Dictionary Definition
pinko n : emotionally charged terms used to refer
to extreme radicals or revolutionaries [syn: Bolshevik, Marxist, red, bolshie] [also: pinkoes (pl)]
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Pronunciation
-
- Rhymes: -ɪŋkəʊ
Etymology
From the term red, affiliated with communism, as pink is a lighter, more diluted form. (1936)Related terms
Extensive Definition
Pinko is a derogatory term for a person regarded
as sympathetic to Communism, though
not necessarily a Communist
Party member. The term has its origins in the notion that pink
is a lighter shade of red, the color associated with communism;
thus pink could be thought of as a "lighter form of communism"
promoted by mere supporters of socialism who weren't,
themselves, "card-carrying" communists.
History
Politics
The word pinko was coined by Time magazine in 1926 as a variant on the noun and adjective pink, which had been used along with parlor pink since the beginning of the 20th century to refer to those of leftish sympathies, usually with an implication of "effeteness". In the 1920s, for example, a Wall Street Journal editorial described supporters of the progressive politician Robert La Follette as “visionaries, ne’er do wells, parlor pinks, reds, hyphenates [Americans with divided allegiance], soft handed agriculturalists and working men who have never seen a shovel.”Pinko and pink were widely used during the
Cold War
to label individuals accused of supporting the Soviet
Union, including many supporters of ex-vice president Henry
Wallace's 1948 U.S. presidential campaign with the
Progressive Party. The word was predominantly used in the
United States, where opposition to Communism grew strong among the
population, especially during the McCarthy era.
It was also in common use in South Africa
during the apartheid
era. In his two presidential campaigns, Alabama governor
George
Wallace often railed at "the left-wing pinko press" and at
"pseudo-pinko-intellectuals."
Some of the most infamous uses of the term pink
came during future president Richard
Nixon's 1950 Senate campaign against Helen Gahagan
Douglas: "She's pink right down to her underwear!" — a play on
the fact that, at the time, pink was the usual color of women's
undergarments. Nixon regularly referred to her as "the Pink Lady",
and his campaign distributed political flyers printed on sheets of
pink paper.
Popular culture
One of the most famous uses of the term in popular culture was the ironic use by Charlie Daniels in his breakthrough 1972 hit "Uneasy Rider." The dope-running hippie narrator is stuck with a flat tire in Jackson, Mississippi. Attempting to avoid a beatdown by the locals, he attempts to deflect attention to one of the locals by accusing him of being "a friend of them long haired, hippy-type, pinko fags" sent by the FBI to infiltrate the Ku Klux Klan.Archie
Bunker, the patriarch of the Bunker family in the 1970s sitcom
"All in the Family" often derisively used the term 'pinko' when
referring to his liberal son-in-law
Michael "Meathead" Stivic or Michael's friends.
Recently, the term was used repeatedly on the
television series John
Safran vs God when Safran is
referring to his target demographic. Safran is likely to have
intentionally referenced Daniels' "Uneasy Rider", and notably
Safran had on a previous episode infiltrated the Ku Klux
Klan.
Although not using the word 'Pinko', there are
several uses of the word 'Red' in the
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and using
the slogan "Rather be Dead than Red" on a banner, which a KGB agent runs
over.
Pinko Mag is an
online magazine, the Journal of Conscientious Hedonism.
Notes
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
Bolshevik, Jacobin, Wobbly, anarchist,
anarcho-syndicalist, extreme left-winger, extremist, left-wing
extremist, lunatic fringe, mild radical, nihilist, parlor Bolshevik,
parlor pink, pink, radical, red, revolutionary, revolutionist,
sans-culotte, subversive, syndicalist, ultra, ultraist, yippie