I feel my views are progressive. My opponents want to turn everything back to the way things were before because they disagree with my views, they are reacting to me by pushing back. So I will call them "reactionary".

And remember, this reasoning probably occured in a language other than English, where reaction may have a different connotation than it does in modern English.

For example. In modern English, "bureaucrat" has a negative, perjorative connotation: a dull, hidebound, unimaginative government paper shuffle--at best.

OTOH, "executive" has a very positive connotation; dynamic, decisive, active leadership, usually in a business environment.

But in Spanish, the two words are used interchangeably, and neither has a positve or negative connotation associated with it.

Words are defined, sometimes arbitrarily, even as slang, and the definition sticks, and then may change through time. When I worked as a postal clerk in high school "swing" meant "taking a break", and "swing room" was the worker's lounge where you could relax with a coffee or have a smoke. There is no real significance, language is all about usage.

French and Spanish both have semi-official Academies, a language police which decides what is good usage and what isn't. They have been very unsuccessful at preventing slang, linguistic drift, regional dialects, borrowing from other languages, etc. Languages evolve, like living things. Dictionaries and schools can slow the process, but not forever.