EDITOR’S NOTE: This article options language which may be hurtful to readers.
On an April episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” the host used a slur inside the first 45 seconds of the present.
“The word ‘retarded’ is back, and it’s one of the great culture victories,” Rogan said with a snort within the April 10 episode of his über-popular podcast. “Probably spurred on by podcasts.”
Just a few months earlier, on January 6, Elon Musk used the phrase in response to a Finnish researcher who referred to as Musk the “largest spreader of disinformation in human history.”
Use of the slur greater than doubled on X, the platform Musk owns, within the two days after he made that January submit, researchers from Montclair State University found. More than 312,000 subsequent posts made on X in that span contained the r-word, wrote co-author Bond Benton, a professor of communication on the New Jersey college.
The buck didn’t cease there, Benton mentioned. Throughout 2025, influential public figures like Rogan, Musk and Kanye West have used the r-word on platforms the place thousands and thousands can see and listen to them. (West most not too long ago used the time period in March to discuss with Jay-Z and Beyoncé’s twins, although these X posts at the moment are deleted.)
Since Musk’s January submit, the net prevalence of the r-word is “absolutely getting worse,” Benton informed NCS.
Rogan, Musk and West are seemingly utilizing the phrase to get a rise out of individuals and draw extra eyes to their content material, Benton mentioned. But by utilizing a time period that has traditionally been used to disparage and diminish individuals with disabilities, they’re renormalizing the slur amongst followers and followers who work together with their posts, he mentioned.
Musk, Rogan and West haven’t responded to NCS’s requests for remark.
The resurgence of the r-word is symptomatic of a graver downside — the “apparent death of empathy,” mentioned Adrienne Massanari, an affiliate professor at American University who has studied how the far-right makes use of tech to develop its affect.
“What you’re seeing now, people’s masks are off,” Massanari mentioned. “This is not just misunderstanding but the mischaracterization and demonization of communities. The use of that kind of language is signaling a shift, a desire to sort of push the envelope.”
Push the envelope too far, she mentioned, and the hurt spills out into all marginalized communities. The r-word’s surging recognition is simply the newest effort in a motion to normalize hate, she mentioned.
The r-word has by no means actually gone away, Massanari mentioned — many individuals nonetheless use the phrase in non-public, and controversial far-right influencers and a few members of the previous “dirtbag left” podcast scene alike have used it for years to rile up followers and attraction to edgy comedic kinds.
But most individuals “were comfortable with the word retreating from normal discourse,” after years of campaigns designed to finish use of the slur, Benton mentioned.
“There was a reason these words are no longer being used,” Massanari mentioned. “They weren’t productive. They weren’t helping. They are actively harming communities.”
The r-word, initially, was meant to exchange phrases that had turn into pejoratives. Introduced in 1895, “mental retardation” became the popular time period amongst psychologists, supplanting the diagnostic labels “imbecile,” “moron” and “feebleminded,” mentioned Lieke van Heumen, a medical affiliate professor in incapacity and human growth on the University of Illinois, Chicago.
The r-word was meant to be a “neutral” time period, van Heumen mentioned. But individuals with disabilities then have been nonetheless largely disregarded and treated as lesser members of society, frequently institutionalized in harmful environments and even forcibly sterilized with out their consent. Under these situations, the r-word ultimately warped into a slur and an insult, she mentioned.
“When disability is framed as a lack, limitation or loss, it reinforces the idea that people with disabilities are inherently incapable,” van Heumen informed NCS. “This framing is used to justify their exclusion from everyday life, as if they are missing what it takes to participate. Such language is not harmless — it influences public attitudes, informs policy decisions and ultimately affects how people with disabilities are treated.”
The refrain to retire the r-word grew louder within the Nineteen Seventies, van Heumen mentioned, as individuals with disabilities advocated for his or her proper to take part totally in society and finish using ableist language. Nearly 40 years later, the “Spread the Word to End the Word” campaign inspired younger individuals particularly to stop utilizing the slur to insult their friends.
The federal authorities signaled its help to finish using the r-word with 2010’s “Rosa’s Law,” named for a younger lady with Down syndrome, which up to date all federal legal guidelines to make use of “intellectual disability” rather than “mental retardation.” The legislation acknowledged that the time period and its “derivatives,” together with the r-word, have been “used to demean and insult both persons with and without disabilities.”
Sophie Stern, a 22-year-old choreographer and actress from Arizona, has Down syndrome and is a member of the Arizona Developmental Disabilities Planning Council. For years, she’s confronted classmates who’ve mentioned the r-word in entrance of her, even petitioning to have the phrase faraway from a script.
But she’s listening to the phrase extra usually now than she did at school, she informed NCS. And it doesn’t make her any much less upset to listen to it, even when it’s not directed at her.
“It still hurts my feelings,” she mentioned.
Celebrities used to apologize once they have been “caught” utilizing the r-word. Khloe and Kim Kardashian each issued statements once they used the slur in clips shared on Instagram in 2018. LeBron James apologized at least twice for letting the r-word slip in postgame interviews in 2011 and 2014. Author John Green said in 2015 that he shouldn’t have used the phrase in his well-liked YA novel “Paper Towns,” wherein it seems in a quote from a teenage character.
