Ann Coulter crosses line with parents of special needs students with her “retard” tweet during presidential debate
Bad girl pundit Ann Coulter has turned offensive and cutting remarks into her signature brand and, based on how often I see her on TV, it seems to be paying off for her.
But one of her tweets this week set off a group of parents who already have it hard enough in my book: Parents of children with special needs who must navigate a dizzying array of state and federal mazes to get their children vital services. And never mind their battle to get their children respect.
In response to the presidential debate Monday between President Obama and Gov. Romney, Coulter tweeted: “I highly approve of Romney’s decision to be kind and gentle to the retard.”
The outrage was immediate. Much of the response to Coulter cannot be printed here, but one person writes: “Again, making fun of people w mental disabilities=not funny. BTW, I am both practicing Catholic AND conservative.”
I have read dozens of commentaries from parents of children with special needs about how hurtful comments like “retard” are to them and their children. Despite condemnation in the past for her use of “retard,” Coulter apparently has great affection for the word as she has used it before to describe people she doesn’t like.
The most eloquent response to her this time came from a young man with Downs Syndrome:
Special Olympics athlete John Franklin Stephen wrote: (This is an excerpt. Please read full piece.)
I’m a 30 year old man with Down syndrome who has struggled with the public’s perception that an intellectual disability means that I am dumb and shallow. I am not either of those things, but I do process information more slowly than the rest of you. In fact it has taken me all day to figure out how to respond to your use of the R-word last night.
I thought first of asking whether you meant to describe the President as someone who was bullied as a child by people like you, but rose above it to find a way to succeed in life as many of my fellow Special Olympians have.
Then I wondered if you meant to describe him as someone who has to struggle to be thoughtful about everything he says, as everyone else races from one snarky sound bite to the next.
Finally, I wondered if you meant to degrade him as someone who is likely to receive bad health care, live in low grade housing with very little income and still manages to see life as a wonderful gift.
Because, Ms. Coulter, that is who we are – and much, much more.
After I saw your tweet, I realized you just wanted to belittle the President by linking him to people like me. You assumed that people would understand and accept that being linked to someone like me is an insult and you assumed you could get away with it and still appear on TV.
I have to wonder if you considered other hateful words but recoiled from the backlash.
Well, Ms. Coulter, you, and society, need to learn that being compared to people like me should be considered a badge of honor.
No one overcomes more than we do and still loves life so much.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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234 comments Add your comment
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
12:51 pm
“So, where was Maureen’s outrage when the leftwing pundits, including AJC hacks Bookman, Tucker, and Luckovich, were calling Bush a “dim-wit”?”
EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
S.
October 24th, 2012
12:52 pm
Ann isn’t a ‘bad girl’. She’s a joke.
Rockerbabe
October 24th, 2012
12:54 pm
Ann Coulter is an insensitive, loud-mouth bigot with a chip on her shoulder. I have read a goodly number of her pieces over the years and have stopped as she is getting meanier by the minute. I say, ignore her; do not heed her tweets, respond to her op-ed pieces or buy her books and write the Sunday news shows and protest her inclusion in the discussion panels. Then write the sponsors of these shows and demand they not support her. . .money talks and when she no longer garners good money or new customers for these businesses, she will either go away or moderate her views and opinions. She is not a contributor to the civility of our discourse. . .put her in the trash where she belongs.
Maureen Downey
October 24th, 2012
12:59 pm
@Lee, Literally running out the door, but could not let this remark go without fact checking in the paper’s computerized archives. Plugged in Jay’s name and dimwit, in every variation of spelling, back to the day he started at the AJC; He never used the term. A reader writing to him used the term “dimwitted,” but it was about a state policy, not President Bush.
Can’t fact check Mike as he does not write. He draws cartoons, which lampoon everybody all the time.
Did same search for Cynthia. She used term once, for an Alabama state rep. And, btw, the guy was a Democrat
Maureen
trailerparkted
October 24th, 2012
1:00 pm
@Phil, this would be a non-story had Coulter used the word “Stupid or even Dim-Wit” but she decided to use “RETARD”!
EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:00 pm
FYI “Retard” is short form noun associated with “retardation.” The term is now obsolete, out of vogue, because there is now a more specialized approach to these disorders, using specific terms. Even today, “autism” is an umbrella terms for a whole bunch of stuff. Saying someone has “autism” does imply knowing what is going on or what is best to do. I recently got school when I was visiting a neighbor’s home that has a severely autistic child. I thought I knew what to expect, but this was way out of my league. I left with two impressions, “There are some people in this world who are saints” and that “it is tragic that we do not have the knowledge to just go into this child’s head and flip a switch and make it right.” People with muscular dystrophy and such are peaceful. Whole different deal with severe autism. Mega-agitated and must have an adult there every minute.
C
October 24th, 2012
1:00 pm
Tell Sarah Palin to call Culter, she knows what to say to her, or may be herself.
EricSF
October 24th, 2012
1:00 pm
@Centrist I am a registered independent and have voted for men and women of both parties. From Ms Coulte’s remarks to your posts I must say – I’m seldom surprised, through I’m always disappointed that those who benefit from or are unaffected by discrimination don’t see the problem.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:02 pm
ted that’s Coulter’s game. deliver the zinger, collect the check.
Useful Idiots
October 24th, 2012
1:03 pm
Typical. Yawn.
Liberals are “outraged’at behavior that they do themselves. Constantly.
@Maureen where was your “outrage’ and call for dignity when Laura Ingraham was called a ‘Right-Wing Slut’ by Ed Schultz? Or, Mia Love’s many racial slurs and attackes – which have been hurled onto her via all facets of social media by self-righteous Liberals? Or, the death-threats against Marco Rubio, Mitt Romney constantly receives death threats (if he’s elected…) and Sarah Palin’s daughter was called the ‘C-Word’ by Bill Maher – who donated $1m to Obama’s campaign. The “C-U-Next Tuesday” word is a hateful and derrogatory word towards women, right? Oh…but…”that behavior is OKAY…because we HATE Republicans…”. Right, Maureen?
While you’re acting as Official Language Police…you may want to have a chat with Jay-Z about some of his questionable Lyrics –such as calling women ‘Ho’s” and referring to African-Americans with the “N* word”. This tends to nott bode well when the President you’re endorsing is claiming there’s a War on Women and the other party is full of racists.
Nor does message that only Romney is “rich” when Obama attended the lavish $40k per plate fundraiser that Jay-z and Beyonce threw for him at his 40/40 Club where the tower of champagne had to be ‘hidden’ from camera view.
Maureen – why don’t you try writing an article about the hypocracy of Liberals of crying “fire” when they are actually the ones holding the matches and the gasoline and then pretending to be shocked when there’s an explosion.
Perhaps that article may actually be worth reading.
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:06 pm
” I have a special needs child and Coulter is nothing more than a pundit that caters to the ignorant segment of the Republican Party!”
So you have “outrage” over what Obama said?
The Ghost of Edward R. Murrow
October 24th, 2012
1:09 pm
Hmmm…well, since this is obviously a topic you care about….. how about using your column to explore the tendency of Special Ed officials in School Districts to be very aggressive, VERY aggressive, about labeling students….because the more students labeled….the more money for their own school districts….the fight that parents fight is not always for resources for their children, but trying to keep their children from being quickly labeled by well-meaning but over zealous bureaucrats.
Joetta Colville
October 24th, 2012
1:10 pm
I am the mother of a special needs, mentally challenged child, and I believe Ann has a right to say what she feels. She was in no way criticizing my son or yours. She was talking about the President so don’t take it so personally people.
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:10 pm
Hey Maureen, where’s your “outrage” over the tweets calling for Romney’s death?
Progressive Humanist
October 24th, 2012
1:10 pm
That’s Centrist’s whole schtick- label himself “Centrist” even though he’s nowhere close to being centrist, position himself with the far right, and then complain nonstop that everyone else is biased to the left. He’s just doing for himself what Fox did for “news”. He’s purely objective, don’t you see?
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:12 pm
Progressive Humanist
Your comment makes absolutely NO sense.
Beth
October 24th, 2012
1:13 pm
@skipper, you are completely missing the point. The fact is, she used this word as an INSULT. She did it to be petty and cruel. We’re not talking abotu something obscure here, we’re talking about a word that was deliberately used as a means of degrading another person. It really doesn’t matter that the word has been around a long time. That does NOT make it okay to insult people with that same word.
