EPT
At first I thought you would call someone retarded, or call something retarded, when it's horribly stupid to the point that you have every right to be insulting it repeatedly. Then I started to notice that it gets thrown around much more easily than that. It gets to the point where you misspell a word and people are like "WHAT ARE YOU RETARDED? IT'S THERE NOT THEIR" when you just typed something into IRC real quick and didn't take the time to mentally grammar check it.
So what does retarded mean? I figured dictionary.com would be sufficient for looking up the denotation and I'd rely on urbandictionary.com to clue me in on the connotation.
According to dictionary.com:
–adjective
1.
characterized by retardation: a retarded child.
–noun
2.
(used with a plural verb) mentally retarded persons collectively (usually prec. by the): new schools for the retarded.
This isn't too helpful unless we are willing to also look up 'retard:'
–verb (used with object)
1.
to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede.
–verb (used without object)
2.
to be delayed.
–noun
3.
a slowing down, diminution, or hindrance, as in a machine.
4.
Slang: Disparaging.
a.
a mentally retarded person.
b.
a person who is stupid, obtuse, or ineffective in some way: a hopeless social retard.
5.
Automotive, Machinery. an adjustment made in the setting of the distributor of an internal-combustion engine so that the spark for ignition in each cylinder is generated later in the cycle.
So basically retard means 'delayed', and retarded means a person with a very specific mental disability (related to 'delayed'). This coincides with what I already thought; there is a 'retarded time' in physics which is a delayed time you need to account for in electrodynamics... and I'm sure it comes up in other places as well.
I then turned my attention to urbandictionary.com and went with the most popular definition:
buy retarded mugs, tshirts and magnets
An "unofficial" (not recognized by dictionaries) slang descriptor for a person/thing/action/object, etc., or a combination of, which is one or more of the following:
a waste of time, abandoned, abject, abominable, abortive, absurd, afraid, aimless, anxious, apprehenaive, arid, arrested, assailable, atomic, awful, baby, babyish, backward, bad, banal, barmy, barren, base, baseless, bastard, beastly, beggarly, behind, beside the question, blah, bland, bogus, bomb, bootless, boyish, brainless, bromidic, bummer, caitiffcapricious, careless, catchpenny, characterless, cheap, checked, cheesy, childish, childlike, clichéd, cloying, coarse, colorless, common, commonplace, confusing, contemptible, cotemptible, controvertible, conventional, cool, corn, cornball, corny, corrupt, counterproductive, cowering, cracked, crap, crappy, craven, crazy, crud, cruddy, daffy, daft, dastardly, dazed, dead, deadpan, deficient, degraded, degrading, dejected, delayed, delusive, dense, dense, deplorable, depraved, despicable, destitute, detestable, devoid, diffident, dim, diminutive, dippy, directionless, dirty, disgraceful, dishonest, dishonorable, dismayed, disposable, disreputable, dizzy, dodo, doltish, dopy, dotterel, down, downtrodden, drab, drifting, drudging, dull, dumb, empty, empty-headed, erratic, evanescent, everyday, evildoer, excessive, exhausted, expendable, expressionless, facetious, failed, failing, faint-hearted, fallacious, false, fanciful, fatuous, fawning, featherbrained, feeble, feebleminded, fickle, flaky, flashy, flat, flighty, flimsy, flip, flippant, fool, fool around, foolish, for grins, forlorn, fortuitous, foul, freaked out, freaky, frightened, frivolous, frothy, fruitless, futile, gagged up, garbage, garish, gay, giddy, girlish, glitzy, goalless, good-for-nothing, goofy, green, gross, groundless, groveling, grungy, gullible, gutless, hackneyed, half-baked, half-witted, hang dog, harebrained, heedless, ho hum, hokey, hokum, hollow, hopeless, humble, humbling, humdrum, humiliating, idiotic, idle, ignoble, ignominious, ignorant, ill-advised, ill-considered, illogical, imbecile, immaterial, immature, immobile, immoral, impassive, implausible, impracticable, impractical, improbable, inadequate, inane, inapplicable, inappreciable, incidental, inconceivable, incongruous, inconsequential, inconsiderable, incredible, indelicate, indiscreet, indiscriminate, ineffective, ineffectual, inept, inessential, inexpressive, infamous, infantile, inferior, inglorious, inscrutable, insensate, insignificant, insincere, insipid, insufficient, interminable, inutile, irksome, irrational nonsensical, irrelevant, irresolute, irresponsible, jejune, jittery, joking, joshing, junky, juvenile, kid