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Name calling has always been a part of politics, now more than ever. It
is so human to label the opponent with some discrediting term in order to
marginalize it. However, these epithets evolve like fashion, some disappearing, some reappearing and others maintaining a permanent place in our closet of
curses.
Looking back over the last two hundred years, there are many political
accusations that have lost their bite over time. Being accused of being a
communist or a republican, not related to the American political party, could get you in jail in many countries in the
20th century. Prior to that, being known as a royalist or a freemason created a
precarious situation in parts of Europe. Today, these adjectives are anachronistic and would be somewhat
baffling to the current public.
Unfortunately, certain labels have re-entered the arena and have been thrown
at rather misplaced victims. For example, the current Israeli government and
its followers accuse those protesting its judicial reform bill of being “anarchists”. This term took its
modern meaning from Mikhail Bakunin in the second half of the 19th
century and was based on principled opposition to government authority at the
expense of individual liberty. Some of its practitioners adopted directed
action, i.e., political assassination, and became rather infamous, giving the
movement a rather nefarious reputation. Having lost the war of complete
individual freedom, the concept of anarchism now implies the advocating
of chaos. The connection between historical anarchism and hundreds of thousands of
protesters arranging and cooperating with police on a weekly basis and not
harming any property is rather unclear. I strongly sense that most of the users
of the word have no idea of the origin of the word, not that it matters.
Clearly, anarchists are bad people because they actively disagree with what the
government wants to do.
Likewise, the Russian insistence that Ukraine is fascist is rather off.
Fascism, at least the German style, can be oversimplified as the use of a
police state to implement an extreme and racially motivated social policy.
Ukraine happens to be rather complex country in terms of ethnic roots,
including ethnic Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, Poles and gypsies, to name just a
few. It has a Jewish elected president, which means it is neither a police
state nor openly prioritizes any ethnic group. It has never attempted to
legislate racist laws, unlike a few of its neighbors, notably Poland and
Hungary. Yet, Putin claims he invaded the Ukraine in order to rid of a fascist
regime. As Spock would say, this is illogical, but logic is not an important
issue in politics.
As politics by definition involves disagreement, people clearly need to
define themselves and, more importantly, their opponents. This definition can
be a curse or a matter of pride. For example, the terms liberal and
conservative are thrown around freely as are right or left winger, relics of
the seating arrangement during the French revolution. If someone proudly
carries that title, it is not a curse but a complement: this is where I stand.
After all, ugly is as ugly believes.
Pictures captions help the blind fully access the Internet.
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