AIBU to find this term offensive

[wakeupandsmellthecoffee]

A colleague at work in reference to someone sitting down relaxing in a chair said "he's monging out"she was surprised when I said I was offended by the term and that it was disabilist.
What is your definitions of the term mong.

People would actually go to professional jobs and say to their boss- yeah I monged out this weekend?
I don't think so.

I thought it was drug-culture slang for being wreaked.

Having trouble reading Alice?

Just lazy I think Owllady.

i thought the same alice like if someone has been puffing/ smoking weed.

Mrsdevere - yes I know SEND is shorthand, that's what I said. Apologies if my other post wasn't very clear. I'll try again.

SN is different to SEND. It may be widely used by some people to either mean LD or SEND but it's not used officially anymore because SN is also used in a derogatory way, in much the same way as retard or spastic, or indeed Mong. Eg calling someone "special needs" when they do something stupid, which is horribly offensive and sadly common.

When SN is used by a parent or on mn it is obviously not being used in a derogatory way, so I don't think it's offensive in that context.

Context makes a lot of difference to how offensive words are.

Oh god I didn't know it was offensive either. I'd use it if I was just lazing around. Clearly I won't use it anymore though!!

Well I didn't know that was what send was shorthand for. No wonder my complaint letters are eleven pages long

Why do people use words they don't understand?

it's not used officially anymore...

I have seen 'special needs resource base' used wrt to educational facilities, and 'special needs jobs' advertised by the council - i don't think officialdom can have completely stopped using it.

I thought after all the Ricky Gervaise arseholery that it was widely realised that 'mong' is offensive.

SEN is used in schools. There are still SENCOs : Special Educational Needs Co-ordinaters in charge of their needs at school. I don't find it offensive.

I can't imagine anyone in my place of work using the term. If they did they'd be challenged and someone would have a word.

Anyone who then persisted in using it would be disciplined.

'thebestfurchinchilla

Why do people use words they don't understand?'

How is somebody supposed to learn that there is another definition of a word they have only ever heard used in one context?

Having SEN or SEND is not the same as having a learning disability.

Special needs used to be used to mean learning disability. Sadly, any term for LD takes on negative connotations because people begin to use it in a derogatory way, so the terminology is changed fairly regularly.

Many young people don't associate mong with disability, or with Mongol. It just means stoned because that's the only context they've heard it in.

Comments I heard last week:

"God you are so special needs"

"I am so monged today"

Imo the first is much more offensive, because it's intended to be derogatory towards people with LD.

2) Bullies and other mean spirited individuals appropriate the word, shorten or adapt it into the word they use designed to cause offense

The main problem is this.

Until global culture shifts to no longer seeing SN people as lesser, it doesn't what new word is suddenly the PC term this time around it'll eventually become a derogatory slang in the next 5-10 years. There's plenty of people saying "S/he's special", and you know what they mean. Voice tone conveys a helluva lot, regardless of the word being used.

Retard and cripple were once polite medical terms to replace derogatory words before it. Before then it was freak or deformed.

One day the new insult will be "disability". It's not a stretch to imagine people poking fun at someone going "Oh, do you have a disability?" and watching it spiral from there.

In the mean time... I don't know what the answer to the problem is. But I do know that attitudes have shifted to much more positive since campaigns have been going on to spread awareness about different disabilities.

Why do people use words they don't understand?'

It's not that they don't understand... The issue with 'monging' is not the meaning that commonly attribute to it (I.e. Relaxing and being lazy), it's its derivation from mongoloid.

Do you know the derivation of every word you use? Of course not... I don't either.

One day the new insult will be "disability". It's not a stretch to imagine people poking fun at someone going "Oh, do you have a disability?" and watching it spiral from there. In the mean time... I don't know what the answer to the problem is.

I think the answer is not to let words become offensive in the first place... Words only become offensive because we allow them to be... For instance, suppose the Spastics Society (as was) had continued to use the term spastic as was originally intended, continuing to own it and be proud of it, in spite of those who wanted to stigmatise it, we could be happily using it today... To continue as we are doing is allowing the bullies to litter our language with words they've made offensive.

Ps what is wrote above is in no way a criticism of the Spastics Society, and given how the word had become offensive they were in a difficult position, but if as a society at large had continued to be proud of the word, mocking and challenging those who attempted to turn it into a term of abuse, maybe things would be different.

"But it's ok to use words like fuckwit, halfwit, idiot, simpleton, crazy, nutcase, maniac etc which all have negative connotations about a person's mental capacity?"
Entirely guessing, but maybe it's because these words haven't been used as an official descriptor within living memory (have they?). Their use is directed more towards the general population.

One odd thing I've noticed, in the US, most people (and it's usually kids) who still use the word retard or retarded, unless they're intentionally meaning to be offensive, would never dream of using it to describe somebody who actually has additional/special needs/learning disability.

Which is puzzling, but might be a clue about how words evolve from one connotation to another. Eventually nobody will associate that word specifically with that group of people, and it won't mean that anymore - maybe that's what's happened with words like halfwit or nutcase.
Or maybe people will forget the original reason for the insult altogether - there probably aren't many people using the word bastard who genuinely believe that having unmarried parents makes a person naturally prone to criminal behaviour. As an insult it literally doesn't mean what it used to mean.
Whether that linguistic evolution is good or bad is a completely different debate.

I think the answer is not to let words become offensive in the first place... Words only become offensive because we allow them to be... For instance, suppose the Spastics Society (as was) had continued to use the term spastic as was originally intended, continuing to own it and be proud of it, in spite of those who wanted to stigmatise it, we could be happily using it today... To continue as we are doing is allowing the bullies to litter our language with words they've made offensive.

Black people do this with the word "Nigga". It's still an offensive word.

Eventually nobody will associate that word specifically with that group of people, and it won't mean that anymore - maybe that's what's happened with words like halfwit or nutcase.

Good post... I agree, and that's the issue here. Words can and do evolve, and 'monging' seems to be partially evolved which is causing the controversy. I'm confused why some seem determined to register offence for words that do seem to have undergone that evolution (eg nutcase - I can't think who would ever actually use that word to describe someone with mental illness)

I find it very easy to imagine someone with a mental illness being called a nutcase or nutter, actually. I don't see why we have to accept the "evolution" of words from something that originally caused offence. Just use another word. Most children I know can get this so not too hard for adults surely.

Iggi99

Yes, I can imagine that too, but 99%+ of the time 'nutter' is not used in the context of mental illness. Where does this stop... The list of adjectives that could be used to offensively describe disabilities, whether mental health, learning or physical is huge (eg odd, stupid, special, weird etc.). Do we have to write off a huge section of a vocabulary because someone somewhere at some point thought they'd use it as an insult?

If I call someone a nutter, i mean they're eccentric in a bizarre or humorous way. Most people, including myself, can be nutters at times by this definition. I don't see why the fact some people at some point chose to use that word in an offensive way means it's taboo for evermore. All this treading on eggshells as we navigate the hundreds of 'offensive' words is crazy (crazy probably being one such word). When did we give the bullies the power to turn our language into minefield!

I didn't say you had to accept it, Iggi, just that it's how language seems to work. I don't think that it excuses using words that have the obvious potential to be offensive, just to be clear. (Although there's definitely something to be said for owning or 'reclaiming' a word or descriptor.)

Honestly, for me, with words like nutcase as an example, it depends hugely on intent, if somebody calls me nuts because they disagree with my opinion I take no issue with it, but I'm not a fan of being dismissed as nuts because I have a mental illness. Tone is huge.