Ruth, we can distance ourselves from the word—but one problem with that is that members of the Democratic Party, like AOC, call themselves Democratic Socialists, and they're not going to stop.
Another problem . . .
A better strategy is to own, reclaim, and reshape the word.
Words change their meaning over time, evolving with popular usage.
Sometimes the changes happen quickly. One year ago, I never thought I’d use the word “mute” this way: “She annoyed me, so I muted her."
washingtonpost.com/news/the-inter…
Look what happened to the word “liberal.”
One source defined it as social programs paid for by taxes, which isn't much better.
But we can still reclaim it and create a semantic shift by how we use it, if enough people use it in positive ways, like: “Socialism means we care about the society.”
It's probably the way to fight all fear-mongering. Reclaiming and using words in positive ways.
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