A rose is a rose is a rose . . .

Rep. Vicki Truitt of Keller has introduced legislation in the Texas House to ban certain words from state documents. It passed without objection or debate. But I object. Among the words that are out the window are retarded, disabled, developmentally disabled, mentally disabled, mentally ill, mentally retarded, handicapped, cripple, and crippled. Those will be replaced by "persons with a disability," "persons with mental illness," etc. Why do I object? Because it's silly. All these words were once the politically correct terms until somebody said, "Shouldn't we call this abc instead of xyz?" And then everybody was afraid of offending somebody so they all jumped on the bandwagon. We'll have to have legislation two years from now to ban "persons with mental illness" with "persons who aren't mentally well." Then we'll probably have to change it to "persons who don't think like I do." And it will continue to be watered down until nobody can tell that what you are talking about is a mental case. Another objection I have is wordiness. As if government documents aren't hard enough to wade through already, now we'll have additional mumbo jumbo to try to parse. Another objection: what do we do about diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and all the other illnesses? Must we now refer to "persons with diabetes," etc.? And my final objection: Just because you call a man "a person with a mobility challenge" instead of a "cripple" doesn't change the fact that he can't walk. I don't see anything wrong with calling it like it is. "Bill to bar 'retarded,' other phrases passes." The Dallas Morning News; March 31, 2011; p. 5A.