Remember me comrades!

You all use tankie exactly the same way republicans use woke. As a meaningless thought-terminating cliche deployed against literally everyone to your left to avoid actually learning anything.

Or the way tankies use the phrase 'libs.'
- Not really? The only thing you ever say to us is "tankie" or accuse us of being bots of some sort. You never actually engage in any discourse. That's why you have this terminology, it functions as a method of literally dodging any engagement with anything we say, effectively by calling someone a tankie you give yourselves a socially acceptable way to avoid learning anything from socialists. It's thought-terminating.
  If you have anything worth saying that's actually in good-faith I will completely engage with you. The point is that you deploy this word to avoid any engagement. The tactic is exactly the same tactic as the conservatives use to avoid any right-wing people engaging with anything to the left of them, if it's "woke" they can switch off their brain and exercise avoidance to learning anything about it that might make them think differently.
  Liberals, of both the conservative and democrat variety, both use exactly the same tactic on the people to their left.
  Talk to me about something a marxist has just dismissed you on with the use of "lib". I am happy to talk to you about it. What do you want to say? We call you libs because you ARE libs. You support Liberalism. The ideology of capitalism. Our actual analog to "tankie" is calling you dronies.

It's a vibes-based invective liberals use the same way chuds use "woke" to dispel any cognitive dissonance that might crop up whenever they discover information they find displeasing because it might mean the rest of the delusions they're immersed in might not be all that airtight. Just a thought-terminating word with absolutely no meaning. Just like "whataboutism," it's a weasel's way out of addressing someone else's argument in good faith (which I have yet to see you display in this thread).

Personally, it's absolutely fucking hilarious to see how much these words get thrown around, especially when it comes from so-called "leftists." If you truly are one, you ought to quit it with that bullshit.

Go Team Venture!
- ✌️💀✌️
I know it gets used like shit but do you think there's any utility in the term 'whataboutism' if the definition is strict? Like I always understood it to be pointing out ludicrous pontificating about things that'll never happen. Obviously that's not how it's used at all in reality and your description is much more apt.
- The new use will struggle while the old use remains popular
  
  I believe that was the original intent of the word, just wondering if it's essentially defunct because of how it's used now.
  
  The term (or the term whataboutery, which it emerged from) was originally used by pro-British newspapers during the troubles to complain that when people would whine about IRA activities others would respond by pointing out that their direct opposition, the British, were committing atrocities.
  It's always been a tool for Western hegemony to avoid criticism and accusations of hypocrisy.
  
  Wow that was definitely an enlightening read on the etymology, so the word was fucked from the get go haha..
  Sean O’Conaill (1976) - 'I would not suggest such a thing were it not for the Whatabouts. These are the people who answer every condemnation of the Provisional I.R.A. with an argument to prove the greater immorality of the “enemy”, and therefore the justice of the Provisionals’ cause: “What about Bloody Sunday, internment, torture, force feeding, army intimidation?”. '
  
  Your willingness to change in the face of evidence is a breath of fresh air, thank you!
  
  I see, my mistake, though from a descriptivist standpoint a meaning that a word long-since lost and one that it never had are virtually the same thing on a functional level
- I know it gets used like shit but do you think there's any utility in the term 'whataboutism' if the definition is strict?
  Nope. Because the argument always goes like this:
  non-neutral party brings up problem about non-western place
  someone says "well this is actually a bigger problem in the west" after which they get le downvoted
  the rationale is "well we're not talking about the west right now so that's whataboutism"
  The actual problem starts at step 1, and it's started by westoids and their news media outlets who constantly a) attack free non-white countries (and Russia) b) stay silent about the (usually much worse) stuff the west is currently doing
  For example, how many westoids have ever said anything about the EU overfishing Indian Ocean waters? Instead it's always China overfishing X, or making Y animal extinct, even though westoids consume 4x more resources per capita and 90% of the rhino and elephant populations were killed by whites since the 1800s. Fuck mayos and fuck anyone who even reasons within their moronic bullshit paradigm
- It'd be tough to get everyone to sign on, but I'd be down for your definition. It sounds like it better matches the word itself. Feels like a term I could use as a synonym for brainstorming, or when I talk about transit expansions in my city ::: spoiler spoiler
  :::
Acting like china and russia did nothing wrong is ludacris. They have fucking gulags and education camps.
Denying this does nothing good for leftist movements. It weakness us as a whole because we can't have real conversation about the future of leftism.
I don't have to support every government that calls itself communist to be a leftist.
I know that liberals use the term incorrectly. That doesnt mean I cant call out blanatant red fascism when I see it.
- Gulag just means prison in Russian. I don't know what they call prisons in China, but its not gulag. The prison system refered to as "the Gulag" in the west only existed for like 20 years or so. Less people were imprisioned in that system than at any time under Czarist russia, and far less than in the US now.
  Just because it has a foreign name doesn't make it anything other than just a prison. I know you're an anarchist and for prison abolition, which is cool. But don't act like there are some kind of extra bad prisons in AES
- Acting like china and russia did nothing wrong is ludacris.
  Which is why we don't do it, as you were literally just shown when you asked for examples. Why are you continuing to spread knowing lies about us?
  
