I might be being temporarily dense, but how is the word "stupid" an ableist slur? It's one of the few words for "you should know better but...

TL;DR - I don’t know any more.

I’ve been informed by other sources that it is. Sources I respect and admire, since they face such micro-aggressions on a daily basis and still hold it together and remain civil well over 80% of the time.

And I am uncertain about use. The more I learn about the things that can hurt people, the less certain I get about things. Hence the ‘any helps’ thing in the AN.

And it never helps that practically all words used to deride or indicate a lack of intelligence or forethought are actual ablist slurs aimed at the mentally disabled. For all that they have faded into common use, they still sting.

I do NOT want to hurt people, even by accident. I’m one of those people who goes into fits of guilt over accidentally -and partially- stepping on someone else’s foot [You know that thing you do where the bottom of your foot makes enough contact with the top of someone else’s before you lift that sucker up and move away? Yeah, that]. I’m a soft-hearted soul.

I THINK 'foolish’ and 'daft’ are still OK and non-ablist, since Fool was an occupation and required artistry, and Daft is a lack of thought processes - or thought processes so far out to the left field that it’s coming in on the right. I’m willing to be taught otherwise by people who know better. Replacement words that I can use in lieu of a wordy sentence fragment would be brilliant.

And I get it. There’s a plethora of “you can’t say that” going around and people are getting irritated by it all. Language is yet another structure by which we judge each other and that can be a bad thing. I’m trying, in my own small way, to not make mine a bad thing.

And sometimes letting people know that some words hurt other people isa part of the positive energy I’m trying to spread in this sad and sorry world. And it’s difficult to know where and when to draw the line or how hard to do so.

I’m still learning how to apply that touch. As I said, all helps appreciated.