Marks & Spencer has changed the name of the favourite childhood sweet Midget Gems to avoid offending people with dwarfism.
The retailer dropped the term midget and has rebranded the sweets Mini Gems after a leading disability studies academic warned it that the word can be “highly problematic”.
Dr Erin Pritchard, a lecturer in Disability and Education at Liverpool Hope University, has condemned the term midget as a form of hate speech which is deeply insulting to people with dwarfism.
Note that we are taxed in order to provide this bird with a berth from which to lecture us all. Carthage, it’s the only solution, isn’t it?
Well, that’s my business plan for Short-arse Sherbert buggered then.
It’s the tyranny of the aggrieved….
‘——deeply insulting to people with dwarfism.’
So we can still call them dwarfs then?
Surely “mini” will offend anybody who identifies as a junior BMW.
Surely an opportunity for some pendantry? A midget is a normal person of small stature, not someone with dwarfism. You may remember Robert Downey jr’s Sherlock made this distinction.
I used to have a MG Mid… oh, can’t use that word. I’ll try again.
I used to have a MG car that looked like an Austin Healey Sprite but with more chrome. Not the “frog eyed” Sprite, the later one. (Can one still say “frog eyed” or is it offensive to somebody with funny eyes? Or frogs?)
TWATS!
Dr Erin Pritchard, a lecturer in Disability and Education at Liverpool Hope University, has condemned the term midget as a form of hate speech which is deeply insulting to people with dwarfism.
We should only use sensitive, respectful terms, such as “wee bastards”.
I’m far more angry with M&S giving in to the complaints of a single grifter than with the grifter herself.
Call them minis. Just like spastics became scorers.
*scopers
I guess my dwarf mandarin orange will have to become unnamed.
Tiny happy people holding hands
Liverpool Hope University
Wishful thinking?
It’s also hate speech to ask anyone over 5’9 about the weather.
So, channelling Cato here……Shortbitch delenda est
If they’re not made by Lions, they’re not Midget Gems…