[Tagging] Yay, new howto map for diabilities created in wiki

[Paul Allen]

On Fri, 11 Jan 2019 at 22:37, Philip Barnes <phil at trigpoint.me.uk> wrote:

>
> The word handicap in this context is very outdated. It is likely to be
> seen as condescending.
>

Off-topic, but "handicapped" was once considered the preferred term.  It
came from a
worldview influenced by religion, that God had caused people to be born
differently in
order to make life fairer: they were such good souls that they needed to be
handicapped
(as race horses are) in order that they didn't have an unfair advantage
over the others.  And
it was considered better than epithets like "cripple" that were used
disparagingly.

Of course, human nature being what it is, the term "handicapped" came to be
used disparagingly.
So now people are "disabled" instead.  Except that is also being
increasingly used disparagingly,
so people now have special needs.

To bring it back on topic, I suspect that whatever term is chosen, in a few
decades it will be
frowned upon in favour of a new term.  I wish it were otherwise, but human
nature has already
required the serial invention of euphemisms for many things because
well-intentioned terms
become used, by some, in a disparaging way.

-- 
Paul
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