Politically Correct, or is that Diplomatically Accurate?
So the other day, while in an MRT station, I walked past a bow-legged midget. And I thought to myself: “Oh look, a bow-legged midget. Wait a minute, ‘midget’ is out. They like ‘little person’. OK, so she’s a bow-legged little person.” Then I started to wonder, is there a politically correct word for bowed legs? Should I have been thinking “a little person with parallely challenged limbs?’ Or ‘curvilinear appendages?‘ I rather like “a little person with excessively curved propulsion protuberances.” But it is a bit of a mouthful. When I develop a handicap (or is that disability?) as most of us will someday, I will insist others refer to it with a bizarre yet evocative euphemism.
Comments
Ryan,
To start to disect your question in hopes of resolution, I must begin by asking if this person's bow-leggedness effected their height? There is a girl at the YMCA I work out at who is so bow-legged that it makes her extremely short. If she could straighten her legs however, she would be otherwise normal, or a typical, short Canadian blonde. If this is the case with your Taiwanese sighting, then I would say that they are physically disabled and possibly slightly dwarfed. The real issue is in perception and stereotype. The term midget is now bracketed in the dictionary as offensive, therefore not politically correct. But, bowlegs is listed as an adjective that is not offensive. I don't think someone with bowed legs minds what you call their disability, as long as it's not V-legs or stumpy. The fact that you tried to catch yourself in the midst of a stereotype, for which there was none, goes to show you were being socially and politically responsible, the 4 party leaders should be so inteligent in their campaining. To close, while Christmas shopping over the holidays, I saw her groping a relitively tall, attractive man in a Winners. So it just goes to show, no matter what the disability, be it midget, bow-legged, or just damn ugly, there's someone out there willing to nail them. Bayne
Posted by: Bayner | January 2, 2006 10:43 AM