Absolutely, and a point I made myself, in some detail, above, even before my back-and-forth with Miller started.
Also true. But what Miller asked me about, and the question to which I responded, was calling a person stupid. Different thing altogether. And after that there was a bit of retconning going on.
I absolutely understand that. Perhaps my ability to “read for context,” or “comprehension,” is limited. I am neither the smartest or the best-educated person in the room. But I understand that you’re making that distinction.
What I’m saying is that there are people who identify as “stupid,” who think of themselves as “stupid” every day. Sure, you’re right to say that’s not a political identity, but it’s nonetheless real.
And to call someone “stupid,” if that person who someone who considers himself stupid, is going to hit pretty hard.
And some people (not you, of course) might perceive that about someone and then use the insult “stupid” to great effect.
Compare the example I gave earlier, which is straight from the SDMB. Some people were insulting a guy by saying he was probably a virgin, lived in his mother’s basement, etc. And other people objected because it was offensive to virgins, and to people who were forced through circumstances to live with their parents. Those things aren’t social or political identities, and it wouldn’t even make sense to insult a movie in those terms, but they are still characteristics that apply to many people, who can therefore be vicariously insulted. I think ‘stupid’ falls into this category.
I think I’ve run my course in this thread. I’ll just leave it with this:
Saying “we don’t need [people belonging to some disfavored group] around here” is something I’m not at all comfortable with. Even if that disfavored group includes some genuinely bad people.
I think we need our conservatives.
Even though they’re wrong almost all the time. 
Wrong I don’t mind. The total disconnect from reality, the endless obvious lying, the stupid gotchas, the racism, the fake outrage at being called a racist; that gets on my nerves.
Don’t forget the projection.
Democrats are REALLY not saying anything about Cuomo. You are so right @Deeg, I owe you an apology. Biden’s silence on this issue is absolutely deafening. I am appalled by the Democrats’ behavior here.
When the accusations against Gaetz become public I expect a similar response from Republicans, assuming they are as easily verified. The public accusations against Cuomo weren’t enough, it took a five month investigation. And he is (currently) still trying to hold on, proving he is just as much of a scumbag as Gaetz.
I bet everyone agrees on that.
Do you agree that saying, “That movie is stupid” is not offensive in the same way as saying, “That movie is retarded” is offensive?
Like the similar response to the Roy Moore allegations?
Ah, there’s the weasel words. What if it is hard to verify, should they just give up?
No argument on the scumbag part, but at least the women he sexually harassed were of legal age. That puts Gaetz in a whole other category.
No in fact.
Like I say, language is not always symmetrical and different things can be implied when you flip words around.
The vast majority of words are inoffensive in all contexts, and the remainder are inoffensive at least to some people some of the time. Thus the statement that a word is inoffensive would be taken to mean it’s always inoffensive, otherwise why even bother saying anything?
Whereas the opposite does not imply always, as I’ve already explained.
Sure but the actual thing being disputed was whether words themselves are marked vulgar (or indeed, offensive) and they are.
Can some mod direct the tedious semantic hijack to the tedious semantic hijack forum?
It would be helpful to have this list somewhere. People being expected to know which insults are seen as reflecting well on the speaker and ones reflecting poorly on the speaker should be known.
Perhaps you could put this list together, sort of like the bad words list that were forbidden before. My recollection of that list was that universal agreement on the specific words to put on that list did not exist, not by a long shot.
Moron was the word that mentally retarded supplanted. It was describing the exact same group of people.
Anyone using the words idiot, moron, cretin or imbecile are just using older words for the same group of people who were called mentally retarded, which was the neutral word that supplanted those words when they became derogatory.
In 2010, Obama passed a Bill to take the term “mental retardation” out of laws and government documents and replaced them with “intellectual disability”.
As Colibri points out here, because of the euphemism treadmill, that term will become a negative term as well.
As long as people consider others with less intelligence to be inferior, the words will continue to cycle and change, but the meaning will be the same.
I disagree. Words themselves are rarely either offensive or inoffensive in and of themselves and completely dependent on usage and context. There is no such thing as a context-free word.
I could write an offensive statement right here, directed at you, that would be composed entirely of words that are marked neither “vulgar” nor “offensive”.
They have vulgar or offensive attached to the definitions of their usage which are neither complete nor exhaustive. That is what your own dictionary cite shows. But again, I’m not the one appealing to dictionaries to define what is offensive usage or not.
And the Kavanaugh allegations. And the Trump allegations.
Context and usage matters, but yes words are also considered vulgar or offensive in general.
Find any dictionary that doesn’t mark words with such categorizations. The OED and others did not even include words like “fuck” until relatively recently, despite them being common in the language because they were just considered intrisically offensive.
That’s right, you’re the one appealing to absolutely fuck all to support your position.
That’s not what you said. You said the vast majority of words are inoffensive in all contexts.
Every dictionary marks certain usages of certain words with such labels. That is a straightforward proof that the same word that is offensive or vulgar in one context and usage, in not in another.
I gleefully point you in the direction of cock, tits, pussy, fag, gay etc. etc. etc.
And now they are included (thus proving the incompleteness and uselessness of dictionaries for this discussion) and you just used the word in a completely inoffensive way.
Great Debates?
So your argument is that if a word is considered offensive in eg Australia, but not the US, then that word is offensive full stop and should be avoided by everyone?
Or is it something different?