The ism suffix: Far too many people think that simply calling someone a (parameter)ist suddenly makes the parameter under question an invalid one to use when forming expectations about someone.
The one most often egregiously used is "classism". Class matters. When one looks at the social mobility of the children of immigrants versus that of the native populations in first world countries, it becomes apparent that after a couple of generations in a mostly free society, most families have reached their natural level. A lot of immigrants are poor, or working in well paid but low status businesses. Their children rarely are. This is because most immigrants are intelligent ambitious people form countries where that wasn't rewarded. Once they're in a country where those traits are rewarded, they reap those rewards.
When you meet someone whose family has been in the slums or trailer parks for generations you can make reasonable assumptions about their ability, work ethic and ambitions.
Yes that is classism and it is valid.
I've also heard ridiculous terms such as "speciesism", "heightism", "sizeism", and the most ridiculous of them all "ableism". Somehow not hiring someone because they aren't able to do the job is bad.
Of course this is all a rhetorical trick to get people to think of those judgments as equivalent to racism. See, they are all "isms", therefore all bad.
Denialism/Denialist: This term was first applied to those who question the fact or the degree of the holocaust. And at the time I didn't object to this because it was clearly being applied only to nut-bars. But then I saw the term being applied to Norman Finkelstein. My cursory examination of his position leads me to believe that his arguments regarding people hijacking the holocaust for current personal or political gain are worth considering. But he doesn't deny it happened. I don't know if he is correct or not, but he doesn't belong in the same class as those who denied it happened.
Then it was applied to those who question the degree of, and the degree of human contribution to global warming. It is used to imply that they are corrupt, just working to make the case for "big oil", because that who funds their grants. Funny how those who support the alarmist position are never considered to be corrupt, just making the case for "big regulatory bureaucracy". Nevertheless, it is used to impugn the men rather than refute their augments.
Now it has been used against anyone who waits for evidence in support of a rape accusation. They are now "rape denialists".
Social Justice: An action or situation, where the concept of justice even applies is either just or it isn't. "Social Justice" is just a term of art used to evade the fact that someone is being denied proper justice, to further some purported greater justice. If frequently comes in the form of "It's OK to deny you this position in favor of this less qualified candidate because someone who looks like you did something bad to someone who looks like him in the distant past.".
When the wronged party and the party perpetrating the wrong or both are dead before the situation can be remedied, the sad fact is that justice will be eternally denied. Further injustice is just that. It's not remedial. It just adds to the amount of injustice in the world.
Progressive: This may just be applicable to American political discourse. It is usually applied to small 's' socialists, those who tolerate a free economy to the degree that it provides the wealth for them to redistribute and the actors in the productive portions of that economy do as they are told. Some time between the wars those with these beliefs hijacked the term "liberal" form those who support liberty. To see how liberal they really are, ask them how many laws and regulations they want repealed. If they name anything beyond the narrowly personal, I'll eat a vegetable.
As an aside, I think we should take the term back, instead of using clumsy terms like "libertarian". Maybe the Australians can help with this since their Liberal party is actually a liberal party.
Once the hijacked form of the term became recognized as referring to those who support the banning of sodas beyond a certain size and the exhalation of water vapor they needed a new term and the settled on "progressive".
It's clever rhetoric. Who could be against progress in a world that has benefited greatly from progress in manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, medicine, communications, hell, damn near every field of human endeavor, including politics. Of course they gloss over the fact that those advances came about because of proper liberalism.
They use the term "progressive" to imply that their policies will bring forth more of what has happened in the past. Of course progress is really just change, it doesn't specify the nature of change. If you're in a car speeding towards a cliff, progress is the last thing you want. If your country is progressing towards the states of Britain or the U.S. in the seventies, you want a Thatcher or a Reagan to hit the brakes and throw it in reverse.
The Masses: Has this term ever come from someone who is not a smug douche? When it comes to manga, sports, video games, kangaroo racing and a lot of other things, I'm the masses. I don't give these thing s much attention. That doesn't mean I can't recognize a bad story, a dropped ball, a boring game, or a poor jump, if kangaroo racing is even a real thing.
Referring to people as "the masses" is probably the most dismissive piece of rhetoric ever invented. When you hear it, you won't have to look far to find someone in a fedora with a beard or a curly mustache, who studied comm or literature.
