• GBU_28@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    13 days ago

    Where does the word travelers come from? I have it as an ear worm from a book or something

    • WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      17
      ·
      13 days ago

      Fellow travelers is a phrase used to denote someone who pushes or encourages an ideology or opinion without officially being part of the organization pushing it. It was originally applied to communist sympathizers but is used for other things commonly. A race science believer might be a fellow traveler with nazis but doesn’t have to be a member of the nationalist socialist workers party.

    • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      edit-2
      13 days ago

      According to The Free Dictionary, the term fellow travelers “originally applied to people in the early days of the Soviet Union who supported the Russian revolution and the Communist Party but were not members.”

      Additional fun fact: the name given to the early Russian satellites, “Sputnik,” has a meaning of “fellow traveler." It was mentioned on that dictionary page, but I ran it through Google Translate just to be sure. (See the third option under “More translations.”)