online snarkosphere, where so many jillions of

people complaining about so many jillions of things are, at the end of the day,

just going to need some more words. (Cf. " asshat, " " douchetard. " )

 

So, then, why " retard " ? For one thing, " retard " and " retarded " have that retro,

old-skool styling that is not only in vogue but also handy when that puerile,

playgroundy connotation is precisely what's needed. Retarded, its fans insist,

steps in where, say, " lame " (also an offensive term, if you think about it)

leaves off. " I always thought 'retard,' which means slows and pretty in music,

was actually a kind of nice way to express the condition. So I'm sorry it got a

bad rap, " says my friend Dixie, whom I called to find out if the teen TV network

where she works would allow the R-word on air. (Answer: No way.) " It got a bad

rap precisely because people used the term to mean lame. So now that we don't

use it for the developmentally disabled, can we please use it to mean lame,

stupid, way stupid? None of these have the punch that retard does. Some things

are more than lame. They are retarded. The true essence of a poor, poor decision

isn't conveyed well

enough with lame. Or with gay, for that matter. "

 

Ah, yes. About " gay. " It's also made quite a comeback, from the fourth grade, as

an insult -- but not against actual homosexuals. Even if you find that

objectionable, there's still a difference. Gays -- unlike " retards " (See? You

just can't say that!) -- have been using that term to describe themselves for

decades. So the word itself, however you use it, just doesn't have the same

thudding impact. And unless I missed them somehow, I haven't heard many murmurs

about a radical political strategy to reclaim, à la " queer, " the R-word.

 

In fact, perhaps not surprisingly, things seem to be going in the opposite

direction. Just last year, the American Association for Mental Retardation

changed its name to the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental

Disabilities, on the grounds that, while the term was still useful in certain

legal and medical contexts, it had become dated at best, stigmatizing at worst.

As one proponent of the name change argued, " It is in the process of dying its

own death, of becoming an archaic term as others have before it. "

 

That observation, in a way, bolsters the boosters' central defense: To the

degree that " retard " is hate speech, well, we use it to speak of our hate for

Paris Hilton. Or people who " go green " ... by private jet. Or certain

politicians. Or any display, really, of eye-rolling dumbassery. Not the

special-needs kids.

 

In fact, at least one person very close to the issue says she has no trouble

separating the epithet, in this way, from its original meaning. " My sister has

Down syndrome and I am most definitely an advocate for her and any

developmentally disabled people. That said, I am in no way offended when I hear

the word 'retarded,' " says Angelique Uhlmann, 40, a physician in Boston who was

not offended by " Tropic Thunder. " " In my mind it's just a word. I don't recall

people ever calling her that, even, but I do recall people staring at her,

mouths agape. That I find much more offensive than a mere word. Looks can kill,

as they say. "

 

Ari Ne'eman, an Asperger's autistic who is founding president of the Autistic

Self Advocacy Network, isn't buying this argument. " That's like saying, 'I'm not

really talking about the Jewish people when I say someone's trying to Jew me out

of my money,' " he says. " It's very disingenuous to say this is not about the

rights of people with disabilities, because in many ways reality and actions

follow terminology. And if we can't reach a point where people with disabilities

have the same basic rights to respect in public discourse that any other

minority community really demands and is generally afforded, then we're never

going to be able to address what is very real and tangible discrimination

against people with disabilities. " (Discrimination, he says, and even violence,

noting that Sen. Joe Biden, Barack Obama's pick for V.P., in 2007 introduced

legislation that would, among other things, expand the federal definition of a

hate crime to include

disability.)

 

Ne'eman and others maintain that disability is one of the last " acceptable "

targets of bigotry. He decries this double standard: " There are people who would

never practice bigotry against people of a different skin color or religion but

are bigoted in their language or actions against people with disabilities all

the time. " I'd argue that no one's thrown around " cripple " much since

Haig, but point taken. Plenty of racism has swirled around the Obama campaign,

for example, but at least in " distinguished " circles, it has had to come at

least a little encoded. We can argue all day about whether a particular, and

subtle, turn of phrase, or sleight of Photoshop, or glance was anti-Semitic, or

gay-bashing or whatever. But people -- whatever you may make of this -- are

going around saying " retard, " " retard, " " retard, " with not a whole lot of

frowning in their wake.

 

Here's how it plays out in my world. The other day an electrician, not a tall

guy, arrived at our fourth floor walkup complaining, jokingly, about all the

stairs. " It's not easy for me and my midget legs, " he said with a grin. Was he

actually making fun of my sister-in-law, who is an achondroplastic dwarf? Of

course not. Would he have said this to her face? No way. He probably didn't even

know that the word " midget " is considered deeply offensive by many people with

dwarfism. And yet, I cringed.

 

Ultimately, anti- " retard " activists are trying to do what I didn't do while that

fellow fixed our ceiling fan: Say something. Or at least to get people, perhaps

especially people like me -- who found the Simple Jack business hilarious

precisely because we're so offended by " respectful " films like " Rain Man, " and

who are deeply aware of the power of words both to pinpoint and to prick -- to

at least think twice about the insult's real-life impact.

 

" People are comfortable using 'retard' as a dis because in the past no one has

stood up and said anything in numbers worth counting. Most marginalized groups

come from places of family pride and tradition. They are able to stand strong

together out of their heritage and make a statement. But people with

intellectual disabilities, scattered through different families, are not part of

a celebrated culture, " says on, who saw " Tropic Thunder " as equal parts

outrage and opportunity. " I think today's high-tech world has finally allowed us

to take a stand. Perhaps the word has continued to grow in popularity, since

there has been no public pressure against it, " she suggests. " Until now. "