A year ago this month, Congress approved a law eliminating the use of the terms “retarded” and “retardation” from federal documents; specifically, rather than using the terms “mental retardation” and “mentally retarded individual”, “intellectual disability” and “individual with an intellectual disability” must be used within any health, education and labor laws

Although the government has enacted steps in order to remove offense terms for legal legislations, Americans, and even more so teenagers, still misuse words. On any given day you can walk through the halls and hear someone say that their teacher or assignment was “retarded.”

Most students will acknowledge they know the origin of this term came from medical documents or was first used to label individuals with mental disabilities, but they will continue to misuse it.

Abusing of terms doesn’t only include the r-word, but also extends to words such as “gay” and “homo(sexual).” Students use gay in the same manner as the r-word, referring to any item or person they deem to not have interest in. People don’t actually mean their homework has emotional feelings for members of the same sex; they mean they don’t think it is a useful or justified assignment.

Students, and people throughout the world, need to stop using derogatory terms when referring to unrelated things. People with disabilities or those with homosexual lifestyles, relatives of those individuals, or just activates of the aforementioned are offended when they hear those words, as they have come to represent an ugly nature that should not be spread.

When students use these words, often they do not realize they may be taken in an offensive way. Yes, they may correctly acknowledge their origins, but the words continue to be negatively used. If those words were banned from federal documents, it is clear some may realize how hurtful they may be. It may be wise for students to begin to realize this as well, and begin using less offensive words.