Seriously? Seriously!?

If you're going to call something or someone retarded, please don't spell it "retarted" because it makes me think that you, are in fact retarded.

I generally try to avoid the use of the term "retard" as an insult.  My mom worked with physically and mentally handicapped  kids when I was growing up and throwing that word around our house as an insult was unacceptable.  Also unacceptable was the use of God's name in vain (apparently 'gosh' is a much more acceptable term for us unswervingly secular folk) or describing your mood as 'pissed.'  (It sounds trashy.)  Shit on the other hand was overall an acceptable expression of frustration.  Regardless, the use of any of these terms never bit me on the ass like the use of 'retarded' did.  You see, this one time in graduate school I got a little punchy and cavalierly threw it out at a classmate.  Turns out this classmates younger sister has Downs Syndrome and needless to say, he wasn't very amused.  That might go down in my biggest foot-in-mouth, moment of all time and if it's not at the top, it's in the Top 10.  Thinking of it in those terms, it's definitely worse than asking a non-pregnant lady when her baby is due and so as of this moment, elevator lady receives a formal pardon for her transgression.

'Retarded' as an insult has been seeing a bit of a comeback lately, a comeback that I attribute almost solely to The Hangover.  REtard is making a comeback and I have to admit that with the inflection on the first syllable, it kinda becomes amusing all over again.  Nonetheless, this is an tweeny bopper, middle school era insult that should seriously just die.  Even the Black Eyed Peas took it out of their song because it just sounds...well, mean and wrong.

All this being said, if you're going to throw down the R word and THEN SPELL IT INCORRECTLY...well that might just mean that YOU are a bit delayed and slow in the brain power area.