We should NOT be expected to ‘lighten up’ when people make comments like that.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:14 pm
GW Bush is not a dim-wit, he’s a zombie. His dad was the head of the CIA. The reason GW Bush is so charming is that he was suffering all of the time. His daughters are definitely not suffering, they’re running wild and free like good girls in Texas. The chain has been broken.
PS Texas has a pretty strong history of zombie pop-culture, if you care to look into it. I’d start with the movie “Slacker” – last of the last before the town was corporatised. Oh look, someone put the whole movie online. What fun. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB4xlYKAVCQ
AlreadySheared
October 24th, 2012
1:14 pm
Aaawwwwp! Losing strength…. going down.. sinking – NO! Maybe if I grab that piece of straw floating over there and hold onto it, I won’t drown…
Beth
October 24th, 2012
1:15 pm
@Joetta Colville, she has a right to her opinion, but that doesn’t make her free from being called out on bad behavior. The word, in the context she was using was insulting.
chillywilly
October 24th, 2012
1:15 pm
Ann Coulter crosses the line by referring to the President of The United States a retard. This silly woman is out of control and needs to be silenced.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:16 pm
Phil Watch the movie.
BehindEnemyLines
October 24th, 2012
1:18 pm
Yawn. Unfortunate that she chose to provide fodder for the politically correct to whine about though.
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:22 pm
“Ann Coulter crosses the line by referring to the President of The United States a retard. This silly woman is out of control and needs to be silenced.”
Obama called himself a special needs kid. Why is it that left wingers always want people silenced?
Beth
October 24th, 2012
1:24 pm
@Useful Idiots, name-calling of this caliber from ANYONE is rude and uncalled for. There is NOTHING acceptable about it EVER. Calling a woman a ’slut’ does NOT make it okay to call another person a retard. Making excuses for it only shows your lack of willingness to accept responsibility and an unwillingness to take the time to actually THINK about the matter and consider that maybe there were other words Ann could have used that she feels describe the president WITHOUT insulting a significant number of the population.
This isn’t so much a political issue as it’s a civility and basic awareness issue. The awareness that the word ‘retard’ is used as an insult regularly and applies to countless people in this nation.
Fighting fire with fire and everyone gets burned. Is that REALLY the kind of language that we want to encourage?
Hippies STILL Smell
October 24th, 2012
1:25 pm
All the petty, shrill, spittle-flecked Leftist insults in the blogosphere doesn’t change the FACTS: Coulter is being satirical. Coulter illustrates absurdity by being absurd. Conversely, Obama mocked “Special Olympics” kids on Jay Leno. Obama’s Chief of Staff spat “F’n retarded!” at White House employees. But you keep pretending Ann Coulter sets today’s divisive tone. “Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel!”
AlreadySheared
October 24th, 2012
1:27 pm
@chillywilly,
“Chimpy McHitler” is one of the many epithets hurled at President Bush by those opposed to republicans, err I meant ‘rethuglicons’. Acceptable?
Note to all – Centrist et.al. are spot on. This has NOTHING to do with schools or education. Ms. Downey, upon further reflection, might apologize for offering this topic up for discussion on this particular blog.
Cindy Lutenbacher
October 24th, 2012
1:32 pm
Phil, I think you may have missed some things along the way. A lot of us did call President Obama on the carpet for his bowling comment. He apologized.
Most of the rest of the things you and others wish Maureen would post have very little to do with education. Special needs kids have been the scapegoat for so many respondents on this blog that I think Maureen was right to bring this issue to our attention.
And for those who didn’t read John Franklin Stephens’ writings, he does speak to the fact that he and his father talk out issues, his father writes down what he hears, John reads it over, and they go forward from there.
Grasshopper
October 24th, 2012
1:34 pm
“This silly woman is out of control and needs to be silenced.”
There’s your left-wing these days; either agree or be silenced.
Overtaxed
October 24th, 2012
1:36 pm
I have a beautiful niece who has D.S. but I choose who and what offends me. Social media caters to the passive aggressive types who would never say something to your face. Come on people – the best press is negative press. Coulter’s no different than Snookie and Fox News is no different than TMZ. Grain of salt in the self-inflicted wounds of propaganda.
Deborah
October 24th, 2012
1:36 pm
First let me state that I hate Ann Coulter. But this furor over the word “retard” is just getting to me now. I am somewhat in agreement with the special needs community, but they need to stop freaking out about people using the word. By that I mean that most people literally don’t recognize the meaning of what they are saying when they blirt it out. The word “retard” has become synonymous with words like “idiot”. And quite frankly, idiot used to mean the same thing but now it really doesn’t.
