but the existence of etymologically related terms doesn’t give an “out” to people using them for offense and denigration in either case
Never said it did. I remember the first time I saw retard being used in a technical sense and being thrown by it’s usage in todays world. Ultimately though you can’t police language, people are gonna say whatever dumb shit they want, doesn’t mean you have to listen. And no, anyone using “dumb” or “idiot” today is not referring to disabled people, those words stopped being used to describe disabled people multiple decades ago and are far removed from being associated with disabled people. Retard is a lot more recent, but even as a kid growing up in the 90s where calling people gay, queer and faggots were acceptable, even retard used as a slur back then was frowned upon.
It’s all good you don’t need to worry about it. I’m just some random on the internet.
When I was younger I used to get in arguments (usually political nature, I guess politics and power are unfortunately one of my special interests) online with random people. I’d get all upset about it, and it’s fair because it is upsetting. I was terribly, horrifically, violently bullied from kindergarten to college for being visibly queer and neurodivergent and have major trauma and ptsd from it (and other things too). As I’ve gotten older I realized that I was just constantly recreating the abusive conditions I grew up under, feeling bullied online just like I did in real life. The stress is in some ways addictive, it’s what your body knows and wants because it’s familiar and comforting even if it’s not ‘normal’ or healthy. I’ve been banned from every major social media platform for being militantly anti fascist. I’m an asshole and I’m proud of it. I’m a product of the violence I received when I was younger, which is why now as an adult I’m more militant than ever as this country falls deeper and deeper into fascism, aided by the tech industry that silences any voices truly critical of the direction we’re heading in. They amplify hate because it brings them revenue. They manipulate the masses because it brings them power.
Most of the people you argue with online probably aren’t even real and are bots used to manipulate public sentiment in favor of the elites (even division is favorable to them, far more so than unity). The people who are real are likely tweens and teenagers and have a naive view of the world, not being beaten to shit by it yet like adults are. And then there are the real people who are adults… but it says a lot about them (and me, shit) that they choose to spend their time arguing with strangers on the internet. Healthy people are too busy enjoying life to be wasting their time arguing with idiots on the internet.