This "divergence" thing is going too far

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I'm watching a TED talk in which the speaker says that physically disabled people are now calling themselves "physiodivergent." What the hell for??

Maybe people are too focused on creating euphemisms for disability. Does it really accomplish anything?

Yep....and those "euphemisms" will become insults eventually.

"ret*d" used to be a euphemism for people who were (scientifically) called "morons," "imbeciles," and "idiots."

It's spreading. Everyone wants to be normal, not broken. Even people with BPD see nothing wrong with their emotions and sociopaths see nothing wrong with themselves either. Even deaf people don't see anything wrong with being deaf.

Well I'm starting to feel stupid calling myself neurodivergent because I'm afraid of being associated with some of these people.

with everything relative and no absolutes, which way is up and which way is down?

You can call yourself whatever you want. You can call me whatever you want. It's just a label. New words are added to the language every year. It doesn't change the facts. Up is whichever way you want it to be; however, you may be opposing the crowd.

So...
Criminals and sociopaths would be....

"the morally impaired"?

I like that, but perhaps "impaired" has negative connotations.
How about morally divergent?

Well that TED talk sounds like BS to me.

a century back, they were termed "moral imbeciles" - a tangential way of saying "criminally insane."

Trueno

Defendants convicted of felonies:. Owners of impressive rap sheets

Creative morality



The fat - gravitationally significant

Intellectual disabilities - neurologically challenged

I wonder which physically disabled people these would be. It wouldn't surprise me if the speaker is a social/political academic who believes that the theoretically "appropriate" language of his own peers is indicative of disabled people in general.

Seems rather like the prescriptive attitude to "person first" language which used to be very prevalent here in the UK for a couple of decades - until the powers-that-be belatedly realised that many disabled people didn't actually use that language to refer to themselves.

Asocials are usually called morally impaired.

That's improved my day!

Like any term it is how it is used.

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery so be flattered neurodiversity movement.

“Physiodiverse” is a hell of a lot better then “cripple” which was the label for that group of people then when is was growing up.

it's the "diverse" that sounds misleading. it's like in "learning differences".

someone that is brain damaged is still "neurotypical", as long as they are not autistic.

someone that is a member of Mensa. Mensa certified differences does not often get called "learning differences".

"differences" could be good, neither, or bad, but almost all the time when someone says "differences", it means something bad.

connotation versus denotation

for example, "care" has a dictionary definition "to attend to". in other words, wasting seconds, calories, dollars. "care" does not say anything about legality, morality, intention or outcome.

plenty of times, someone does not use the dictionary definition of the word. "girl" has gone from "(cisgender) female child" to "female of any age". even females that appear well over 60, sometimes call eachother "girl".

seriously it got on my nerves to hear "guys and girls". especially in undergrad. it is boy/girl. man/woman. lady/gentlemen. "guy" is not the linguistic equivalent of "girl". college age males sometimes do not like to get called "boys" and they sometimes recognize that they are not yet men. so they call themselves "guy". it's like, what? maybe not all college aged females love getting called "girl".