It's official, New York's Kathy Hochul will not be considered "retarded" according to the state any longer.
"New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed into law Tuesday legislation removing 'mentally retarded' as an official term from state laws overseeing everything from alleged crimes to the arts.
'Numerous sections of New York State law [describe] people with disabilities as being mentally retarded. We’ve evolved from that. That is a stigma that we can move away from', Hochul said at a Midtown press conference. State laws covering topics like crime, social services, education, the arts and family law are to use 'developmentally disabled' and similar terminology instead of 'mentally retarded' or 'mental retardation', according to two bills sponsored by state Sen. Roxanne Persaud (D-Brooklyn) and Assemblyman Thomas Abinanti (D-Westchester).
Supporters say replacing the outdated terminology provides a big boost for developmentally disabled people alongside three other bills signed into law by Hochul on Wednesday, which collectively aim to help people live more fruitful lives.
Some disabled people who need some assistance could qualify for 'supported decision-making' as an alternative legal status to being under the official guardianship of another person, according to a legislative memo explaining a third new law.
'We all make better decisions after we make some crummy ones, right? This is part of the human experience and the supported decision making bill is really a groundbreaking bill', Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon (D-Brooklyn) said of the bill she sponsored with Senate Disabilities Committee Chair John Mannion (D-Syracuse).
The bill signing comes on the 32nd anniversary of President George H. W. Bush signing into law the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990." -Zach Williams, New York Post
For those of us who enjoy reading the Unabomber Manifesto, this legislative measure taken by Hochul to remove "outdated" terminology was all too predictable.
Back in 1995, Mr. Kaczynski detailed precisely how seemingly inoffensive terms used to classify particular groups of people are inevitably considered derogatory in the "liberal-minded" vernacular.
"When someone interprets as derogatory almost anything that is said about him (or about groups with whom he identifies) we conclude that he has inferiority feelings or low self-esteem. This tendency is pronounced among minority rights activists, whether or not they belong to the minority groups whose rights they defend. They are hypersensitive about the words used to designate minorities and about anything that is said concerning minorities.
The terms 'negro', 'oriental', 'handicapped' or 'chick' for an African, an Asian, a disabled person or a woman originally had no derogatory connotation. 'Broad' and 'chick' were merely the feminine equivalents of 'guy', 'dude' or 'fellow'. The negative connotations have been attached to these terms by the activists themselves. Some animal rights activists have gone so far as to reject the word 'pet' and insist on its replacement by 'animal companion'.
Those who are most sensitive about 'politically incorrect' terminology are not the average black ghetto-dweller, Asian immigrant, abused woman or disabled person, but a minority of activists, many of whom do not even belong to any 'oppressed' group but come from privileged strata of society". -Theodore Kaczynski, Industrial Society and Its Future
Just as the word "retarded" was used to replace the disparaging term "mongoloid" in describing a person with Down's syndrome, the time has now come for it to be replaced with terms that are more reconcilable with the sentiments of the modern-day progressive such as "disabled" or "mentally challenged".
How essentially referring to someone as cognitively unable and incapable has less of a negative connotation to it than effectively calling someone "slow" or "delayed" is beyond my understanding.
It's interesting considering Hochul's pro-choice record that she would profess to care deeply about how the law describes people with Down's syndrome given that she conflictingly champions the right of a woman to induce abortion for an unborn child who has been diagnosed through prenatal screenings.
"Incidence rates derived from prospective studies of 120,000 newborns were applied to live births and induced abortions to estimate the trend of Down's syndrome in New York State after liberalization of the abortion law in 1970. The estimated number of newborns with Down's syndrome in the state declined 20% from 1971 to 1975. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)" -Holger Hansen, American Journal of Mental Deficiency
Thanks to the tireless advocacy of representatives like Governor Hochul, it won't be long before the phrase "developmentally disabled" becomes seen as anachronistic and is substituted with a more neoteric descriptor for the Down's syndrome populace. Namely, "extinct".