To whom the word “retarded” may concern,
I was reviewing some of the material and realized that there were some comments that stand out to me for negative reasons. I, and I’m sure all readers, appreciate your unoriginal presentation of political correctness. Speaking as a mentally ill person—excuse me—a PERSON who suffers from a mental illness (I forgot for a moment that word order is important so as not to offend), I find it hard to applaud your sentiments. The way that you and other writers speak in such heightened, or rather, condescending tones, is just rude. It is similar to any of the masses stepping forward to make what they think is a poignant remark and, as is the case here, failing. Let me see if I can explain…

By using such words as “crazy” or “retarded,” this blog’s author is hardly insulting anyone but the person about whom the blog was written. Imagine if I had a friend who was studying counseling, and I said to her “You’re an unappreciative person who can’t take a well-written blog for what it is.” We could generalize and say that such a statement applies to all counseling students. However, we don’t; we know that it just applies to yo—… my student friend. In calling Mr. West “retarded”, the author is in no way attacking those suffering from mental illnesses. He is using a slang term and applying it to one person. A SINGLE PERSON. The very act of your saying “Using the word ‘retarded’ to describe Mr. West is offensive to a specific group of people,” is the same as you calling them such a thing. If it doesn’t apply do them, why should it offend them? If they are not retarded, they shouldn’t be offended or, as you say, hurt by someone unrelated being called such a thing.

Let me use an example that may help illustrate my point: I am not a bad driver; I am, in fact, a very good driver. Now, if someone calls another person a bad driver, should *I* be offended? The term doesn’t apply to me; they are using it to attack another person. If I *was* a bad driver, then the term would apply to me, and I might be a little hurt. Now, you are telling me that these people about whom you are concerned are not “retarded.” Explain to me, then, why they are being hurt? It doesn’t apply to them, but I’m not sure you agree on that. If you are saying they should be hurt, you’ve called them just as “retarded” as the author of this blog has. Thank you for prolonging the streotyping and stigmatizing just as this blogger has apparently done. Think about that, and maybe you should apologize to the people you have hurt by calling them “retarded.”

Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Paul H.
Counseled Student

You are a fucking idiot. As a white, relatively young person into many, MANY forms of music, I can say with all honesty that you have no fucking clue what you’re talking about. Kanye doesn’t RAP, he makes retarded pop music for the retarded pop culture. Want some real rap (hip-hop)? Try Immortal Technique, try Aesop Rock, try Tech N9ne, try Del Tha Funky Homosapien (or any of his awesome side projects)…hell look up any ARTISTS similar to these…they ALL trump his no-talent retarded ass endlessly.

And this recommendation, by the way - is coming from a devout Metal Head and musician whose favorite bands include Decapitated, Lamb of God, and many others you’ll probably never hear of (or have the balls and mental capacity required to enjoy). Take your worthless, half-brained comments and shove them up your stupid ass.