Ooh, you can't say THAT!

Apparently, we must add to the list of words which mustn't be used, the word "spastic".  Really?  It was used by an American athlete being interviewed at the World Athletics Championships the other day, and resulted in an apology by the British presenter, who described it as a word "that may have caused offence". Well when I was younger, to have called anyone a "spazza" would have been very definitely derogative, but to have said that they were spastic would not have carried the same disparaging meaning, but probably be seen more as a statement of fact. In America it seems it is used to mean clumsy or over-excited, and that is the sense in which it was used on this occasion.  You remember that quote about us and America being two nations divided by a common language?