AOC’s reframing here cuts to the heart of it:
A politics that blames the most vulnerable people in society for society’s problems is diametrically opposed to a politics that blames the most powerful. Lumping these opposites together as both being “populism” is nonsense.
It is important, she says, to provide an explanation of the •causes• of society’s problems — both why and who — or the worst people will fill that explanatory vacuum.
One of my pet peeves of recent years has been the mainstream press:
(1) adopting “populism” as a euphemism for fascism (e.g. “Trump’s populist rhetoric”), which is at best a blurring of the word’s actual meaning (yes, fascists can use populist language, but populism is not their defining feature), and then
(2) applying the word in its original meaning (i.e. mass appeal to ordinary people) to leftists in direct comparison to fascists as if this constitutes a useful insight (e.g. “politicians with a populist message, such as Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders”).
@inthehands
The old definition for ‘Populism' I remember is “The bludgeon to destroy democracy”.
@inthehands In the “words mean things” camp, I am forced to point out that populism doesn’t just mean “popular” or “an appeal to the people”, but a specific kind of antiintellectualism that is often a tool of fascism.
@criffer
The definitions I referred to composing this post:
Oxford New American: “a political approach that strives to appeal to ordinary people who feel that their concerns are disregarded by established elite groups”
M-W: “a political philosophy or movement that represents or is claimed to represent the interests of ordinary people especially against the Establishment”
Wikipedia: “Populism is a contested concept[1][2] for a variety of political stances that emphasise the idea of the "common people", often in opposition to a perceived elite.[3] It is frequently associated with anti-establishment and anti-political sentiment.[4] The term developed in the late 19th century and has been applied to various politicians, parties, and movements since that time, often assuming a pejorative tone. Within political science and other social sciences, different definitions of populism have been employed.[3][5]”
Those definitions certainly include what you wrote, but are not limited to that. It sounds like you have a narrower understanding of the word that common consensus.
@inthehands @criffer Populism *LITERALLY* means "appealing to the people". Full stop.
It should not be a dirty word at all.
It is used as a dirty word by supremacist perverts to signify that something or someone is going after the "vulgar" votes of the people instead of the "proper" votes of the elites.
Remember: This country was founded to only allow power to wealthy white landowning men, not "the people".
So when something is "populist", it's considered to be pandering to their "lessers"
@inthehands Sadly, words lose semantic content over time, which was my point. So if populism is allowed to mean “popular” or “mass appeal”, then we lose the ability to talk about the specific concept.
AOC’s reframing here cuts to the heart of it:
A politics that blames the most vulnerable people in society for society’s problems is diametrically opposed to a politics that blames the most powerful. Lumping these opposites together as both being “populism” is nonsense.
It is important, she says, to provide an explanation of the •causes• of society’s problems — both why and who — or the worst people will fill that explanatory vacuum.
@inthehands The caveat here is that a popular trick among the fascists is to cast the weak group they want to oppress as being the elites who are actually in charge of everything or at least getting some kind of unearned privilege and thus a legitimate target for the "common man" of the majority. "They come here and get free money and hotel rooms" is just the latest version of "they're secretly controlling all the money" or whatever.
@inthehands Yes, the term 'populism' is widely abused. It means a political position that your base likes but is absurd or impractical upon examination. A good example is One Nation's wish to stop migration at a time when several economic sectors depend on it and the CEO of Stockland home-builders says we need 5x the current number of skilled migrants to actually build enough homes to ease our housing crisis. Claiming the rich and powerful cause society's big problems is quite logical because they have the power. #auspol