  Stop using we. And us. You are not a representative of every communist. Lol
  Ive argued many times on this topic. And I found many people calling themselves communists and blindly supporting CPC and The russia federation.
  Stop acting like this isnt a thing.
  
  You can speak for us comrade @Zuzak@hexbear.net
  
  Stop using we. And us. You are not a representative of every communist. Lol
  I'm not claiming to be. I am, however, a member of the online community that you're insulting with claims that you know to be false.
  
  Not completely hating all AES is the same as full uncritical support to them
  
  Ok great. Honestly I'm getting tired & running out of steam arguing with people.
  Truth is this. When one of the first big lemmy jumps from reddit came I heard that hexbear was cool a leftist space. so hopped on. I was honestly disgusted by the comments i saw. I saw so many people arguing blindly for CPC and DPRK. Saying they were better than the US and calling anybody critiquing the bold claims they were making libs. such as "Cpc is the future socialism." And "all the bad things people say about the CPC is american propaganda. "
  Basically same thing that happend here when I defined tankie as authoritarian communist . In fact I saw this kind of thing on reddit too alot.
  I dont give a fuck what you say or what other commenters post. I've seen this phenomena myself. I've been called a lib, So many times, simply for posting that I don't support Russia or the CPC in leftist spaces. I'm sick of it.
  So what are we arguing about? Is hexbear not as bad as I thought it was? Ok cool. Im wrong.
  I know there are people in "your" community that are actual tankies. I've argued with them myself. Are you trying to say these people don't exist? Cuz If you are, You're the one that is full shit.
  There anything else you want to debate about?
  
  Have you ever heard of supporting ideas and not concepts as a whole?
  What I’m saying (and I assume others on Hexbear) when I mention CPC, the USSR or DPRK is taking ideas that are meant for empowering the working class, not the whole concept. The problem is that in the current world the CPC have much more empowerment of the working class than say many of the western countries, with the US being one of the worst offenders.
  So if you call that blindly supporting the CPC, then I guess we can’t have a conversation about Marxist (or any other political thought) at all.
  Like let’s say for example Mao and his views towards landlords
  it’s not as much the hatred towards a landlord as a person (sure there is some animosity) but more of a hatred towards the idea of landlords.
  Honestly if you really are a critical-thinker Hexbear is a place where that critical thought can flourish as you’ll get called out on bullshit as much as you’ll get great sources of information if you ask for them.
- When did my personal opinions on Russia or China come into any of this lol all I said was that "tankie" has no definitive meaning as used and that leftists using it is dumb and makes them sound like liberals. That the term to you equates to uncritical support of AES and Russia kind of proves the point in both respects.
  How do you build a future for leftism if you're going to just call people tankies and tell them to fuck off back to hexbear and lemmygrad? They're about the last place I'd expect fascism to be celebrated based on my experience.

If you are unable to recognize atrocity propaganda by the US and/or Nazi collaborators or evangelical wackos who believe God tasked them with destroying a country, you're a chump.

Its a good thong that that I do recognizes these these events. i just also know that russia has also commited atrocities. Much like most imperialist nations.
- Tell me about the second and third ones I mentioned

There is a healthy and honest way to appreciate communism, Russia, the CCP and even DPRK.