The connotative meaning of words in the English lexicon is constantly changing. When the average American is calling someone with average mental abilities a “retard”, they may not be intending in any way to reference special needs people, or they may not even realize that they are referencing special needs people. Many people are just saying the word for extra impact and others may not even realize their hidden prejudices.
So I think instead of attacking people that use this word, it would be better to educate people about the word itself. Attacking people just makes them want to fight back and dig their heels in.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:37 pm
AlreadySheared I think it’s a good break from the formal topics / realpolitik. Plus. that’s what Coulter does now, entertainment with a twist.
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:37 pm
“Most of the rest of the things you and others wish Maureen would post have very little to do with education.”
This ENTIRE piece has nothing to do with education.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:37 pm
pardon. I’ve got the html all messed up.
Private Citizen
October 24th, 2012
1:39 pm
Phil watch the movie
Phil from Athens
October 24th, 2012
1:39 pm
“Phil watch the movie”
Why?
Progressive Humanist
October 24th, 2012
1:45 pm
Private Citizen- Please don’t feed the apes (Sheared, Phil, et al). Oh, I’m sorry, that was probably offensive to the lower primates.
Former Reagan Republican
October 24th, 2012
1:48 pm
I’m the father of a special needs child,but I’m also tired of living in this ultra-sensative world. I respect Ann’s right to be an idiot.
blaquemano
October 24th, 2012
1:53 pm
poor choice of words, she shoud have said “arrogant, peevish man-child” instead
Decatur Greg
October 24th, 2012
1:55 pm
Not going to get dragged down into the political fights on here. I just want to say kudos to Mr. Stephen. He was far more eloquent in his response than Ms. Coulter has been in her entire life. Keep up the good work and your continued effort for greater understanding from others James!!
susan pegsmen
October 24th, 2012
1:56 pm
she had a poor choice of words, “arrogant’ peevish man-child” is more accurate for the Obummer
DawgNole
October 24th, 2012
2:01 pm
bootney farnsworth
October 24th, 2012
12:28 pm
in a slightly different direction….
one of my closest friends has a profoundly retarded (noun, not verb or adjective) child. she has no issue with the noun, since it is accurate. it’s only when used as an adjective she gets pissed.
___________________
You used the word as an adjective here–not as a noun or verb–so is your close friend now pissed at you?
Tyler Durden
October 24th, 2012
2:05 pm
Ann Coulter is about as relevant as Sarah Palin, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and soon to be Mitt Romney. Although I agree what she said is offensive, it only proves what everyone (as I see not one single person disagrees) knows….she is pond scum with no true belief system, just a hate based schtick to keep raking in money.
woodrow
October 24th, 2012
2:07 pm
Coulter has never said an intelligent thing in her life. I don’t understand why people keep handing her a microphone.
Simply More....
October 24th, 2012
2:11 pm
Evidence that the GOP = Hate, Fear & Intolerance.
Matt
October 24th, 2012
2:14 pm
While not approving of the use of “retard” by Coulter, I think it’s rich to watch columnists like Maureen Downey get outraged about the comment while their silence was deafening in 2009, when Obama remarked on “The Tonight Show” that a low bowling score of his”was like the Special Olympics or something.” . The White House (rightfully) apologized later on for the comment, but nary a fraction of the outrage was heard from the media for what was effectively the same kind of insult.
Once again, left-wing media bias is in full force.
markie mark
October 24th, 2012
2:18 pm
“No wonder our culture has become so uncivil and crude.”
With all due respect, Ms Downey, it was the liberal left in the 60’s that started that ball rolling….this is a case of you reap what you sow. And the left sowed all the seeds of the lack of character, respect, anything you want to call it, that we deal with today.
Entitlement Society
October 24th, 2012
2:18 pm
What does this have to do with education? I thought this was an education blog.
Devil's Advocate
October 24th, 2012
2:21 pm
Just remember that name calling is immature when someone does it against your agenda. However, when someone pushing your agenda resorts to name calling then those who are offended are simply liberal commies trying to take away more of your rights.
Raisin Toast Fanatic
October 24th, 2012
2:21 pm
Not really a big deal. Methinks the people here doth protest too much.