As this is being written, one of the main issues at the forefront of the cultural consciousness is ableism and the use of an ableist slur, spaz. (For the rest of this piece, I will refer to the word as the “S-word”, but for the sake of clarity, I felt it was important to write once.) These conversations came to light when both Lizzo and Beyoncé used the word in their respective songs. Both artists have since removed the lyric and have issued formal apologies. The reason many found this to be jarring is that both Lizzo and Beyoncé are considered advocates for many social movements and are thought to be very up-to-date on harmful language for different marginalized groups. So why did they think it was okay to use and what’s the problem with the S-word? I think the answers to those questions lie in the history of the S-word and how it became a slur, how it plays into a larger culture, and how it impacts the way we think and act.
It is important to note that while each of us has a responsibility to learn about stigmatizing language and the effects our speech has, Lizzo and Beyoncé are not the issue. Not only did Lizzo and Beyoncé remove the lyric and issue apologies, but they are just an example of a larger societal issue— how we treat disabled people. (After much research, to my knowledge, I am honoring the most updated consensus on respectful language which is to use the term “disable” and not use people-first language.)
Understanding Albeism
So, what is ableism? There are many definitions available online, but the best one I have found was on accessliving.org: “Ableism is the discrimination of and social prejudice against people with disabilities based on the belief that typical abilities are superior.” Here, the term disability may be a bit of an umbrella term as it includes people with physical, cognitive, developmental, and/or other disabilities, as well as chronic physical and or mental illness. Like with all forms of discrimination, there is much discussion about whether or not the best practice is to categorize different experiences together— for example, discrimination against someone who uses a wheelchair and someone who has a chronic mental illness will look different. However, I would like to argue that both types of discrimination, as well as all of the aforementioned, share the same fundamental reasoning: your worth is equivalent to what you can accomplish.
A History of The S-Word
Before we can fully delve into the S-word and why the way we talk about things matters, we need to establish some linguistic background and theory.
Words’ meanings change, and they change for many reasons and in many ways. One way this happens is that the words’ connotations can change, for better or for worse. When words change for the better it’s called amelioration and when they change for the worse it’s called pejoration. An example of these conceptions is the words “buddy” and “sissy.” While the words used to be diminutives for brother and sister, respectively, “buddy” has ameliorated to become a term of endearment, while “sissy” pejorated to an insult. I like this example because it shows how the meaning of the words has really changed. If you tried to use “buddy” to mean brother instead of friend, nobody would understand you. I also like this example because it reflects another concept— the semantic shifts in words often reflect cultural attitudes and realities. An unfortunate reality is that the world at large thinks very highly of men and masculinity and thinks very lowly of women and femineity.[1] Notice the one-way relationship between the words’ meaning and the cultural norms. Broadly speaking, it is the way we think that influences the way we speak and not the other way around. There are many notable exceptions to that rule, but the most notable are slurs and stigmatizing language; not only do they reflect the way we think, but they also change it.[2]
Let’s talk about the S-word’s history.[3] It started off as a clinical-diagnostic term, spasticity, meaning a medical condition featuring altered skeletal muscle performance. It quickly became a specialized term describing features of cerebral palsy. And then the S-word came into existence as the pejorated form. The word became a derogatory term for physically and cognitively disabled people. The word then shifted meanings yet again. It also became the general opposite of “cool” while specifically referring to clumsiness, inaptitude, otherness, overexcitability, and awkwardness. Today, in the UK, the S-word is considered to be the most offensive term for disabled people and is still used as a slur for disabled in many Anglophone countries, including the US.
So What’s The Harm?
The harm of this term, even with its most current meaning, is that it sends a clear message of who is deemed acceptable and who is not. The use of the word tells us that those who can do are better, and those who can’t are not only worse comparatively, but inherently bad. It’s not just you want to be abled, but you actively don’t want to be disabled. This is evident from the fact that the word’s meaning hasn’t shifted much; it went from directly insulting disabled people to also insulting their behaviors and mannerisms. The S-word says not only is it bad to be disabled, but it’s also bad to be like a disabled person.
This line of thinking is reinforced by so many systems that are the basis of our society today. The biggest culprit is a society that has equated human worth and value to labor output and performance. Fixing that will require major reform on many systemic levels, and the work to do so needs to start. However, on the individual and cultural level, there is also much work to be done.
In our culture today, we act and think of our health and ability as products of our choices and therefore representative of our character. To put simply, as a society, we believe that anyone who is “healthy” is that because they “put in the hard work” and anyone who isn’t was “just too lazy” to be healthy. There are so many fallacies with this line of thought, the largest being that health is a choice when in reality it rarely is. In addition to the falsehood of that thinking, it breeds a self-fulling belief of justified prejudice and discrimination. When we view disabled and chronically ill people as morally less-than because we believe they “chose to be that way”, then we convince ourselves that we don’t need to create a society that is inclusive to them; when we don’t create a society that is inclusive, then traits of disabled and chronically ill people are viewed as weird or bad, and thus adding more reason we feel the need to change our society. The two thoughts play into each other, adding more fuel to each, and come to a meeting point at how we think of and act toward disabled people. When we use the S-word, we are saying both that being disabled is a) weird and b) wrong. Using the S-word reinforces our societal norms to outcast disabled people while also stripping away the sympathy we would need to have in order to change those norms. Using the S-word keeps us in the same socio-cultural echo chamber that has hurt so many people with disabilities and/or chronic illnesses.
Takeaway Message
There are two lessons that I would like to highlight. Firstly, as much as we might feel like we have destigmatized disability and chronic illness, there is still so much work to be done, individually and societally. We need to have policy reform. We also need a cultural reform and remove the moral stigmas behind health and ability.
Secondly, the way we speak makes an impact on the way we think and act. It’s not just that slurs cause harm to people’s emotional wellbeing; it is that by equating an attribute of a person that is external to their being to something that is lowly, we start to think of that person as lowly. In the context of the S-word— when having an illness or disability is equated with “uncool” and “unlikable”, then we start to think people who have them are not worthy of our respect, care, and consideration. It’s time we start building and continue to build a world that is safe for all and considerate of the specific needs of people with illness and/or disabilities. So, let’s start with a very easy first step— stopping to use the S-word.
[1] See Muriel Shultz, The Semantic Derogation of Women, (1975).
[2] See John McWhorter’s Nine Nasty Words, (2021); and Amanda Montell’s, Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language, (2019).
[3] Much of this paragraph is taken from the Wikipedia entry, Spastic (word), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spastic_(word).
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