Please tell us more about those healthy and honest "anti-authoritarian" non-tankie communists. Who are they and what political results have they made?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sankara
Please shut up and read more.
- Sankara is a tankie by everyone's definition here. He came to power via a coup, held military tribunals trying people for corruption, formed armed groups to defend the revolution, and was vehemently against NATO, the IMF, and other western powers.
  What does anti-authoritarian mean to you if Sankara is anti-authoritarian
  
  Also arrested trade union leaders and got into it with a teacher's union. I obviously support Sankara, and like you say he's really not different from any other communist leaders except that he was assassinated and his work undone.
  
  He came to power via a coup, held military tribunals trying people for corruption, formed armed groups to defend the revolution, and was vehemently against NATO, the IMF, and other western powers.
  You think trying people for corruption make you authoritarian?
  Are you a liberal?
  
  what
  
  I think that authoritarian is a basically meaningless term when applied to a states.
  All states are in the business of using lethal violence, or the threat of it at least, to enforce their rule within their borders.
  
  Thats why i am an anarchist......
  
  Okay so if being "authoritarian" is bad and means you shouldn't be supported, and Sankara ran a state, making him authoritarian, by a definition you're now agreeing with (again, anyone who runs a state) why are you pretending you don't think he's an authoritarian and trying to use him as a cudgel against people who actually share an ideology with him?
  
  Is whether or not something is "authoritarian" to you simply determined by vibes, or is it actual actions? By all measures, you should hate Sankara as well. Be consistent.
  
  By all measures, you should hate Sankara as well. Be consistent.
  i dont think. so sankara did some really cool things.
  The USSR did some cool things too , AT FIRST: then they started murdering anarchist and consolidating power and becoming a police state. As an anarchist I oppose this.
  Maybe Sankara would have done the same if he lived. But he didn't. He was murdered in a US back coup. He was murdered for being an anti imperialist.
  The USSR is not anti imperialst. Neither is the CPC. These communists experiments became police states. Sankara didnt.
  Sankara fought for nitrution, literacy anticorruption anti imperialism. He put more women in government snd fought against female genital mutilation. Anarchist support all of these things.
  What we dont support is police states. Among other things.
  
  Sankara was a supporter of the USSR and a Marxist-Leninist. Sankara isn't a non-tankie just because he didn't live to the tankie phase, he was always acting as an ML. If that makes you sympathize more with MLs, or makes you hate Sankara as you do tankies, either is your choice.
  
  Sankara isn't a non-tankie just because he didn't live to the tankie phase, he was always acting as an ML.
  I believe there is a difference in being ML and having police state aspirations/trending authoritarian. Which is when I use the term tankie.
  Maybe I'm wrong tho you tell me. I liked what sankara did and I dont want to negate the cool things he did simply becuase he got murdered and we dont know what he was going to become.
  There is nuance in his life that I can accept. But what I cannot accept is modern day MLs who look fondly on the actions of the USSR, russian federation and the modern day CPC. they are large authoritarian states that I cannot support as an anarchist.
  Everytime I bring this up tho. I get called a lib.
  
  It's pretty simple. Most MLs critically support ML states. Almost all of them, for example, hate that Stalin banned homosexuality. At the same time, they can also appreciate how both Mao and the USSR doubled life expectancy and ended famine. By metrics, both states improved rapidly.
  As an Anarchist, you can learn a lot from MLs on how to actually get stuff done. Anarchism is a beautiful dream currently, outside of fringe cases like Revolutionary Catalonia it hasn't actually existed to a meaningful extent. I'm not saying you should become an ML, but MLs typically take their routes because it gets results, even if the Means aren't pretty at all.
  I'm saying this as a non-ML Marxist.
  
  Sankara was murdered 31 years after the revolt in Hungary was put down. He supported the USSR. He was, by definition, a tankie.
  
  then they started murdering anarchist
  A number of those anarchists were counterrevolutionaries. Some, I'm sure, were good people.
- Sankara supported the USSR and DPRK, just like all actual communists do
  
  Im not a communist, i am an anarchist.
  
  Then why are you telling communist to read about Sankara, a figure we already know and love
  
  Becuase he is am example of a communist I support.
  People keep calling me a liberal. Im an anarchist.
  
