Nazi

Nazi is derogatory term for members of the Nazi Party (NSDAP), or for supporters and adherents of National Socialism (better known as Nazism). Nazi is also commonly used to describe people who espouse similar views to those expressed by the NSDAP, or in reference to anything related to Nazi Germany (that is, Germany under the rule of the Nazi Party, from 1933 to 1945).

Post-World War II supporters of Nazism are often called "Neo-Nazis". Someone who supported Nazism before 1945 and continued to adhere to Nazism even after the end of the Second World War is sometimes referred to as an "Old Nazi" (Altnazi).

The original Nazis as well as Neo-Nazis tend to (though not always) reject the label and derivatives of it, knowing that it was first used in reference to them as an insult and that Nazism carries a lot of historical baggage.

Etymology

Nazi had been used as a nickname for people named Ignaz for years before the Nazi Party was even founded. The name Ignaz was popular in majority-Catholic regions such as Austria, Bavaria, and Bohemia in the late-1800s and early-1900s, leading many Northern Germans to begin using the term Nazi as an insult for Austrians and Bavarians, who they perceived as backwards, unsophisticated, and reactionary.

In addition, Nationalsozialist ('National Socialist') could be shortened to just Nazi, just as Sozi (another political insult in German) was short for Sozialist ('Socialist').

The facts that Nazi was already an insult and that Nationalsozialist could be shortened to Nazi, along with the fact that the Nazi Party itself was founded in Bavaria, is why opponents of Nazism began using the term.