All good. Old habits die hard honestly. Like I said, we used to say stuff like that all the time as a kid and it sometimes is a hard habit to break. One of my sons has an intellectual disability and seeing him put in the hard work to do what comes naturally to many of us just puts to shame the notion that we should look down on these guys.I agree with you whole heartedly and apologize for that. I have actually railed against other people for that, and have even reported people for doing it. So no way should I have ever gone there.
I thought as I got older that it was embarrassing I ever used the term and that was before I ever had him. After having him you feel even more terrible that you could ever have been so ignorant.
A lot of politics is personal, that is why people can be so reactionary when we have these discussions. Take the abortion question for example, I was against it before my wife had our son, I am even more strident in that position now. People often have reasons behind their positions that are not just anodyne policy positions. We all fail at recognizing this at times, particularly when we are not seeing each other face to face when having these conversations, but it is so easy for us (me) to sometimes forget that there is a person on the other side of these 1's and 0's.