May 8, 2025, 4:00 AM CDT
By Pilar Melendez
In a recent episode of his highly influential podcast, Joe Rogan declared what he sees as the latest triumph in the cultural battle over language: the return of the “R-word.”
“Every time I see people that disagree with any that’s happening, any gigantic world events, it’s one of these retarded shows where they’re screaming,” he said April 10 on an episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” before he interrupted himself to go on a quick rant about the word.
“The word ‘retarded’ is back, and it’s one of the great cultural victories that I think is spurred on, probably, by podcasts,” he added.
Rogan is right, at least to those in some circles.
Once relegated to the cultural dustbin, the so-called R-word has made a resurgence in recent months, used most commonly by people in right-leaning and anti-political correctness worlds, some of whom have tried for years to bring the slur from the social media undercurrents back into the mainstream.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk now frequently uses the word on X to disparage everyone from a Danish astronaut to Ben Stiller. In March, Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, used it in questioning the mental capacity of Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s twins, only to later issue an apology. The FX show “English Teacher” included a bit about how “the kids are not into being woke” and they’re “saying the ‘R-word’ again.” And a recent Netflix comedy special invoked the word repeatedly.
While its use has percolated in the comedy world for years, only recently has the word — and discussion of its return — become more normalized. That is fueled in no small part by a sense that the tide has turned both culturally and politically against those seeking to keep the word out of the popular lexicon. But the battle lines are not as clear as one might think, with even some on the left softening their stance on the slur’s rebrand while some on the right — most notably former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — decry its return.
Timothy Shriver, the chairman of Special Olympics International, noted that the word is used across the political spectrum.
“People on the left and people on the right have treated people with intellectual disabilities in subhuman ways, historically,” Shriver said.
Still, there are some political dynamics at play. Kenneth Luna, a linguistics professor at California State University, Northridge, who teaches a course on forbidden language, said the word has emerged as a cultural signifier, used by people on the cultural and political right to reinforce a group allegiance — and create further division.
“There’s this term, the politics of cruelty,” Luna said. “It’s a political ploy to marginalize opponents. But it also reinforces, if you think about it, this kind of in group loyalty.”
And it is not just right-leaning voters who are using the word. Business Insider reported that some liberal-identifying people are using it, among other canceled words, in response to feeling overly self-censored by the fear of saying something non-inclusive.
Robbie Goodwin, 33, a comedian and podcaster who identifies as an anti-Trump social Democrat, said he has used the word in his comedy to describe something dumb but never to describe a disabled person or to hurt anyone’s feelings.
But in the last year, Goodwin said, he has noticed people abusing the word, and he believes the joke is going away, partly because Rogan and Musk are using it as a signifier of their culture war.
“I never try to offend anyone, and it feels like they are getting off on the fact that it’s offending someone and triggering the libs,” Goodwin said in an interview, adding that he is “grossed out” by Rogan’s comments about the word’s supposed cultural victory. “I found myself using it less now, because I see unfunny people using it. It’s so cringe.”
Some high-profile people have pushed back. Palin, not one to usually embrace the policing of language, criticized Ye in March for using the word.
“BTW, he & everyone else (especially ‘Christian conservatives’) thinking it’s hip to ramp up use of the ‘R’ word… please unfollow me & know that my disrespect for you is insurmountable,” wrote Palin, whose son Trig has Down syndrome.
The word’s return has also been particularly hurtful to people with intellectual disabilities.
“It’s frustrating, and it upsets me beyond words to hear anyone use the R-word. That word isn’t in style; it’s hurtful,” said Novie Craven, a Special Olympics athlete and host of the podcast “Inclusion Revolution Radio.” “When that word is used, you’re telling the world that people like me, people with intellectual disabilities, don’t belong, can’t achieve or aren’t worth respect.”
Craven added: “But you don’t know us. You don’t live our lives. If you did, you’d understand how wrong that word is. You should get to know us before you speak about us.”
Before it became an insult, the term “mental retardation,” derived from the Latin for “to slow,” was adopted in the mid-1990s by the medical community and the government to replace words like “moron,” “idiot” and “imbecile” in describing people with intellectual disabilities. The term was shortened and sent into the mainstream lexicon, and by the 1990s and the early 2000s, it had become an insult.
The first big move against the word came in 2003, when President George W. Bush renamed the President’s Committee on Mental Retardation as the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities. Seven years later, President Barack Obama signed “Rosa’s Law,” which changed the term to “intellectual disability” in federal language.
For a time, the pejorative against the millions of people in the United States who have intellectual or developmental disabilities was largely deemed socially taboo thanks to movements like “Spread the Word to End the Word.” However, the word never quite disappeared the way some others have, and the rise of social media in the 2010s provided a new way to observe its use and its growing embrace by those particularly on the right as political polarization grew.
Now, Musk is arguably doing more to bring the slur back than anyone else.
Musk, as leader of the administration’s efforts to shrink the federal government, also has a direct influence whenever he invokes the slur, which he recently hurled at Yale history professor Timothy Snyder and used in a derisive nickname for Trump adviser Peter Navarro.
“I’m tempted to call this guy a retard but I won’t because I’ve used that word too many times,” Musk wrote Feb. 22 on X in response to Snyder.
A study in January by Montclair State University found a 207.5% increase in posts on X using the slur four days after Musk used it in a post, or 312,642 posts using the term.
Musk did not respond to a request for comment.
Daniela Peterka-Benton, an associate professor of justice studies at Montclair State, said in the study’s news release that the increase in the slur’s use after Musk is an “example of how hate content has been normalized and boosted in the online space.”
“The online space has always held potential dangers for marginalized communities, and it appears to be getting worse,” she said.
And while Luna, the linguist, believes “all bets are off” in this political environment, he does not think the slur’s return to the mainstream will last as long as Rogan might hope.
“It’s pretty bad, but I don’t think it’s going to get worse in the sense that I don’t see people widely using it at all times because it violates linguistic social norms,” he said. “We just have to combat it right away.”
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