> Is the expectation that we slowly disallow insults in culture

The current equilibrium seems to be that we're on a sort of vulgar treadmill. The process goes as follows:

1. Decide that previously formal/medical/technical word like "idiot" has developed too many colloquial negative connotations.

2. Invent new formal term, like "mentally retarded", and tell people that they have to use that instead, because the old term is now considered offensive.

3. Because connotation emerges from denotation, the new term develops precisely the same colloquial negative connotations.

4. Rinse and repeat.

The euphemism treadmill is not even just a contemporary phenomenon: it's age-old and not even exclusive to English.

> Wait until they realize that every single fucking insult in existence is equally "able-ist"

goofball potato-head fool wet-napkin shithead fuckface noodle git dipshit dingleberry dillweed bellend fucknuts wanker tosspot toerag unwise nonsense bullshit silly useless wild ridiculous unreasonable unbelievable fantastic absurd

I actually really like replacing my language with non ableist versions. It’s never actually important for me to use the ableist version, and it’s nice to think a little bit when I speak instead of just scraping the bottom of the barrel for the same shit I have always said. The other day I did something unwise and said “wow I’m a potato head”. I thought that was fun.

You can get really mad at people trying to improve their language and gently suggest that others do the same. But your anger is pointless. The language will change. Most of us stopped using “retard” a long time ago for example. You can keep using all that stuff if you want but everyone else is just gonna move on and you’re going to look bad. That’s just the way the world changes.

>potato-head

You'll need to adjust your language as the language has changed.

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-can-count-to-potato

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/acprjo/how_did_p...

Frankly any insult that attacks intelligence in any way is going to be ableist. Attack the merits or lack thereof of the argument.

Its true that potato head might be borderline. I suppose I prefer to make the effort and adjust my choices when someone points out my error, than make no effort and ignore feedback I am getting from others. Potato head was new to me and seemed like a good idea, and I did use it against myself. I generally will not insult anyone else's intelligence, but I do suppose that calling myself a potato head might perpetuate that kind of thing. Thanks for the suggestion!

To me, git is ageist.

That’s fair. Where I grew up no one uses that, I just pulled it from some suggestions on Reddit. I’m not actually familiar with how it’s used.

Doesn't fool fall in the same category?

I think of a fool as someone who makes a bad choice, but this isn’t the same as intelligence. Someone can be very smart and very foolish.

Also a typo made me realize that “tool” is perhaps a good non ableist insult.

Fool and goofball are even less subtle.

You like changing your language because you convinced yourself that you’re part of the crew getting to make the changes. Just wait until you’re on the receiving end. Or even better forced to speak a different language, you don’t know, which has happened before under the banner of progress.

On the receiving end of what exactly? Does it feel worse to be called a fool rather than an idiot? I don’t see what you’re getting at.

> forced to speak a different language

It’s very weird to me that you view my choice to use different words as somehow forcing something on others. Culture shifts and changes and there are always people responsible for participating in those changes. Yes sometimes people have used violence to change the language and of course that has generally been horrific. But my choice to simply tweet differently is well within the bounds of the type of normal human change that happens in a healthy society. I’m not forcing anyone to do anything.

The "receiving end" comment was about what happens when society decides that your thought patterns make you a bigot, and you fundamentally disagree.

Lots of older people have this experience as the world changes out from under them.

You're replying to a homophobic troll whose handle is a hex digit substitution code for 0xdeadfa65 = "deadfags", so it's pretty obvious which end he's on, and that he's not arguing in good faith.

On the other hand, I've enjoyed all of your comments, and you've made great points!

hey, you illiterate racist dogshit mongrel https://www.irishpost.com/news/irish-potato-head-mum-asks-ir...

> Most of us stopped using “retard” a long time ago for example

This never happened

Its actually hilarious to me that the words you list out could all mostly be incredibly offensive to certain types of people, but you think its ok since its not "ableist".

Really points out how stupid policing literal insults is

If you're right then "able-ist" itself would be an insult and won't be allowed, thus it won't be possible to disallow insults. qed

Able-ist is a criticism.