Ask Lemmy
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
view the rest of the comments
The biggest shit-stirrers on this front don't tend to express issues with authoritarianism under capitalism. In fact they tend to be the first to browbeat people to fall in line with western narratives and express contempt at challenging the existing systems. I have no obligation to take them seriously.
The problem is that you're using tankie now interchangeably with what was originally 'leninist' and the goalposts shifted for what they believe.
I can point to a recent thread where these 'tankies' are complaining about the fascists larping as communists on reddit 'tankies' are not a monolith and the site cultures are clearly different. Here's a thread where 'the tankies' on hexbear are saying that the CPRF should all be shot for supporting the SMO, and that if Putin is praising you then you're not a communist party.
Most marxists/leninists I've known in real life are pretty quick to concede the failures of previous socialist states, because having a critical understanding of history is integral to having a materialist worldview.
If people are just shouting slogans it's a problem, obviously. However that door swings both ways: I find it's more often the people complaining loudly about 'tankies' who are starting off with slogans and an uncritical reading of their own sides history.
What? Just because they're not actively going on about how the West is so shit doesn't actually mean they don't think it is, and that is especially pertinent to the fediverse since there're already so few people on here defending US-style capitalism.
I don't get the constant pedantry about the term "tankie". It's simply a pejorative for extreme far-left views which include, but is not limited to, valiant defense of authoritarian regimes, anti-US imperialist states simply because they're anti-US, etc.
Those threads you showed seem to be disdain for very niche and specific issues pertaining to Russia. Especially since those are hexbear communities which are very notorious for supporting the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Remember, the point here is not that tankies align with Russia on every single issue, it's that they do so on any issues at all; like the war in Ukraine.
If that is the case then they certainly aren't well represented here on the fediverse. All I seen on here is about how past socialist states only failed due to external contradictions, failing to see how external contradictions could have exploited internal contradictions that existed within the system.
Once again, most leftist anti-tankies already criticize the US. It is failing to see how the alternative isn't worse. I'm not defending centrists or conservatives here.
'tankie' is used a pejorative for any leftist, just like 'red' or 'commie' or 'pinko' was. You apply it to them because they say one thing, and automatically ascribe to them all of the other things that you dislike. It's a caricature.
I linked two different threads of people unanimously shitting on purported communists who are reactionary or offer full support to the war in ukraine and you read it as them being 'aligned on the war in ukraine'. I don't really know what else to say if you're just going to read the opposite.
The 'vaguely left' poster that's one of the main 'anti-tankies' is constantly posting NAFO shit and anticommunism. I don't think that we are in agreement on what 'leftist' is, beyond a self-identification.