"Peacenik" as pejorative

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Excuuuuuse me for not wanting to blow up the rest of the world

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 17:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Not even certain portions of the world?

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 10 February 2003 17:57 (twenty-two years ago)

http://killing-joke.com/bomb.gif

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 10 February 2003 17:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Just because I don't want to doesn't mean I wouldn't

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 18:00 (twenty-two years ago)

This word dates to the early days of anti-Vietnam protests. It contains both a hint of red-baiting ("sputnik") and a little anti-hipsterism ("beatnik"), cf. my hipster thread.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 18:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Don't people sound evil when their criticism of someone is that they like peace too much?

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 18:16 (twenty-two years ago)

iceland should be blown up for giving the world Sigur Ros.

― Tad (llamasfur), Monday, 10 February 2003 18:27 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah, but I'd show them mercy cuz of Bjork

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 18:30 (twenty-two years ago)

That was interesting, Amateurist.

― Sarah McLusky (coco), Monday, 10 February 2003 19:32 (twenty-two years ago)

The criticism isn't that Peaceniks like peace too much, it's that they're naive.

― Stuart, Monday, 10 February 2003 19:38 (twenty-two years ago)

"Naiveniks" then? Doesn't have the same ring, eh?

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 19:39 (twenty-two years ago)

The impeccably well-informed Amateurist is once again OTM. A peacenik, as originally conceived, may be legitimately suspected of being a pinko, a fellow traveller or even a comsimp. They sometimes are the dupes of outside agitators and suffer from debilitating bouts of unAmericanism.

― Aimless, Monday, 10 February 2003 19:47 (twenty-two years ago)

I understand the intentions of those using peacenik as a pejorative, but shouldn't they have chose something else to hang their hat on?
It just doesn't seem like much of an insult and makes the person look like they are against peace. The use of peace in any insult seems comical to me--it reflects the stereotype that people who are pro-war are evil and aren't working for peace.

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I think the pejorative cast of the word has declined somewhat since the Cold War, since (a) it's more difficult to red-bait and (b) now peace is ostensibly the norm and the warmongers are deviating. At least, that's how it seemed before Sept. 11, 2001.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Have you listened to any talk radio since the whole Iraq War thing started? I think 'peacenik' is said more often than "we'll be right back"

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Have you listened to any talk radio since the whole Iraq War thing started?

Actually, no (I'd probably have a aneurysm if I did). That's interesting that they use "peacenik" as a pejorative frequently.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Oops, wake up and smell the napalm! You are making the common mistake of thinking of peace as something inherently good. A true-blue 100% American knows that peace is inherently suspicious and unnatural, like homosexuality, ascot ties and burning candles for a saint. Such things cannot be admitted unless and until they are sanctioned by the President of the United States, and sometimes not even then the taint of them is so strong that rather than being elevated by the benison of presidential approval, they create a powerful drag that pulls the Great Leader straight to hell by the heels.

― Aimless, Monday, 10 February 2003 20:08 (twenty-two years ago)

they don't - they just say 'liberals', two birds one stone, nevermind the accuracy per usual

ascot ties = mason plot

― James Blount (James Blount), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:10 (twenty-two years ago)

The hosts seem to be smart enough to not use 'peacenik', but callers are a different story and probaly reflect society better than the rarefied talk show host

― Oops (Oops), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:12 (twenty-two years ago)

How about Bunny- and Tree-huggers? Those are pejoratives even though there's nothing wrong with bunnies, trees, or hugs.

Peace and pacifism are two very different things. Producing peace by denouncing war is like producing health by denouncing the immune system.

― Stuart, Monday, 10 February 2003 20:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Producing peace by denouncing war is like producing health by denouncing the immune system

But you're falling into the same trap as the "peaceniks," that is, removing the ideas of war and peace from historical context. There are wars and there are times of peace; it is silly to argue that all wars have the same political effect just as it is silly to argue for "peace" on every occasion where the possibility of military conflict arises (it necess. begs the question, peace on whose terms?).

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:23 (twenty-two years ago)

By "peaceniks" there I mean the construction of the RW ideologues, not necessarily the actual anti-war protestors. Although I've no doubt there are actual people that more-or-less fit the cliche.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:24 (twenty-two years ago)

bunnyhuggers!!!

― James Blount (James Blount), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:24 (twenty-two years ago)

i heard the sputnik => beatnik => peacenik derivation before, and i always stumble at the first step of it

i mean obviously it does come via an implied sense of moscow-duped tinge (narodnik etc), but a sputnik is just so much not the same kind of a thing as a beatnik,

(i think i disbelieve it bcz it actually has a kind of poetic imagination to it — they are both soviet satellites haha? — that i don't want to credit the coiners of the term with: but maybe that's a bad reason for disbelief)

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:25 (twenty-two years ago)

"implied sense of moscow-duped tinge" = eenglish as she be spoked here, blokes

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:26 (twenty-two years ago)

But the launch of Sputnik was such a huge media event that it's not so unlikely that people would pick up on it to formulate neologisms, etc. Although I didn't mean to imply by my post again that "peacenik" necessarily derived from "Sputnik"; I was using the satellite as an example to illustrate the comsimp implications of the word. There are obv. lots of other "-nik" words from which it could have derived.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:27 (twenty-two years ago)

"my post again" = my post upthread

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:27 (twenty-two years ago)

-nik being an all purpose suffix like -core

― James Blount (James Blount), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Emonik, slownik, hardnik, etc.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:30 (twenty-two years ago)

no i know amateurist, and this probably IS the derivation, it's just i don't know of any other post-sputnik "x-nik" coinings, and you'd think there would be others, by exactly the same logic (maybe there were dozens but i never came across any, i don't think)

(i think beatnik => peacenik is a sure thing, but it's a lot later)

(the thing about hardcore etc is that hard and core are both words in their own right, so the formulation of eg sludgecore is easily readable in a rockpaper headline say — whereas "sputnik" doesn't obviously collapse into "sput" and "nik" if yr not russian, so how would "beatnik" be being read in its early appearances?)

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Actually I'm as likely to believe that the source is Jewish culture as much as the Cold War, since -nik is a suffix more prevalent in Yiddish than in Russian.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:40 (twenty-two years ago)

(Jewish culture of course being a major influence on American culture in those years, in general.)

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:40 (twenty-two years ago)

that makes much more sense to me (the amount of russian i know = the amount of yiddish i know = little)

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:43 (twenty-two years ago)

(I still think even if the derivation was from Jewish/Yiddish culture, the comsimp associations were there.)

God, I'm so pedantic. (Pedantry: C or D?)

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

sputnik => beatnik => peacenik => beckylovesnik

― N. (nickdastoor), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Becky Lucas was a pinko plant!

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:46 (twenty-two years ago)

http://photos.imageevent.com/bloomlovers/minissemis/icons/Smoldering%20Pink%20Plant.JPG

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:47 (twenty-two years ago)

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