  Sankara was ML like all the people you're calling tankies. I respect him too. What makes him good and and the rest of us evil "authoritarians"?
  
  Sankara was a tankie
  
  What do you think about Bakunin?
  
  Im not a communist, i am a
- He set up Popular Revolutionary Tribunals to prosecute public officials charged with political crimes[12] and corruption, considering such elements of the state counter-revolutionaries.[15] This led to criticism by Amnesty International for human rights violations, including extrajudicial executions and arbitrary detentions of political opponents.[16]
  idk sounds pretty authoritarian to me.
  
  His country had corruption!
  Im sure there is a better way but your acting like having tribunals makes you authoritarian.
  It doesn't.
  
  I wonder if any other countries had to deal with corruption after the revolution...
  
  Statists using tribunals to try other statists is the use of state authority and the use of the state's monopoly on the legitimate use of force. If "Authoritarian" means anything at all then using the power of the state to prosecute people who are doing state stuff in ways you don't like is authoritarian.

Are the tankies in the room with us right now, shitlib?

Yeah some of them. I think im speaking to one right now.
Pleae tell me your totally not tankie ideas.
- What is a tankie? How would we know if we are according to you?
  
  If you support authoritarian communism, you are a tankie.
  Do you know where the term comes from?
  
  What is "authoritarian" communism? Sounds like some political compass bullshit that doesn't exist in the real world.
  Yeah it comes from a disagreement amoung British socialists between people who correctly supported the USSR committing military force to safeguard Hungary from a coup, and some libs who were against it
  
  What is "authoritarian" communism?
  Why dont you google it?
  Lmao you acting like im making this word up is the most tankie shit i have ever seen.
  
  I'm not acting like you made it up. I answered your question about where it came from accurately. But it gets thrown around today as a meaningless thought terminating cliche like "woke" is by american conservatives/fascists. So, if you're saying it, I'm going to ask you to clarify, because it doesn't mean anything, except that you don't like it.
  Resorting to "google it" is such
  "Authoritarian" communism is not a real thing. Its some made political compass bullshit
  
  While the term was invented first to describe the event you have stated.
  It is also used to describe the actions of the USSR toward the republic of spain during the spainish Civil war. Specifically how the USSR would not openly support the anarchist government fighting a facist coup backed by nazi germany.
  Which is my whole point. The USSR was more freindly toward capitalist governments of Briton & USA at the time. Becuase they are a state and it was more benefical for the USSR to not support an active leftist revolution begging for their help.
  This is why I use the term Tankie. Hierarchical goverments regaurdless of their economic principles will enevitablly trend toward fascism and authoritairnism. It is only a matter of time. The ussr cpc and other "communists" conuntries are no exception.
  Communists have never truly support anarchist.
  "Authoritarian" communism is not a real thing. Its some made political compass bullshit
  Honestly reading this statement makes me so depressed. It makes me want to call more communist tankies because it fits so well.
  Are you so foolish that you don't think a large government ran by a small group of people could not become authoritarian?
  
  I think your use of authoritarian is idealist nonsense and has to basis in materialism. I'm a marxist so that is my veiwpoint. If you are a utopian socialist then we will disagree because your veiwpoint is not grounded in a materialist perspective
  
  You lean really hard on Wikipedia and Google for your leftist theory, I must say
  
  "You see a simple search of reddit will clearly show that my point of view is the chad wojack, while you tankies are the soy wojack." -this lib probably
  
  You acting like I'm the one who made up this made-up word is such made-up word behavior 🤣
  
  We aren't uncritical of the USSR, China, and the DPRK, we just think they broadly did (and do) much more good than bad.
  Also, "CCP" isn't a country or even a party (CPC), it's China or the PRC. I assume when you say "Russia" you mean the Soviet Union that hasn't existed in thirty years as Russia is a capitalist country now.
  
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Communist_Party
  Do you people have internet?
  I speak of russia generally so I can include USSR and the current state of affairs. I realize they are different but they are both authoritarian.
  They be capitalist but they call themselves communists.
  
