Me personally? I’ve become much less tolerant of sexist humor. Back in the day, cracking a joke at women’s expense was pretty common when I was a teen. As I’ve matured and become aware to the horrific extent of toxicity and bigotry pervading all tiers of our individualistic society, I’ve come to see how exclusionarly and objectifying that sort of ‘humor’ really is, and I regret it deeply.
I feel like ‘retard’ is insensitive to use in current times, but it will have a similar progression to the word idiot. Idiot used to be a medical term, and when used as an insult, I’m sure it was hurtful to the people diagnosed as an idiot by a doctor. Nowadays it is considered pretty tame. I am curious to see if 20 or 30 years from now the word still has the same hurtful connotation to it.
It is also a term used in physics. To retard as a verb means to slow. I feel like it can still be used respectfully in an academic sense.
As far as calling people out for using words in a hurtful way, I am all for it.
Fire retardant, for example.