小天的週記

之前提到皇后樂團Freddie Mercury曾想過要將《波希米亞狂想曲》(Bohemian Rhapsody)命名成《蒙古狂想曲》(Mongolia Rhapsody)，

但他後來還是用波希米亞/Bohemian。

我英國朋友跟我說: "I think 'Mongolian' has negative connotations in this country."

原來蒙古在他們眼中是比較原始的國家 (英國人就是狗眼看人低)。

他後來也跟我說，在英國，"mongol"這個字對蒙古人還有智能障礙者根本就是歧視。

所以他現在在英國不會聽到有人叫別人mongol。不過他不確定英國小孩在學校還會不會這樣講就是了。

他另外也跟我提另一個英文單字，也是很不禮貌、會冒犯他人的單字，

那就是 "spastic"跟"spaz"。

英國小孩覺得腦性麻痺者就是笨，但那只是凸顯孩子們的無知。

很悲哀的是，我覺得在台灣，很多人歧視腦性麻痺者。

我英國朋友如此描述: 

"The use of the word 'Mongol' is doubly offensive, to Mongolians and to

people with a disability. But as I said, I haven't heard it used for a

long time. I don't know whether kids would still use it at school.

Similarly, kids at school would call someone a 'spastic' if they

thought they were stupid, or sometimes abbreviated to a 'spaz'. The

word spastic means someone with condition such as cerebral palsy, but

it came to be used as an insult, so the word is not used now. There

was a charity called the Spastic Society for people with the

condition, but they changed their name some years ago to Scope due to

its common usage, as Wikipedia puts it, as a 'playground insult'. Even

when I was a child, I would never call someone a Mongol or a spastic."

總之，本文是想告訴大家，mongol、spastic、spaz 這三個英文單字，不要用來形容人，以免被誤會。

同理，在英國，如果你稱呼印度人，不要叫他們Hindu；就像你在美國，你如果講nigger，你肯定被揍。