  Communist Party of China, CPC. The country that they are in is China (PRC). A billion people do not live in the "CCP", that's like saying Japanese people live in the LDP, and your imprecise use of these terms makes you look uninformed. Unless, of course, you just constantly say "CCP" because you don't want to recognize that they are the legitimate and popular government of China, you know, a country.
  I speak of russia generally so I can include USSR and the current state of affairs. I realize they are different but they are both authoritarian. They be capitalist but they call themselves communists.
  This is a meaningless statement. Any government that wields power to accomplish things is "authoritarian". It's silly to equate the USSR with the Russian Federation when they are two very different administrations with distinct ideology and policies. Russia for the past 30 years is a capitalist country with an administration originally installed by the US. Putin is a right-wing figure and an anti-communist. I don't like Putin and the other rightists in charge of Russia, but I hope NATO doesn't win out in the East because I don't want the US Empire ruling over the whole world.
  
  I get the vibe you're a big fan of le political compass
  
  Nope. I am just not blindly supporting anyhting called communism.
  
  You don't seem to support anything remotely called communism, except for comrade Sankara. He's great, but why is he the one good ML? How was he not "authoritarian" like the rest of us?
  
  saying it like you do, the imperialist media/state department way, puts emphasis on the "Chinese" part, which we object to for reasons that should be obvious
  you people
  
  Lol you used the royal "we" In your original comment.
  That's why I said you people.
  Your really calling me racist for that?
  I will change the way I type ccp to cpc. Thanks.

Strange, I do not uncritically support any of those democracies (I assume you mean USSR when you say Russia) and I keep being called tankie.

Tankie is to liberals as woke is to right liberals and fascists.

Also it is CPC, CCP has racist connotations and also isn't what they're called.

What is your definition of a democracy? Does it involve the public voting?
- I'm partial to full process people's democracy and other participatory democratic and consensus generating models

Im actually an anarchist. I critizes everone. Including the liberalszzzzz communistss, facists, and the corrupt american imperialsts.
What a surprize this person pull his images from hexbear.
- i criticize everyone therefore i am correct and enlightened
  
  Do you have any arguments besides calling me a lib? You've done this like 15 times.
  If you have such a problem with being called a tankie, its kinda hypocritical to call me a lib. Imo.
  Im not a liberal. Im an anarchist. anarchist also use this term to describe the way the USSR acted toward the Anarchists of the spainish civil war.
  
  I don't care if you call me tankie
  
  You engage when i call you a
  but not when asked questions, like why Sankara is the one good "authoritarian?" or people asking what you about your thoughts on anarchism beside "authoritarian bad." You just link to wikipedia and use that
  -ass word tankie
  
  I don't care if you call me tankie !
  You seem pretty movtivated in the conversation about me using the term tankie so I think this is bs.
  Stop calling me a lib and we can have a conversation.
  Are you interested in that?
  
  Also I realize now that The Black panthers were ML and anti imperialst so I support them as well.
  
  All MLs are anti-imperialist. There are no imperialist communists
  
  Rosa Luxemburg was a marxist who criticized Lenin.
  She also accused both Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks of having police state aspirations.
  
  You support everyone that failed, and no one who succeeded. You're a left anti-communist, which is no better than being a
  
  Remind me, what happened to Rosa again?
  
  Ok cool
- Ah, what sort of anarchist political theory have you read?
  
  wikipedia, evidently
- What is the position anarchists take regarding the state, as opposed to say, socialists?

the atrocities commited at any point in history, by the USA China, Russia , or any other country for that Matter

Just another whataboutism from a liberal centrist tankie!!!

I dont understand what you are saying here.
Can you expand?
- expanding hog

What stops China and the DPRK being utopias is resources, not the CPC or WPK. The CPC and WPK are both forces of good. (What stops Russia from being a communist utopia is that the bourgeois democracy is actively working towards creating a capitalist dystopia).

whites can't understand what resources are, because doing so would take away the special snowflake status they've given themselves in their mind

Not even authoritarian communists. Tankies defend state capitalist China all the time. Same with Russia.

Oh wow, it's almost as if the tiny parcel of land that China controls (less than 10% what the capitalists have) is not sufficient in resources to change the world on its own, so they have to partially adapt to the already existing system in order to have a chance against the west, while still keeping in place socialist policies like eliminating homelessness, small individual plots of farmland, limits on buying real estate on credit, etc
"OMG this POC must hate themselves because they speak english!" <---- This is you
- Did you mean to reply to someone else?