Had a heated argument with a tankie who glorified stalin and lenin. So fucking tired. The worst thing he’s a discord mod of a good streamer, and i left the server because i can’t be there anymore. Context: i’m russian whose grand-grandparents were repressed and forcibly relocated. Left Russia several years ago because i didn’t want to support the aggressive war in Ukraine. And his american (no offense to amreicans tho) ass tried to explain me that stalin is an actual hero who singlehandedly saved Europe from fascism, and all repressed were rich “bourgeois land owners” (actually, no. but even if yes, that’s a terrorism). Then he and other user started posting stupid tankie memes. Ofc they ignored my questions how LGBT+, religious groups and small nations were treated and deleted the message. I’m sick of that shit. Needed to vent somewhere.
I wonder if it’s a symptom of the great age of misinformation, in such that, people can’t trust anything they read, and therefore create or believe propaganda, that was previously discarded. Like how there’s a whole heap of people believing the 50’s propaganda when they had to tell all the women who were working “man” jobs, earning their own money and doing all the things that they were actually happier just slave labouring at home with no rights to vote or have a bank account etc, and they put out all this propaganda in the adds etc at the time to shove women back in the box, and they were all depressed af, and had to take drugs to get through the misery of their day, and all that propaganda was discarded, eventually, but this big wave of a certain type of person is cherry picking mystical meaning from that era. You know. Like that.
I can’t for the life of me understand why someone would advocate for an authoritarian government. Is it really just a really deep belief that “some animals are more equal than others” and that exploiting or oppressing those “lesser” is good?
frankly, yes. you’ve summarized the position basically perfectly. there’s a lot of people out there who view hierarchical society as necessary and good. auth comms take issue with the order of the hierarchy, but not with the structure of it
also that bootlickers yearn for someone to tell them what to do
and the answer to that is easy: they need to tell themselves. Or if they so badly want to, they should read Kropotkin.
I’m not generally a fan of memes that imply an equivalence between the auth-left and auth-right, because they tend to be used by “enlightened centrists” to push horseshoe theory and over-simplify an already over-simplified political compass.
…but the “but I wish it had been” got me pretty good. They really do be like that.
Also, it’s “so forth”, not “so fourth”.
I made this two months ago, on horeshoe theory:
Communism itself obviously isn’t nazism, if someone says that your comment may apply. But tankies are as close as it gets.
The thing is that communism on it’s own doesn’t mean much or can mean many things. Kropotkin’s anarcho communism? Hell, I’m in. But nowadays, the term communism is pretty much only used by tankies and I’m fine with letting them keep the term. I don’t need it that much.
a few friends from post soviet states introduced me to that what we in the west refer to as left vs right or communist vs capitalist they refer to as anarchist vs fascist. the communist label got so attached to a fascist form of government that it probably can’t ever be reclaimed, and we have to find another label that is more resistant to cooption
“freedom and order” vs “censorship and chaos”
first is whatever anarchocommunism is, second is fascism, capitalism, and all forms of totalitarianism (including Trump’s MAGAs)
because if there’s freedom, that’s an order of liberty
and if there’s chaos, there’s only censorship
Anarchism isn’t seen as positive by everyone but very difficult to corrupt by auth*ritarians
yup. and it’s easier to talk people through anarchism isn’t as bad as they’ve been led to believe than to reclaim communism from authoritarians. the problem you run into talking about anarchism is socdems and enlightened centrists calling you a simple minded brute
Left Russia several years ago because i didn’t want to support the aggressive war in Ukraine.
How is it going after relocating?
It’s good, thanks. I moved to Finland, very nice country. My wife, pets and some of my friends moved with me, and I found new friends in the company I work
The very idea that 21st century Russia is “anti-imperialist”, as they are actively engaged in a war to take over land that belongs to another country, is laughable.
And China? Have we forgotten what happened to Hong Kong less than a decade ago already? Are we not aware of the current circumstances in Xinjiang and Tibet? Of the threats towards Taiwan, including aggressive incursions in their airspace?
You don’t understand it’s only imperialism if it comes from the imperial region of the evil American empire.
Can you define imperialism?
A group dominating another area than what the global community considers to be that group’s, through infiltration, coups, annexation, exploitation, and colonialism.
So, what pretty much every society did that’s not anarchocommunist.
Yes it’s when one country loves another but the other country doesn’t want anything to do with it so they use diplomacy or sometimes place their military into the other country and commit war crimes to try to make the country love them back.
Imperialism is when America. Duh.
Otherwise it’s just a sparkling annexation.
Otherwise it’s sparkling Read More Theory.
If only they would fight against each other
Remember our rule about no tankie apologia before you comment!
Removed by mod
I’m not a tankie nor tankie apologist. Could you explain what was about it (my comment)*?
I may be missing some vernacular or something, but last I checked, the ‘both sides’ argument is used by fascists as a centrist mask.
Same with unity being an important concept in fighting fascism.
So, what am I missing? I’m asking seriously here.
There are authoritarians on both the left and right. They share an uncomfortable amount of traits with one another.
No I know, but my comment was explicitly criticizing (the parent comment, in favor of)* the two arguments I highlighted above. It was deleted without explanation.
The “left-right” spectrum is too vague to be of any real use.
“leftist unity” is just “trickle down economics” for Marxists.
That’s why a political compass looks like this
I dislike the political compass because it lends too much to right-wing libertarianism. Right-wing libertarianism moves the boot from the state to corporations.
right? 3 quarters of this are different kinds of authoritarian
One problem is that it doesn’t really show authoritarian tendency since left authoritarians will end in the left lib corner because there goal is a liberated society and they don’t get that they don’t get there by authoritative means. It’s all just for now, trust me bro
political compass is honestly worse than a vague idea of left and right to me.
forcing a human beings complex and ever-changing moral and political thought into a literal box, i feel, has done irreparable damage to today’s modern understanding of ideology. at least everyone understands the nuance between what “left” and “right” can be due to it being so muddy.
Removed by mod