Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Shocking or not?

Donald Trump called Seth Meyers a stutterer: "I thought Seth Meyers -- his delivery frankly was not good. He's a stutterer." And Stuttering Foundation of America slammed Trump: "We at the Stuttering Foundation find it discouraging that in 2011, Donald Trump has chosen to use the word 'stutterer' in a derogatory fashion, something to be made fun of, to describe Seth Meyers' speech at the annual White House Correspondents' dinner."

I am not so shocked. He probably used it more in the sense of mental hesitation. What do you think?

7 comments:

Pam said...

For clarification, it was the Stuttering Foundation of America who made the public statement about Trump's remarks, not the National Stuttering Association.
My understanding is that Trump called Myers a "stutterer" (which from what I heard on the video clip, he does not speak with stuttered speech, unless he is very covert and a master word-switcher), not President Obama!
My opinion: despite it being 2011 and stuttering awareness at an all time high, politicians or wannabe politicians still find it acceptable to term someone as a stutterer in order to denote poor communication or otherwise paint the person in a negative light.
So, I agree with you. I am not shocked. Stuttering continues to be a misunderstood disorder (for some, a true disability) that many people still think its ok to take potshots at.

Anonymous said...

I'm more shocked by a lot of the comments. I hope that isn't how the general population really thinks. It's not their attitude towards stuttering, it's that they don't have a brain.

Tom Weidig said...

Sorry, I messed up a few details!

imcesar said...

To give Trump the benefit of the doubt shows how in love you are with him. Trump is a rude, classless loud-mouth who very often and publicly calls people names. So let's not overanalyze here.

Jerome said...

Do you like the Donald, Tom??

Anonymous said...

Colin Firth started stuttering in real life...http://blogs.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2011/05/05/colin-firth-grappling-with-kings-speech-stutter/

Unknown said...

In my opinion, his intent is secondary. Primary is his use of the word as a pejorative...an insult. It is wrong for the same reason we shouldn't use "retard" as an insult. It reduces those who suffer from those conditions as being "less than" those who do not.