One of my uncles-by-marriage had a sister with Down Syndrome. Her name was Charlene.
Continuing the slight hijack…
Isn’t “developmentally delayed” a real misleading term for individuals with mental retardation? Doesn’t the use of delay suggest that the person will at some time in the future catch up?
Just something that kind of bothers me.
I’ve known an Eddie and a Jason, and my cousin is named Julie.
Our challenged person at work is Ryan.
it seems like some of the real challenged people are the ones coming up with new phrases that won’t offend people who couldn’t understand them at first.
Well, my college friend Walter (who is normal, generally) was named that because he was born early and with a lot of problems. They named him Walter because it meant strength, and he was gonna need it to survive. He turned out smart, but now has this old fashioned name. If things had gone the other way, he’d have been part of the trend that inspired the thread, I guess.
I dated a girl named Charlie in college who was hot as a pistol, sharp as a tack, and had too much sense to date me for very long. 
I think what happens is that you meet these 'tards and then associate their names with 'tardiness.
For me, and the rest of the kids on my street in Madeira Beach, FL circa 1977, that name is Macky. You say “Macky” and my immediate urge is to do a 'tard impression, with the goofy laugh and distorted face and the banging of the limp wrist against the chest…
:smack:
Reminds me of ‘LA Law’. They had one a’them thar classic dodgy haircut and cardigan ‘retarded dudes’, although, IIRC, they did do some positve educational stuff with that character as well as reinforcing those coupla aspects of the media stereotype.
What was his name in the show Benny, no ?
It’s more than misleading; it’s completely assinine. My sweet niece is never going to ‘progress’ any further than the not-too-bright teenager she is at 40-something, even if she lives to be a hundred. Not even if you stand in front of her and shout “Act your age, goddammit!”
For the same reason the term retarded never seemed appropriate to me either, and has been rightly abandoned in most contexts. The word means, of course, not “slow”, but “slowed”, and implies that the person will “get there” eventually, but that doesn’t happen. Not that many cognitively impaired folks do remarkably well given the circumstances.
My brother’s name is Stephen. When I describe him to others, I call him retarded.
Cranky said of her friend,
“They named him Walter because it meant strength, and he was gonna need it to survive.”
Here in Japan, that is a very common occurence when a baby is born with difficulties, as it is kind of a prayer or a wish for strength for the baby. Thus when I was in hospital for three months with placenta previa with my second, babies born around me were called “Riki” (strength) “Satoshi” (clever and wily) “Tsubasa” (a bird’s wings) and “Sho” (flight). Our little one was named with the characters for “spring” and “tree” to symbolise the hope that he would grow straight and strong.
Which he did! Some of the above mentioned babies did not do so well, and some of them have handicaps. I suppose you could say they need those characteristics more than ever to battle with their every day struggles.
My ex-fiancee’s brother’s name is Trevor, he’s autistic.
His sister accepted nothing but “autistic” to describe his problems.
What about the middle name Lee? Don’t you know that if you give your kid that middle name that he is going to grow up to kill someone? C’mon people!
John Lee Hooker? F. Lee Bailey? Those bastards.
I never thought Walter was such an old fashioned name. That’s probably because I’m old enough (barely) to remember Leave It To Beaver, where Beaver’s older brother was Wally. I’ve known a couple of Walters too, and no one ever commented on their names, the way they might have done if they’d been called something like Thaddeus or Houghton.