Ban the R-Word Billboards Are Up

Statewide Billboards Promote New Campaign

For Immediate Release: September 15, 2008

Special Olympics Texas (SOTX) is taking its new campaign to the streets.  Across the state, drivers will spot "Erase the R-word" billboards along major roads and highways.  The R-word campaign, which kicked off on September 15, is a public awareness campaign that educates people to not use the R-word (retard) in any form, regardless of the intent.  The campaign is a Special Olympics Texas project with support from the Arc of Texas and the Texas Council for Developmental Disabilities.

The billboards are currently up in the Austin, Dallas/Fort Worth, El Paso and San Antonio areas.  Billboards will appear in Houston on a future date to be determined.

SOTX invites the public to rewrite the way society thinks and help eliminate the R-word.  Take the pledge online, encourage others to take the pledge and join the movement on MySpace and Facebook by visiting www.specialolympicstexas.org/rword.

R-word Campaign Background
In 2004, Special Olympics changed its terminology from mental retardation to intellectual disabilities in response to a call from our athletes who deeply felt the negative connotations associated with the R-word and the term - retardation.  Also, updating our terminology put Special Olympics more in line with the international community that has used terms other than mental retardation for years. 

As a global organization, Special Olympics recognizes intellectual disabilities as the most widely accepted and least objectionable term that is synonymous with mental retardation, and wants other organizations and people to do the same.  For that reason, in 2006, Special Olympics Texas assembled a group of experts from different fields to work together and take steps so that people statewide will recognize this new terminology and change their own vocabulary.

About Special Olympics Texas
Special Olympics Texas is a privately funded non-profit organization, providing year-round sports training and athletics competition for 27,610 children and adults with intellectual disabilities in the Lone Star State.  For more information about Special Olympics Texas, call 1.800.876.JOIN or visit www.specialolympicstexas.org.

Official Partners:
Coca-Cola Bottling Companies of Texas, ConocoPhillips, Food Town,
H-E-B Tournament of Champions Charitable Trust and Wal-Mart

Andi Baca Kelly
Public Relations Coordinator
akelly@sotx.org