stuff, kooky, lacking courage, lame, late, laughable, lemon, lifeless, light, light-minded, lily-livered, little, loathsome, loony, loser, lousy, low, low-born, lowly, lowly, low-ranking, ludicrous, mangy, meager, mean, meaningless, measly, mediocre, menial, mentally incompetent, meretricious, microscopic, mindless, minor, minute, indecisive, miscarried, miscreant, miserable, modest, momentary, monkey, monotonous, moronic, moth-eaten, naive, needless, negligible, nervous, niggling, nihil ad rem, no bargain, no dice, no good, no guts, no place, no-account, nonessential, nonsensical, not at issue, not serious, not to the purpose, nothing, nowhere, nugatory, hopeless, nuts, nutty, objectless, obscure, obtuse, odd, off offensive, old hat, old-fashioned, ordinary, otiose, outcast, paltry, panicky, pathetic, pedestrian, peripheral, petty, piddling, pitiable, pitiful, platitudinous, playful, plebeian, pointless, poker-faced, poor, potty, pre-kindergarten, preposterous, primitive, profitless, proletarian, prosaic, puerile, puny, purposeless, pusillanimous, random, rash, ratty, raunchy, recreant, removable, repetitious, result less, retiring, rinky-dink, rotten, rough, routine, rubbishy, run scared, sappy, scandalous, scanty, scared, scatterbrained, screwy, scrubby, scurvy, second-rate, seemly, senseless, sentimental, servile, severe, shabby, shallow, shameful, shiftless, shoddy, shopworn, shrinking, shtick, shy, silly, simple, simple-minded, skin-deep, sleazy, slight, slimy, slow, sluggish, small, small time, soft, sordid, sorry, sorry lot, spineless, sportive, squalid, square, stale, stale, stark, stereotyped, sterile, stiff, stock, stodgy, stolid, stray, stuffy, stupefied, stupid, submissive, subnormal, superficial, superfluous, tame, tatty, tawdry, tedious, terrible, the subject, the willies, thick, thickheaded, thin, thoughtless, threadbare, timid, timorous, tired, tiresome, tiring, tomfool, tongue-in-cheek, transparent, trashy, trifling, tripe, trite, trivial, trumpery, ugly, unassuming, unavailing, unbelievable, uncommunicative, unconvincing, uncouth, underdeveloped, underfoot, underprivileged, undevelopedundirected, undistinguished, unessential, unexciting, unexpressive, unfit, ungrounded, unguided, unimaginative, unimportant, unintelligent, unmanly, unnecessary, unneeded, unoriginal, unpersuasive, unplanned, unpredictable, unpretentious, unproductive, unprofitable, unreal, unreasonable, unrefined, unrelated, unsatisfactory, unsophisticated, noncommital, unsubstantial, unsuccessful, unthinking, unusable, unvaried, unworthy, uselessvacant, vacuous, vagrant, vaguevain, valueless, vanishing, vapid, vile, plebeian, volatile, vulgar, wackywandering, wanton, waste, watery, wayward, weak, wearisome, well-worn, whimsical, white elephant, wide of the mark, wide of the point, wishful, wishy-washy, witless, worthless, wretched, or yucky.
There are literally a thousand different uses for the slang version of "retarded" - (Quick note
Usage-wise, it came before and set the precedence of the way we use "gay" in slang today - used correctly, they're practically interchangable."That test was really gay!"
"Oh yeah, our chemistry teacher is being retarded."
"Mary, stop being retarded! You're so gay, grow up!"
"I thought it was a simple babysitting job, but I was wrong. Besides all the other stuff, I had to clean up after the retard, which was pretty retarded. To top it off, he set the carpet on fire, which I had to put out with the flame-retardent extinguisher. And after all of that, the parents only paid me $15. Babysitting is gay."
This is a ridiculous definition... but at the same time it confirms some suspicions I've had: we call people retarded whenever they do something that is somehow perceived as wrong or culturally unacceptable, even if it was, in actuality, a perfectly reasonable thing to do. It also seems like 'retarded' is a blanket label for people whenever they annoy you or you aren't sure how to actually describe what it is that is wrong about the thing you are insulting. For example, if you hate this blog and then reply with "this blog is just plain retarded micronesia" you are not actually explaining what is wrong with this blog and are accomplishing nothing. Still, I fully expect people to do it. This blog is retarded. There I did it first.
I'm not really a supporter of calling things/people retarded even if you legitimately have good reason to be mad at them for stupid things they've done, but it feels like the word is just thrown around so much at this point it's not even worth saying it anymore. People are too lazy... and not articulate enough to actually insult each other anymore.
