Someone who is stupid is mentioned as a fool.
Dumb is an adjective that refers to someone with poor understanding or judgment . A fool, therefore, is a stupid, unintelligent or deprived person of reason .
For example: “You cannot leave the most important decisions of the company in the hands of a fool like Aníbal” , “You are a fool who does not understand anything” , “You have behaved like a fool” , “If Enrique accuses me of fool, I will be forced to leave work."
Notion of fool
The etymology of mentecato leads us to mentecapto , which comes from the Latin juxtaposition mente captus . This can be translated as “mind-taken” or “mind-deprived,” that is, one whose mind is captured or imprisoned and, for this reason, cannot use it normally.
The notion of idiot, therefore, can be associated with terms such as fool , fool , idiot , stupid or memo . It is an insult or, at least, an aggressive and derogatory word. Its use is also linked to the geographical region since, in certain countries, it is not common for someone to attack another person with this adjective.
The concept appears in various literary works. Miguel de Cervantes wrote in Don Quixote de la Mancha : “…and I seek for my own glory the narrowest and most difficult path. Is that, stupid and stupid? . In another fragment of the book, the Spanish writer indicates: “You are crazy, and if you were alone and within the doors of your madness, it would be less bad; but you have the property of driving crazy and stupid those who treat and communicate with you…”
The notion of idiot is often used as an insult or in a derogatory way.
Society and insult
The choice of vocabulary used to insult is certainly very interesting, since it varies according to the geographical region, the historical period and the age of the speakers. The term foolish is not widely used today, but it is well known by the majority of Spanish speakers, and is often part of phrases with a humorous tone and without the intention of hurting the interlocutor. And this already demonstrates another curious aspect of the insult: the same word can cause pain or joy, depending on the context .
In countries like Argentina , Spain and Italy , insults are a fundamental part of culture , especially everyday speech; In other places in the world, however, people go about their daily lives without the need for this particular portion of language. Returning to the aforementioned curiosities, the term gay is currently used, for example, to verbally attack other people or to disparage a product, at the same time that it serves as a synonym for homosexual.
This is the reason for endless discussions and projects to modify speech to stop promoting hatred through language; How do you explain that a word whose original meaning was happy , bright and attractive , has come to mean homosexual and, later, of poor quality ? The power of words, evidently, exists only in the use they receive; They do not have independence from human beings, but they control them as they wish and can turn them into lethal weapons.
On the use of the term fool
Regarding the term stupid, no one can feel happy about being considered slow, stupid, unable to solve common problems or understand simple commands.
However, this does not seem to matter to those who use it for aggressive purposes, as may happen if someone accuses another of being "the class fool" in public. But once again, in a phrase such as "oh, look how stupid you are, huh..." , it is not common for there to be hatred or contempt, but rather it is a nice way of pointing out someone else's mistake.