Sunday 28 August 2016

Information On The R Word Pledge

By Lisa Brooks


The R pledge is basically an ongoing campaign that seeks to raise the awareness and consciousness of people in the society about the hurtful and very dehumanizing impacts of using the R letter retarded. It also aims at encouraging citizens of United States to shun using the word retard or any of its forms. The R word pledge is also primarily intended to engage different school organizations as well as communities to pledge their divine support in aiding to build a community of inclusivity and acceptance for everybody.

This advocacy forum hence is dedicated to ensuring that all and sundry respect all the members of community, their intellectual, personal or developmental problems notwithstanding. The advocates behind this movement also hold very strong opinions that mentally impaired persons should not be sidelined or overlooked under whatever circumstances, since it is not by their fault that they are the way they are, but is a natural force or fate.

This campaign under discussion is basically a youth-driven advocacy movement, and it is supported by two organizations namely Special Olympics and also Best Buddies International. These are the key organizations that have played a big role in the movement, since its inception. The movement was created by the youth having intellectual disabilities, as well as those without, and participated in Special Olympics Global Youths Active Summit. This was at the Special Olympic Winter Games that were held in 2009.

The movement sought to make this world a more acceptable and warm place for all members of the society, regardless of the intellectual capacities. The campaigns are held every first Wednesday of March, and the anniversary is celebrated on 31st of March every year. People from all parts of the globe are usually recommended to be very vocal and active in educating others against using dehumanizing terms and sentiments that may adversely affect certain individuals in society.

This campaign is exponentially important, and has made great impacts since it was incepted in 2009. Respectful language that is inclusive of all persons is very essential to this movement, especially for dignity as well as humanity of persons having intellectual disabilities. Nevertheless, some people in the society do not fully recognize the demeaning, dehumanizing, and hurtful effects the word retard poses to intellectually disable people. It is now time to give some credence and attention to the minority, and revamp the consciousness of societal members to the hurting effects of using retard.

To clear on this, the pledge has time and again made it clear that it only intends to discourage as many people as possible from including the offensive terms such as retards in their speeches, whether formal or informal. This is because such terms demean them hence making them feel inferior and unwanted. It is very wrong to ridicule people because of their various conditions, not matter what.

The merchandise that is used in this movement for instance t shirts, bracelets, baseball caps and many others can also be purchased from this official R-word store. Residents are advised to buy these materials as much as possible, to help in spreading the word against retard term.

Regardless of the fact that we all have our rights and freedoms of free speech, we also are entitled to petition choice of the language we use very carefully, so that we do not end up demeaning certain characters in the society in our utterances or even actions. Every person is very special in their own way, and therefore a person ought to come first at all times irrespective of their abnormalities and other conditions.




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