There’s Many Labels Out There Already, Others Like Spastic and Retard Are One’s We Can do Without
Now this is a story that just so happened to grab my interest on working social media site, LinkedIn. The story mainly consisted of a young girl with Down Syndrome holding a card with a very simple request; to call her by her name and not a retard.
For someone like myself, I can understand all too well how it can feel to be labelled on a characteristic that you have no control over whatsoever. For those of you that have read some of my past columns will have seen that I have mentioned and openly spoke about my own characteristic in that I live with a learning disability known as Asperger Syndrome, which is a mild form of Autism.
As someone who grew up in the mid-late 90’s to the early 00’s my diagnosis, which happened around the mid 90’s it could not have come round at a more awkward time. I was a preteen about to enter my teens and attempting, in one way or another, to navigate my life both at school and out I found life to be complicated half the time.
For me, Autism had not long come into the fore of the mainstream psyche of the public consciousness so therefore not nearly enough was known growing up about it, hence where labels came into being. Much of it down to lack of public knowledge and understanding.
Growing up, there was not a great deal of understanding around problems such as Down Syndrome, Dyslexia and Autism. If you were Dyslexic, you were viewed as ‘thick as s**t’ due to reading difficulties, if you were Autistic, you were just viewed as a complete and utter ‘weirdo’. Now I openly admit that growing up I didn’t have has much knowledge of Down Syndrome so I would tend to avoid those with the condition, mainly cos I didn’t know how to interact with them. During my time at college a course mate would frequently ask me and others how to spell certain words and after a while I found myself thinking how thick he was if he couldn’t spell a simple word.
There you go, due to my own ignorance back then I to was as guilty as charged. However, as I grew up, I came across knowledge and first-hand accounts of what it was like growing up with the disability.
I even watched the documentary with former Eastenders actress, Kara Tointon, as she revealed what it was like growing up with the problem, how it affected her ability to read the scripts. During the programme she openly admitted that one of the things that she really wanted to do was to read a book. Something which we easily take for granted.
I openly admit that it was whilst watching this that I thought back to my course mate and of frequent asking of spelling words, I began to understand how awkward it must be for him.
For me, it wasn’t that easy either. Due to my issues with social interactions at school I would frequently get called a ‘freak’, ‘weirdo’ or ‘spastic’ and this is something I felt to be somewhat upsetting because I was being labelled based upon something that I had no control over, no understanding over and in my darkest moments, just didn’t want to be.
I wanted to be normal so I could fit in with everybody else and not feel ostracised over something that I knew wasn’t within my control or influence.
When I looked at the image on the site, I understood all too well what being labelled as something negative felt like. Now, you are probably looking at this and thinking that first and foremost words like Spastic, Weirdo and Retard are just words like any other such as Lard Arse, Pillock, W****r but there is a great deal more to that than you realise.
Now there are already labels in society, and nearly all of them to do with fashion. So why are we doing to others in the minority groups?
Those words are based on negative connotations based upon characteristics that cannot be controlled in anyway. For example, Dyslexics aren’t thick they just have a problem with the actual spelling. They understand what the word means and the context usage but they just have an issue with spelling it. Autistic people aren’t weird, they can suffer a wide range of social issues from feeling entrapped to having problems both interacting with their peers and/or large numbers of people. You may or not be aware of it but their IQ (Intelligence Quotient) is above average. A few years ago, I did a test at home when a specialist visited and my IQ was 100. Not bad for someone like me who is Autistic.
However, I openly admit that when some minority groups did start trying to reclaim these so-called labels, I would refer to myself as ‘your resident spastic/retard’. My reason for doing this? I knew I would receive some sort of friendly piss-take so my immediate defence was to get the self-mockery in there so as to lessen the blow from others and also to show that it wouldn’t hurt as much.
Yet, again, I openly admit, I am as guilty as charged. But then again, I myself was part of a minority group merely trying to regain some control over the words, and this is something that I still do today.
Now if you’re looking at this and thinking that if I can say it then why can’t you? Well, the answer is simple, it’s not so much about the word but rather the power behind the word, something that’s been used against people like me as a form of attack for so long. Once you understand that you can hopefully understand why I chose to reclaim that word and what it means, though I do make sure that I steer clear of it as much as I can.
So yes, I am a spastic, or weirdo and there are many others who are often referred to as freaks or retarded by label but just remember, we’re humans first.
Please remember this; I may wear the Levi’s label but I ditch spastic label any day of the week.
