I'm not making any value judgements about what these people are doing. What I am doing is calling for more clarity of terms.

Meme stock traders are, as you say, looking for "very interesting short term swing trades". That makes this activity *trading*, not investing. Maybe some people are buying because they want to "stick it to the shorts" and are furious at how the system seems to be allowing them to continue naked short selling despite its destructive potential. That sounds more like "political activism" to me, which is also not investing.

I have no issues with people who trade, as long as they realise what they are doing is trading, and risk manage accordingly.

The problem arises when people who aren't savvy about the markets get involved for the first time, conflate trading with investing, and end up losing their shirts because they put their hard-earned savings into a trade thinking it was a long-term investment. I knew two people who made that mistake, one of whom couldn't take the pressure and took her own life.