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"Gadfly" is a term for people who upset the status quo
Status Quo

Status Quo, also known as The Quo or just Quo, are an England rock music band whose music is characterized by the twelve-bar blues....
 by posing upsetting or novel questions, or just being an irritant.

The term "gadfly" (Gk. µ??~?, muops) was used by Plato
Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greece Greeks philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Platonic Academy in Ancient Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the western world....
 in the Apology to describe Socrates
Socrates

Socrates was a Classical Greece Philosophy. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known only through the classical accounts of his students....
' relationship of uncomfortable goad to the Athenian
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 political scene, which he compared to a slow and dimwitted horse. The Bible also references the gadfly in terms of political influence; The Book of Jeremiah (46:20, Darby Bible
Darby Bible

The Darby Bible refers to the Bible as translated from Hebrew language and Greek language by John Nelson Darby. The English version was first published in 1890....
) states "Egypt is a very fair heifer; the gad-fly cometh, it cometh from the north." The term has been used to describe many politicians and social commentators; in modern Hebrew, which knows many more idioms than those used by Jeremiah, gadfly is "mekhapes pagam" literally "fault searcher".

During his defense
Apology (Plato)

Apology is Plato's version of the Speech given by Socrates as he defends himself against the charges of being a man "who corrupted the young, refused to worship the deity, and created new deities"....
 when on trial for his life, Socrates, according to Plato's writings, pointed out that dissent
Dissent

'Dissent' is a sentiment or philosophy of non-agreement or opposition to an idea or an entity . The term's antonyms include ...
, like the tiny (relative to the size of a horse) gadfly, was easy to swat, but the cost to society of silencing individuals who were irritating could be very high.






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"Gadfly" is a term for people who upset the status quo
Status Quo

Status Quo, also known as The Quo or just Quo, are an England rock music band whose music is characterized by the twelve-bar blues....
 by posing upsetting or novel questions, or just being an irritant.

The term "gadfly" (Gk. µ??~?, muops) was used by Plato
Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greece Greeks philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Platonic Academy in Ancient Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the western world....
 in the Apology to describe Socrates
Socrates

Socrates was a Classical Greece Philosophy. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known only through the classical accounts of his students....
' relationship of uncomfortable goad to the Athenian
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 political scene, which he compared to a slow and dimwitted horse. The Bible also references the gadfly in terms of political influence; The Book of Jeremiah (46:20, Darby Bible
Darby Bible

The Darby Bible refers to the Bible as translated from Hebrew language and Greek language by John Nelson Darby. The English version was first published in 1890....
) states "Egypt is a very fair heifer; the gad-fly cometh, it cometh from the north." The term has been used to describe many politicians and social commentators; in modern Hebrew, which knows many more idioms than those used by Jeremiah, gadfly is "mekhapes pagam" literally "fault searcher".

During his defense
Apology (Plato)

Apology is Plato's version of the Speech given by Socrates as he defends himself against the charges of being a man "who corrupted the young, refused to worship the deity, and created new deities"....
 when on trial for his life, Socrates, according to Plato's writings, pointed out that dissent
Dissent

'Dissent' is a sentiment or philosophy of non-agreement or opposition to an idea or an entity . The term's antonyms include ...
, like the tiny (relative to the size of a horse) gadfly, was easy to swat, but the cost to society of silencing individuals who were irritating could be very high. "If you kill a man like me, you will injure yourselves more than you will injure me," because his role was that of a gadfly, "to sting people and whip them into a fury, all in the service of truth."

In modern and local politics, gadfly is a term used to describe someone who persistently challenges people in positions of power, the status quo or a popular position. The word may be uttered in a pejorative
Pejorative

Words and phrases are pejorative if they imply disapproval or contempt. When used as an adjective, pejorative is synonymous with derogatory, derisive, dyslogistic, and contemptuous....
 sense, while at the same time be accepted as a description of honorable work or civic duty.

See also

  • Deconstruction
    Deconstruction

    Deconstruction is a term used in philosophy, literary criticism, and the social sciences, popularised through its usage by Jacques Derrida in the 1960s....
  • Gadfly (mythology)
    Gadfly (mythology)

    The gadfly, a type of fly plaguing cattle, typically ones belonging to either the family Tabanidae or the family Oestridae , appears in Greek mythology as a tormenter to Io , the heifer maiden....