Today, whether or not it’s “Silicon Valley tech bros” or far-right figures, individuals who use the r-word on-line seem to share a motivation — “the appeal of transgression,” mentioned Julie Ingersoll, a professor of non secular research on the University of North Florida. Many individuals who use the r-word know it would anger individuals who disagree with them, Ingersoll mentioned — it’s a method of “owning the libs.”
“I think that they are flaunting their ability to offend and confront,” she mentioned. “Why do you need that word? If it bothers other people, why wouldn’t you just pick a different word?”
Content designed to impress outrage is usually extra more likely to court docket engagement — from each supporters and people who disagree, Benton mentioned. Engagement ensures visibility, and if the r-word is extra seen on-line, it’ll ultimately turn into much less jarring for customers to come across, he mentioned.
“Clicks are the currency in the commerce of social media,” Benton mentioned. “And if I put up content where the r-word is prominently used, I can just guarantee there’s going to be a few thousand replies.”
Platforms can find yourself “rewarding” controversial content material that pulls sustained consideration, mentioned Brandon Harris, an assistant professor on the University of Alabama who research content material creators, particularly these within the “manosphere.”
“Being controversial is more profitable than being kind to people,” Harris informed NCS.
Inconsistent pointers and enforcement on what constitutes hate speech additionally makes it simpler to get away with utilizing hurtful phrases, Harris mentioned.
X and Spotify didn’t reply to NCS’s requests for touch upon their hate speech pointers, however neither platform permits attacking different customers based mostly on incapacity, amongst different traits. Content that violates these guidelines is typically eliminated, demonetized or made much less seen, each corporations have mentioned. X does allow users to submit “potentially inflammatory content” and encourages customers to dam or unfollow different customers whose content material offends them.
Spokespeople for Meta and YouTube mentioned their platforms don’t enable the r-word for use to mock a individual’s incapacity, however the phrase is not banned outright on both platform.
The agitators utilizing such language don’t essentially must consider the issues they are saying, Harris mentioned — intent doesn’t matter when the end result normalizes the informal use of a hurtful time period.
A spike in on-line use of the r-word can be dangerous by itself. But much more regarding is what the slur’s return represents, Massanari mentioned.
“These are never just about the words,” she mentioned. “The words are standing in place for a whole symbol.”
What’s occurring now, the place notable persons are utilizing the r-word in posts on X or on podcasts, is a “classic testing of the waters,” Massanari mentioned, when influential individuals who receives a commission to agitate see how far they will push the road.
“These communities come out to denigrate, to make fun of, to demonize the most marginalized,” she mentioned.
The r-word will nearly definitely not be the final slur to reemerge on well-liked platforms, from well-liked customers, Benton mentioned. And when the road is frequently pushed, it will possibly take individuals to “the worst spaces imaginable,” he mentioned.
“The term itself — the casual use of it — is a problem,” he mentioned. “The normalization of it will allow even more problematic terms to be normalized.”
Other hurtful phrases are already getting used to hurt different marginalized individuals, Harris identified. Republican Rep. Nancy Mace earlier this yr repeatedly used an anti-transgender slur in a House Oversight Committee listening to. NCS reached out to Mace about her use of the phrase. In response, her communications director mentioned, “While you tiptoe” round hurting emotions, the congresswoman “is standing up for women and girls.”
“We’re now using language that promotes cruelty, and not just cruelty but casual cruelty — where you just offhandedly don’t think about it and dismiss someone’s humanity,” Harris mentioned of utilizing slurs like these lobbed at trans individuals and folks with disabilities.
Seeing how the r-word proliferates offline is the “next threshold” to cross, Benton mentioned. Some individuals seemingly by no means stopped privately utilizing the r-word, he mentioned, but when individuals who aren’t protected by wealth, fame or political affiliations use the phrase at their office or in social settings, they might face punishing penalties.
Many persons are actively pushing again towards the r-word once they encounter it. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who has a son with Down syndrome, earlier this yr called out Kanye West, “‘Christian conservatives’” and “popular newbie-conservative women” for “thinking it’s hip to ramp up use of the ‘R’ word.”
“Please unfollow me & know that my disrespect for you is insurmountable,” she wrote on X in March.
“The Brady Bunch” star Maureen McCormick, who’s additionally a Special Olympics ambassador, mentioned that Joe Rogan celebrating the resurgence of the r-word “ignores the terrible hurt” the slur causes individuals with disabilities.
“This is not a victory,” she wrote on X, prompting greater than 8,000 replies from supporters and detractors alike. “It is a regression.”
Engaging with customers who submit the r-word to court docket outrage and on-line engagement may cause well-meaning individuals to fall into a lure of rage bait, Benton, Harris and Massanari cautioned. But there should nonetheless be resistance towards reintegrating the r-word into common speech, they mentioned — a dialog handiest when it’s had offline, individual to individual.
“We have to continue to have courage, to have these conversations and these moments of resistance to say, ‘We don’t appreciate what you’re doing, we don’t share your values,’” Harris mentioned.
Sophie Stern, the dance instructor from Arizona, has a phrase of steering for anybody who desires to choose up the r-word: “Don’t.”