Rant on "Populism" 乱谈民粹主义

由于对“民粹主义”的滥用、污名化，以及对populism与demagogy的混用不满，跟朋友讨论时的rant在此记录

维基百科对"populism"的定义是

A common framework for interpreting populism is known as the ideational approach: this defines populism as an ideology which presents "the people" as a morally good force and contrasts them against "the elite", who are portrayed as corrupt and self-serving.

简而言之，一位Populist的立场是代表“人民”，以”精英“为敌

近年两位被标签成Populist的人物，无非就是Donald Trump和Bernie Sanders，可是由于对Populism的污名化和乱用，网络上出现了很多Bernie=Trump的言论，这里要证明的是Bernie的Populism与Trump的Demagogy的不同

Populism与Demagogy的混淆使一切草根运动都失去了正当性

维基百科对"demagogue"的定义是

A demagogue is a leader who gains popularity in a democracy by exploiting emotions, prejudice, and ignorance to arouse the common people against elites, whipping up the passions of the crowd and shutting down reasoned deliberation. Demagogues overturn established norms of political conduct, or promise or threaten to do so.

其实看两者的定义，的确很容易两者互用，毕竟都是代表”人民“去打败”精英“不是吗? 可是demagogue这个词包含着更深的含义，它还带有一层“虚伪”、一层"disingenuous"在里面，一个demagogue代表“人民”的目的，并不是为了人民，而是为了自己，以人民为工具来实现自己的目的，支持者想听到什么，Ta就会说什么，无论是用Caravan去制造恐慌，还是用Lock her up去制造仇恨，威胁暴力（beat the shit out of him, will ya），亦或者是反智主义（I know the best words），Ta为了权力不择手段。

而一位populist，Ta只是在"the people"和"the elite"这两元中选择代表"the people"的利益，而被the people支持的人。

当一位左派政治家的核心理念（比如Sanders）与马克思主义一样，认为无论国家斗争（战争），种族斗争（歧视），各种斗争的本质，都是阶级斗争，而阶级斗争的最简单描述便是People vs. Elite，那么Ta在转递他的理念的同时，如何才不能自动成为一位（被污名化的）“populist”？

if a candidate's fundamental belief, (most likely a leftist candidate), is that all conflict and struggle in its core is class struggle
then how does that candidate, when relaying his/her message, not automatically becomes a populist

现时对Populism的滥用与污名化，只会制造一种深层的cynicism：那就是永远不会有一位候选人会为“人民”奋斗，如果有点话，Ta也只是在为达到自己的目的来说慌。结果便是把人们推倒了一位真正只知道维护精英的利益的候选人那边，而人民永远也无法翻身做主。

the use of "populism" as derogatory term, does nothing but creates a deep cynicism, that there's will never be a candidate that fights for "the people"and anyone who does is a liar, thus moving people towards a candidate that only protects the profit of the elite