Misuse of Political Labels

To clarify:Why is use of the term 'SJW' to dismiss viewpoints not ok - but use of the word 'racist' for the same purpose is rife.

I think that the problem is that Republicans tend to use the terms as bogeymen and catch all straw men to attack the other side (e.g. Antifa, woke, social justice warrior). That creates a situation where, even if the term still could be useful for describing an ideology, it becomes associated with bad faith arguments. If Republicans argued more in good faith then I don't think we would see this phenomena as much.

A big part of the problem is that terms like 'racist' are often used as synonyms for 'people who don't share my viewpoint'. As long as that level of hyperbole is present, you can't have meaningful conversations on this stuff.

In the past, whenever I read the word 'racist' or 'sexist', it was an alarm bell, signifying that there's a good chance someone was in the wrong. Nowadays, whenever I read the word 'racist' or 'sexist' in an article, I replace it with the words, 'something outside of the bounds of what the author finds politically acceptable.' I don't do this literally, of course. It's just that the words are thrown around so much that it's be

Leftists using it as an insult?

I'm not surprised. I consider it a badge of honor that neo-nazis, neo-confederates, racists, white supremacists, sexists, kiddy diddlers, et al, side against me.You might consider being concerned if your ideas and attitudes align with those of the aforementioned deplorables. And yes, that would be the correct term.Edit: Calling people by the correct descriptive terms is not smearing. I'm sorry you are confused.

No it's not. Stop diluting terms. You're making this problem worse for everyone, even the people you think you're on the side of, whoever they might be.

| many people are tired of being called racists, bigots, misogynists, etc., for simply opposing nationalismNow I'm completely confused. Is this really happening?

This (conflating opposition to a process or movement for X with opposition to X) seems to be a common trick in the political discourse nowadays, and is unfortunately called out very rarely. We didn't hear many instances of "anti-jobs" as suggested in this article, but it seems like describing a variety of institutions as "anti-white" has been a right-wing staple since long before the emergence of well-connected Tumblr and Twitter rubes who could plausibly be described as

Meant in a merely descriptive way to describe the new breed of lefty extremists. In other words a bit of both of your meanings. This is a prime example of folks who think pushing their identity politics is a higher priority than ethics, and have gone a bit too far. This seems to happen with every movement, even well-intentioned ones.Not meant pejoratively outside of how poorly this current example speaks of the movement.<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=336107