Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) urged her Democratic colleagues to stop attacking the "oligarchy," arguing that the word did not resonate with most Americans.
I read the article and I completely disagree with her. ‘Oligarch’ means something different than ‘king’, and many Americans don’t have the same negative reaction to the word ‘king’, which is often romanticised in media, whereas ‘oligarch’ calls up images of nefarious machinations in authoritarian regimes – exactly what’s actually going on.
Also, being whiny that the bullies are calling us ‘woke’ is reactionary and misses the whole point. This is where we should be doubling down, not diluting our language.
Our country was also founded on saying fuck off to a king. It’s part of the foundational mythology of the country. To a lot of people the word oligarchy means precisely nothing.
Rule by powerful elites isn’t unamarican. It’s actually kinda the opposite, given the caveats on our democratic system and it’s history.
A king however is actually one of the few unambiguously unamerican things out there.
This is not to disagree with your point, but more to say that it’s not without room for debate.
As for the “weak and woke” bit, I’m gonna disagree. That one read to me as a need to address public perception, not criticism from the right. Backing down from a bully is different from trying to change public perception. I didn’t see it as a statement of needing to be less woke, but of needing to be perceived as being effective and concerned about things other than the most pejorative senses of the term woke.
That political parties need to be viewed in a positive light by the public to be effective is inescapable.
Most of your peers don’t have that reaction. They should~ but they don’t. Ask them to name a king not from a Disney movie and report back. *edit: ask them to name the king independence was fought over. I’ll bet many can’t, and I’ll bet none can give you the actual reasons (other than vague concepts like ‘freedon’ or ‘taxation’).
I’m with you. Let’s stop fighting each other and figure this out.
What’s more “alpha” than backing down from a bully and adhering to their chosen framing of an issue?
You know what would actually be “alpha” (ugh)? Not trying to figure out the ideal terminology for whatever state she thinks the populace is inclined to right now and actually driving the conversation to bring people to our viewpoint. Like having a national tour highlighting wealth inequality and corruption by literal mustache twirling villains. Because if you say it enough and talk about the problem that’s right there fucking everything up right now and LEAD, they’ll adopt whatever goddamned term you feel like.
I read the article and I completely disagree with her. ‘Oligarch’ means something different than ‘king’, and many Americans don’t have the same negative reaction to the word ‘king’, which is often romanticised in media, whereas ‘oligarch’ calls up images of nefarious machinations in authoritarian regimes – exactly what’s actually going on.
Also, being whiny that the bullies are calling us ‘woke’ is reactionary and misses the whole point. This is where we should be doubling down, not diluting our language.
Yes they mean something different. If you go ask 5 random people what an oligarch is, at least one is likely not to know what it means.
The “woke” reputation stuff is also a little weird, but there again, the people using it as an insult probably don’t have a good working definition.
It’s easy to say “words have meaning” but lots of people, even left leaning ones, don’t always know what those meanings are.
I’m not saying ‘words have meaning.’
I’m saying we create meaning and we should not just give in to the fascists’ definitions.
They do not define us.
Our country was also founded on saying fuck off to a king. It’s part of the foundational mythology of the country. To a lot of people the word oligarchy means precisely nothing.
Rule by powerful elites isn’t unamarican. It’s actually kinda the opposite, given the caveats on our democratic system and it’s history.
A king however is actually one of the few unambiguously unamerican things out there.
This is not to disagree with your point, but more to say that it’s not without room for debate.
As for the “weak and woke” bit, I’m gonna disagree. That one read to me as a need to address public perception, not criticism from the right. Backing down from a bully is different from trying to change public perception. I didn’t see it as a statement of needing to be less woke, but of needing to be perceived as being effective and concerned about things other than the most pejorative senses of the term woke.
That political parties need to be viewed in a positive light by the public to be effective is inescapable.
Most of your peers don’t have that reaction. They should~ but they don’t. Ask them to name a king not from a Disney movie and report back. *edit: ask them to name the king independence was fought over. I’ll bet many can’t, and I’ll bet none can give you the actual reasons (other than vague concepts like ‘freedon’ or ‘taxation’).
I’m with you. Let’s stop fighting each other and figure this out.
What’s more “alpha” than backing down from a bully and adhering to their chosen framing of an issue?
You know what would actually be “alpha” (ugh)? Not trying to figure out the ideal terminology for whatever state she thinks the populace is inclined to right now and actually driving the conversation to bring people to our viewpoint. Like having a national tour highlighting wealth inequality and corruption by literal mustache twirling villains. Because if you say it enough and talk about the problem that’s right there fucking everything up right now and LEAD, they’ll adopt whatever goddamned term you feel like.