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Hot Translation Take but I think if you're translating something that has a slur/derogatory term in it, it should be localized as a slur/derogatory term of the same/similar severity in your target language.

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From:

palominocorn

I see your hot take and raise you: the same word can have vastly different severity levels even in different regions that speak the same language (eg: the c-word gets treated differently in the US vs UK). Then I up the ante by pointing out that some words simply don't have a good translation (Finns, Eastern Europeans, and Central Asians have a colorful vocabulary for insulting Russians... none of which has the right oomph when translated into English).

From:

stardust_rifle

And I agree, and raise you the fact that the Japanese language has a pretty nasty slur for the mentally ill, so severe it is literally banned from being said on TV, (i’ve seen it compared in severity to the R-word), which causes some problems the rare time it does show up and some poor translator has to figure out how they’re going to handle it in English, which does not have an equivalent “targets X group of people at Y severity” slur.

(I’d probably use “psycho”, personally, and stick a footnote explaining the situation. I know a translator who chose to leave it untranslated + stick a footnote when they came across it. I’ve seen translators just go with “crazy/insane”, some of whom did not use footnotes to explain the difference in severity)

From:

palominocorn

"Untranslated with a footnote" would be my choice, personally (though I generally avoid slurs in my own works, so grain of salt there).

The reality of translation is that, whether the translator wants to or not, they will lose some things and add some other things; the best translators understand this and make deliberate choices as to what to lose and add in order to fit their work (because translation is also a transformative work). Insults fall squarely into the "so easy to lose" category.