You are. It’s a slur. It is not an accepted term in the medical community.
Edit here’s an actual definition from https://www.merriam-webster.com:
dated, now offensive : affected by intellectual disability : INTELLECTUALLY DISABLED NOTE: The term <r> is increasingly considered offensive. The use of intellectually disabled is now preferred over <r> in medical, educational, and regulatory contexts, as well as in general use.
Further, you use it as an insult specifically in that you suggest someone of a certain political preference is intellectually disabled.
Essentially you are combining someone’s medical situation they did not pick or cause, with someone else’s political interests. That’s fucked up.
Edit this is like if you used the n word then finished a comment saying “I’m not insulting anyone. I’m using it my own way”. You don’t get to do that, that’s not how slurs work.
Damn, I knew the original term was offensive now and had wondered what they replaced it with, intellectually disabled sounds kinda offensive too xD
Like, it’s not just saying this person has a cognitive disability, but that they’re lower on a class level as well.
I know that’s not the intent and it’s miles better than the old offensive term, but something like “cognitively disabled” sounds much less offensive than “intellectually disabled”. Wish they went with something like that.
I think it’s probably because the term intellectual is used in society to describe a class of people (e.g. “Why yes, I’m an intellectual, I read Yeats while you people read the daily rag”) who tend to think of themselves as better or smarter than others…
So, calling someone “intellectually disabled” sounds like it’s an insult someone from that class would use on someone they wanted to look down on, you know?
I’m glad they moved away from other misused medical terms, but yeah, pity they settled on a term that sounds like it’s throwing shade ><
