"It feels like shit, to say such a thing."

No-Go

Many people are uncertain:
How do you call people with Down syndrome?
What is politically correct?
Can you still say 'mongoloid' today?
Is 'Downie' OK?
And what about 'Down Child'? Or 'Down Person'?
Is it a question of taste?

Marley Thelen comments:

„I find "Downie" just stupid.
I find it totally and absolutely stupid, to call me that.
And I don't want it.
And, how, I don't know, I find that very difficult.
I also find it belittling."

Verena Günnel feels hurt:

„I really don't like it, if someone just says it like that.
It also hurts me.
I can't explain how that feels.
But I know that it also hurts."

Daniel Rauers doesn't find it fitting:

„That means disabled with Down syndrome.
Mongo - that doesn't fit."

Verena Elisabeth Turin finds the expression 'Mongo' revolting.
She writes:

„For me it's not ok to label me as a 'Downie'. It feels uncomfortable, unfair, not nice, excluded.
When I'm called Downie.
The expression 'Mongo' I know well.
The word Mongo from this expression I find revolting, downright unfriendly, hurtful.
Mongo is also not a pretty word.

They should call me Verena or Elisabeth.
That's actually what I am called.
Most people call me Verena.

The grown up people with Down syndrome can be addressed by our first name.
We all have a name."

The Ohrenkuss team in Hamburg also looked at the labelling of people with Down syndrome.
Nora Fiedler dictated a text on the topic:

„Downie, I would have thought, means Down syndrome. Many people have Down syndrome, those little chromosomes.
I find it definitely too hard to be able to say 'Downies'.
That's a plague of mankind to say such a thing.
Then I walk away, if others talk badly about others and such things. They also use other swear words, for example Wobble-Ass: or, who is that, this Fattie: or Sad-Sack.
More like that.
It feels like shit, to say such a thing.
And apart from that I can't take criticism.

Mongo would be the most full-on swear word, that I've heard.
I'd thought it's like muggle.
Muggle is non-magical person.
Mongo is definitely as bad as slut, or piece-of-shit.

You can go up to people with Down syndrome absolutely normally and ask:

What is it then - to be Down syndrome?
I say then, for example: I've also the same as other people.
You can call me Nora."

Dorothee Reumann dictates:

„Many people, the boys also say "Down", say also asshole, and I walk away, absolutely away.
Fast.
And I don't want to hear.
And I am sad.

I would really like that many people call me: normal person.
And I am not Down-syndrome-person.
But is very difficult."

Julian Göpel also doesn't like the term:

„Well I don't like the word at all.
And I know why: I am an adult.
A grown up man with Down syndrome.
And that's how I want to be treated."

Paul Spitzeck has a great alternative to offer:

„I find 'Downie' is also stupid, because for me that's an insult. What's better is: simply my name."

What the members of the HORA theatre in Zürich think about the topic 'Downie' can be found here.