| S.Peelman said: Got to say it’s kind of weird for me to keep reading about “No Kings Day” protests and seeing the signs and the images when in my country ‘King’s Day’ is basically our national holiday and everybody is always super happy on that day lol. |
SvennoJ said:
Haha, yep I didn't get the reference at first either, neither did my wife and she's Canadian. (So she's used to Queen Elizabeth and now King Charles as King of Canada) I was more used to Koninginnedag or Queen's day though, what I grew up with. Anyway both used to King just meaning some (99%) powerless ceremonial state head. I wish Trump was just that lol. |
One of the reasons why "No Kings" hits better than say "No Dictator" in the American context is historical. U.S Conservatives (and liberals, but especially conservatives) use to pride themselves as inheritors and extenders of Classical Republicanism. Both parties more or less descend from and have called themselves at different points republican parties, with the more monarchy-positive Federalist Party having died out in the early 19th Century.
George III plays the role of a tyrant in the founding myth (even if the reality was a lot more nuanced.)
The American population is 90% small "r" republican if you go by polls.
So "No Kings" has a lot of symbolic meaning here that "No Dictators" likely wouldn't. With the latter, you'd pretty much just get the radical right (which controls the GOP now) responding with things like "If Trump is a dictator then Lincoln was a dictator. Trump isn't doing anything he didn't." You also capture Trump's flamboyance-ness with "No Kings" and therefore target the whole populist spectrum, as that is something which disgusts large segments of the populist-right.
