I think it may be you who is confusing those terms. The ones you’re using as examples are in fact considered hate speech on this board and would be moderated even if used against an offboard character, or in the Pit against another poster, or in some cases even in general discussion.
Slur just means a word that is intended to insult or harm the reputation of the target. For example it is permissible to call an off-board person a cunt despite that term rising somewhere above insult and below hate speech.
I’d like to know the story of the OP’s personal hatred of a fictional character that is so strong that it’s considered a matter of personal importance to be able to describe the character as a retard. Did Shagnasty get a papercut from the Forrest Gump novel or something?
Well, “slur” is very often used to refer to the terms you’re calling “hate speech”: for example, a word like “nigger” is often called an “ethnic slur”. So no, I don’t think “slur” necessarily signifies a term less offensive than “hate speech”.
Still, in the interests of clarity I’m happy to use the descriptor “hate speech” instead of “slur”. And ISTM that the term “retard” is considered by The Powers That Be around here to fall into that category, although the suffix “-tard” does not (though I wouldn’t mind if it did).
I said “offensive slur” not “ethnic slur”, “racial slur”, “religious slur” etc.
My post wasn’t ambiguous - I said any offensive slur other than hate speech has always been permissible to use toward offboard people. Up until this point at least TPTB haven’t categorized this particular slur as hate speech, thus my post.
Your use of the term was not reported speech. You are using a derogatory term to describe someone. Whether the person has the qualities in question is irrelevant; whether the person is fictional is irrelevant. If you want to describe a person as having those qualities, use a non-derogatory term.