Someone using "settler colonialism", "turtle island", etc etc is akin to hearing a Republican bring up Hunter Biden in that I know I can simpy discount everything they say about everything.

It's also more aggravating than the Republican version -- the MAGA vibe of "I'm just a simple man who believes what I see" is way more tolerable than "My niche hyper-privileged worldview represents the pinnacle of human intellect".

Hm. I wonder why one of those is more tolerable to you than the other. What a mystery. Also complaining about intellectual smugness is rich coming from the official technocracy fandom subreddit.

but postcolonial theory is decades old, why are they all acting like it's something that only sprung up recently?

because now people are applying it in ways that pose a very immediate and significant threat to western interests in the middle east, and discourse about how palestinians are somehow the colonizers didn't stick, so the best move for maintaining western hegemony is to denounce it. up until now, ignoring it or paying small inconsequential lip service towards it was the better move (because jumping the gun on that would end up being received a lot like republican fearmongering about CRT), but that only remains the case as long as the material impact of it can be contained.

Strategy of Tension : "Did somebody call?"