JUNEAU — Alaska has moved one step closer to striking “mental retardation” from state laws.
The Alaska Senate on Thursday unanimously passed HB88, which would replace “mentally retarded” and “mental retardation” with terms such as “intellectual and developmental disabilities.”
“Anyone who doesn’t see how demeaning and debilitating the ‘r’ words can be, should listen to the emotional testimony given during these committee hearings,” Sen. Kevin Meyer, R-Anchorage, said in a news release. “This is great first step in creating awareness by using more inclusive and respectful terms that are ‘people first’ in our state laws and other official communications.”
Meyer sponsored a Senate companion bill to go along with HB88, which unanimously passed the House earlier this month.
According to Rep. Charisse Millett, R-Anchorage, who carried the bill, more than 40 states have already adopted similar measures.
The bill now goes to the governor, but his Council on Disabilities and Special Education has already hailed its passage as a success.
The Key Coalition of Alaska, an advocacy group for Alaskans with developmental disabilities, held its 26th annual rally on the steps of the state Capitol when the Senate voted on the bill.
Members of the coalition from locations such as Barrow and the Kenai Peninsula traveled to Juneau to attend the rally and meet with lawmakers about a handful of topics, said Steve Lesko, one of the Coalition’s founders. Those include HB88 and SB36, which would establish an Amber Alert-style system, referred to as a “Silver Alert,” to help find missing vulnerable adults.
SB36 was moved out of its first committee of referral Thursday.
Comments (14)
Add commentStick and stones..
The way people are treated is far more important than the term referring to their condition.
Vocabulary
Without the 'R' word, we'll have to find some new way to refer to some of the decisions our lawmakers come up with...
It is a matter of perception. State references to this
denigrating term will not remove it from the lunchrooms or playgrounds but it will go a long way towards making parents aware that children are being bullied in ways which do not leave physical marks. Every household should remove this ugly word from discussion just as we discourage the f- word.
As a footnote...if the vangaurds of Children Services employees feel they are in eminent physical danger I suggest we not limit security to the building. It should be a gated community, with accompanying home delivery as determined by the threat level.
Snagger: One's action against a certain class of citizenry tends to be empowered by perception.
I wonder how long the terms
I wonder how long the terms "intellectual and developmental disabilities" will last before they become hurtful and necessary to do away with. I give it twenty to thirty years.
J.E.Fume: Very good point.
Can we all just agree to call them 'children'?
Good idea!
Agreed!!
meeting the challenge
i think its perfect that senate has tackled this problem, now they can put their challenged minds together and de-fund public education, restrict our voting rights,pollute our streams and river's,and give a tax break to the richest corporations in the world...can you think of any thing else? there's got to be something? Let's see if they can tackle torture and privatization of the post office and the military.
aka
you forgot arming our teachers while cutting their pay and erasing their job security---Some way to make our defunded schools safer!
Bunch of retards...
meeting the challenged
lets not forget the police training video games ; how many murders does a kid get to watch by the age of six,graphic murders, with close ups and surround sound ; and then the drone thing worked out in their favor, ( one for the gipper ) they use the same controls on the drone's as they do with the video games... Oh I shot little bobby because I thought he had a gun?
Whatever happened to the
Whatever happened to the idiot, moron, and imbecile labels? In practice, those worked out pretty well. An idiot was pretty much useless, a moron had step on the idiots, and imbeciles were the cream of the crop of the 'challenged'. And, the labels corresponded nicely with socialists, progressives and democrats.
simple
simple comes to mind; don't rock the boat, and stay the course...
This legislation is so
This legislation is so retarded .
Watch out
Beth and JE will ban you from using the word H.O.M.O. that is next.
This is PC police at its finest
Really, are we not living in a country with FREE SPEECH????
Setting your distributor timing...
... Will take an extra line in the mechanic's manual. Now, if the timing is advanced too far, Mr. Goodwrench will have to chronologically disable the ignition advancement to five degrees before top-dead-center. Hmmm. We have to find a politically correct replacement for TDC. Truck drivers will have to call their "Jake" brakes something other than retarders. Can't have Rain Man being offended by the English language dictionary, let alone operators and engineers.