‘Unhoused, Conventionally Attractive, and People of Color’: Why Do We Keep Having to Change Our Labels?
The connotations that get attached to words reflect a society’s systemic issues
Black or African American; Indian, Native American, or Indigenous people; disabled, handicapped, or differently abled; homeless, unhoused, or people experiencing homelessness; attractive or conventionally attractive; fat, overweight, or plus-sized; prostitutes or sex workers; and on and on — there are endless examples of words, especially for historically disadvantaged groups, being replaced with more considerate versions.
There are, likewise, words for transgender people, those with intellectual disabilities, and those with dwarfism that were originally not offensive and commonly used, but which are now characterized as so outright derogatory that I’m reticent to include them. What causes such extensive evolutions in the way a word is received by the general public?
Many of these transitions in language have occurred for good reason. In some cases, since they came to be used in offensive ways, it was time to seek out a replacement word without the bad connotations. In other cases, the language itself was harmful. Yet, in most instances, I think the issue is not the wording itself or even…
