Bill and I got together with his sister for a couple of drinks. It’s been awhile since it was just us grown-ups so in spite of the horrid headache I had, I was looking forward to our evening together. We ended up at a local club…I’m being generous when I refer to it as a club. This is, after all, Manteca. Just as we walk in a rather loud, slightly inebriated man greeted us with shouts declaring someone to be such a RETARD! .

I hate that word. I despise that word. Members of my family, Daniel’s family, sometimes have a hard time with the fact that I hate that word. What’s the big deal, they wonder when we do debate it.

It’s just a word.

People are just going overboard with this PC crap.

Use of that word isn’t really about people with disabilities.

It’s just a word…a funny word.

The most awesome Stimey offers some very compelling arguments why this word is so offensive. Like her , I find myself poised to take a stand against the use of this word because when one uses that word to be funny or because it is no big deal they are talking about people with developmental and intellectual disabilities…like my son. No, of course they are not talking directly about my son…they better not be. But they are talking about a section of society that more often than not can not speak for themselves and say just how offensive and hurtful using that word is.

It’s not just a word.

This last week I wrote about an unfortunate encounter my daughter had with a teacher from my son’s school. A teacher who declared how frustrated she was that she would have to have a couple of deaf kids and some retards in her class…her class of normal kids. Many people got why this upset me so. Many friends, who happen to be teachers that work in the same school district as Ms Whomever, were appalled and embarrassed by her unprofessional behavior. Clearly even they saw the wrong in her behavior.

But some saw her in a different light and rushed to her defense as one commenter who described the teacher to me as “a stressed-out individual, worried about an increased workload or being buried in unfamiliar bureaucratic paperwork that one sometimes associates with IEP“. Perhaps, she chided me, I should see how hard she has it…the teacher, has it…dealing with kids like…like my child? She went on to lecture me about how it wasn’t too long ago that class sizes were so much smaller but now the teachers must have responsibility for 30 or more students at a time. She wasn’t alone in reminding me of this.

Well considering the fact that I am the mother of five children , two of whom have graduated from high school and gone on in their education, I think it is fair to say that I have had experience with a few teachers. Okay, I counted. I have had interactions with just under 100 teachers who have taught one or more of my five children in the last 19 years that I have been a mom with school aged kids. I remember rejoicing when the state mandated the class size limits for the primary grades when my now 18 year old started kindergarten. For the record, at Daniel’s last IEP the administration was pushing for more time in the mainstream class for him. Thankfully, the professionals who worked directly with him agreed with my concern that he would get lost in a class of 30 or more students. While he is progressing well, he is not ready to be overwhelmed in such a large class…or disrupt or burden the teacher in a mainstream class in the editor’s words.

Over the years we have been VERY fortunate to have some pretty phenomenal teachers. We have had mostly exceptional, great and good teachers  working with us as a team to educate my children. Yes, I wholeheartedly embrace the idea that I am a part of this team and I do work with the teachers who teach my children. Frankly I believe that they should have more parents like my husband and me working with them. So when the editor of the local paper felt compelled to lecture on how hard teachers work, how much they sacrifice and all that they have on their plate, I just wanted to shout out while raising my hands up in the air, “Amen! Preaching to the choir!”

No the problem that I had last week and still do is the perception that any student less than “regular” or “normal” or “gifted” is some sort of burden or disruption in the classroom that a teacher is forced to deal with. I have a problem with it because when such thoughts are expressed, just like when the word retard is being bandied about in jest, you are talking about my child. You are talking about the nine other students in his SDC class. You are talking about a multitude of people…people who do have potential, who do have talent, who do have a heart, who do have feelings…just like that poor, hapless teacher who has so much stress and difficulty in performing her job, the job she trained long and hard for.

She had a bad day, I’ll give her that much grace. But she behaved unprofessionally and irresponsibly and she was representing her school and all the students who attend it when she did. There is no excuse for that. For arguments sake what if she was talking about other students in the same manner…what if she was referring to students of a particular race?…what if she was referring to students of a particular sexual orientation?…religion?…what if she used a derogatory term to describe them? Would that be acceptable? Would that be okay? Would some rush as quickly to defend her for all the pressure she is under or for having a bad day?

The next time one feels the need to defend such behavior picture this child because after all, that is whom one is talking about when they talk about burdens and disruptions teachers are forced to deal with. That is whom one is talking about when they use the r-word in a lame attempt to be funny. That is my child.