Cool - it’s nice that you say this is an American trait. I was almost about to say that this entire setup was manufactured to pit Americans against each other, weaponising victimhood and identity, with the complicity of legacy media and big tech. And out of the three players in this game - the ‘left’/‘libs’, ‘right’/‘conservatives’ and the billionaire fascists up top pulling the strings, only the billionaires stand to win.
It depends on the insult; sometimes that doesn't work. One of the purest expressions of joy I've seen in politics was Scott Adams (Dilbert guy) back in 2019 analysing [0] a group of anti-Trumpers trying to rally around being called "human scum". He had a lot of interesting things to say back then about the art and science of persuasion.
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_3HGjAVv0M 1:30 to 7:30
Godwin himself openly endorsed calling Trump a Nazi.
My takeaway is exactly the opposite, that not only were people right to call out radical fascist elements and influences in our society, they (we) were wrong to be cowed.
In a different timeline, Trump being called a Nazi or any of the vicinity terms should have been an immediate termination of his campaign chances.
What actually happened is Trump ignored it (as he should) and the American people shrugged "OK" and went to vote for him with complete disregard.
Then Musk got called a Nazi at the inauguration, and the American people shrugged "OK" and went back to facepalming at just how much sheer waste the government has with complete disregard.
The moral you should take away is you should not invoke Godwin's Law. It's probably too late for "Nazi", "racism", "sexism", and a host of other insults the Left have thrown around to see what sticks (none have), but that doesn't mean future originally-valuable-terminology have to face the same fate.
Another moral is that insulting Americans probably doesn't actually work in general. "Deplorables", "Garbage", and others were turned around into rallying cries during the 2016 and 2024 campaigns, not unlike the original meaning behind the term "Yankee" which was originally an insult not unlike "Kraut" or "Jap" but is now one of the fondest nicknames of Americans.