Counterpoint: SirFochs states:

Also enraged was his other brother Dirrell.

Look, you can’t get away with this in the rest of the business world. As a member of a community partnership program with a multi-billion dollar company, you’re allowed to criticize, but when you break decorum and get nasty, you lose partnership. That’s the way it works. They get to choose who they get to partner…

We certainly used “retard” growing up, no question.

Are you honestly going to say kids didn’t call each other that (and “retard”) 30 or 40 years ago? We’ve all evolved, (and here’s really no excuse for a grown man to use either today) but let’s not rewrite history in some kind of virtue-signaling Olympics now.

I feel like you guys are kinda not-all-men-ing him right now. I’m honestly glad to hear you guys didn’t use the word but you really didn’t hear that word tossed around like nothing back then? That was absolutely the most commonly-used insult (if the shortened version is included anyway) I heard growing up.

That’s honesty pretty shocking to me. I doubt if I know a single 40-year-old dude who hasn’t called someone that before. I heard that constantly growing up and I’m only 28.

I have no intent to generalize EVERYONE in said demographic, simply to speak from my own personal experience and observation. Sorry bro! We cool?

It’s absolutely a terrible term and should NEVER be used. The intent when using this term in the context I am referring to is/was meant to belittle the receiving party by exploiting a known insecurity within that person. The intention is not to belittle the homosexual community, but it is absolutely a consequence, as…

Listen, I am fully convinced you were a good kid that didn’t use bad words to hurt people. I mean that. What you’re saying is likely true. I was a dumb fucking 16 year old that didn’t look adults in the eye and refused to get a part time job because I wanted to watch baseball and porn all day and sometimes I said a…

My experience is that most of those people did know it was hurtful, and that’s exactly why they used it. Out of childish malice, not ignorance.

I actually think “gay” and “fag” were terms used when I was younger and seriously had no idea of what it meant. I think it kind of gets burned in your brain where you use it almost automatically. There are people I know who literally cant go more than two words without swearing, and I feel its the same thing. They…

Ah yes, morally superior Ka Mal.

Jesus, can I link to this comment for the next time someone asks what virtue signaling means and why people don’t like it?

I play baseball and I’ve heard it a few times and we have tried to make the guy who said it calm down. Maybe you live in a magical world where no one insults each other.

Your experience was not universal. I’ve lived all over the country and played a lot of rec sports in different leagues. Some places I heard gay slurs a little, some a lot, some maybe not at all. Overall it is still pretty common and was pervasive as recently as 10 years ago.

And that’s awesome. Good for you for never having been taught the word when you were too young to consider its impact on others.

I used the word interchangeably with ‘fuckhead’ until after high school. Then I realized that wasn’t a word anyone should use. My experience is that there were a ton of people growing up that…

It is literally the most powerful insult you can use on a white male in the age range of 30-50. That’s a fact. It’s not meant to insult the gay community, but there is nothing we hate more than anyone insinuating we might possibly be homosexual.
That being said, yeah, we really need to work on that, and I am hopeful…

2 points:

I’m with you and in that age range- I recently caught myself saying this exact word under my breath, to myself after doing something dumb. I actually stopped and thought about why the hell that specific word came out. Years of using it as an insult to my peers as an adolescent, was my conclusion. At my junior high…