Remember kids, Tankies wants to undermine democracy - same as facists.
this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2023
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I think most of you need to worry way less about sounding sufficiently the "right kind" of leftist and focus more on promoting leftism through action. More than half the "tankie" discourse is, at best, a needless distraction from actual progress. Lose your buzzwords and stop the ideological purity pissing contest and actually put in the work in your communities instead, goddamn.
Nah, it's critically important that we make it clear that we do not accept autocracy and campism simply because it stands against an army of strawmen. Authoritarian leftists are not well. They are the ones standing in opposition to progress which doesn't fit into the correct rhetorical box, which is why they are marginalized to the point where they can hardly even be said to stand for socialism, because they are too busy standing in reactionary defiance to "the west."
It has so blinded them to anything resembling reality that they've effectively exiled themselves from academic consideration. They trade in conspiracies and revel in violence while showing little interest in statecraft or politics. It's the incredible intersection of privilege and ignorance, and it needs to be condemned as fiercely as any fascist or robber Barron or it will continue to suck the oxygen out of every leftist space on the internet.
It's actually quite ironic that you'd talk about ideological purity, when you don't have to look far on Lemmy to find "leftists" calling social democrats rebranded fascists. Wake up and stop getting your politics from teenagers.
I have no idea why you mentioned this. What does this have to do with me?
But to your greater point: Are there going to be ideological differences that matter? Of course. I'm not saying not to debate or defend positions for the sake of refining and strengthening ideology, I'm saying don't do it for the sake of stroking yourself off to how ideologically pure you are, especially when you go about doing so in a way that doesn't actually help refine and strengthen the ideology but rather muddies it all up with a bunch of reductive and useless buzzwords and short-hands.
We should be saving our ire for the unsaveable so far past the ideological divide as to where no commonality can be found; if we actually give a shit about making any progress we should be approaching anyone winnable with nuance and confidence, and not reductivism and hand-waving.
If you truly aren't a tankie and believe that the path forward can be achieved as a peaceful people's revolution, then you have to remember that winning people over is an enormous component to that strategy
Or ban them, whatever. Just stop fucking stroking yourself off to how fucking elite commie leftist you are for it
Tankie doesn't understand the argument he made.
Also, Tankies are fascists that wear the skin of the lefties they murdered. They advocate for an all powerful vanguard party that dictates basically everything, it makes more sense to try and win over conservatives than a Tankie.
No fuck that bullshit. The largest leftist majority is aligned with non-revolutionary socialist democracy... Tankies are actively undermining the largest leftist group by refusing to partake in democracy. And now WE need to stop complaining and work together and not be so pure. Fuck off with this absolute disgrace of a discourse. The group that controls the purity of its members by refusal to partake in progress through democratic means are tankies. They want it all to go down in flames. Their idea of progress is revolutionary uprising.
What's this large leftist group you speak of?
I for one 100% believe in purity tests. For example, anyone who hates trans people isn't a real leftist, doesn't belong in the community, and needs to fuck off. Purging the community of reactionaries is the only way to protect our most vulnerable members and create a unity of people who truly believe in equality and justice. There are lots of marginalised peoples who feel disrespected by mainstream left movements and cannot afford to participate in direct action for their own safety. Liberty for one means liberty for all. We need to kick tankies out of the left so we can actually get some shit done
Very well put. Please keep yelling this from every rooftop.
Being Marxist in general makes you as evil, hateful, oppressive, and violent as being a Fascist, but being a tankie puts on a whole other level of disgusting
Talk to people about policies and opinions, not ideological labels.
Sure, but Marxism is evil because of its policies, goals, and guiding framework. I agree that talking about policies is better than talking about labels, but some policies are crappy regardless of what label they are given.
Yeah that whole delivering freedom to the oppressed working class thing is so evil. Basically Satanic. 🙄
Ah yes, freedom from oppression by enacting even more tyranny and oppression
Marxists are truly the peak of idiocy.
What "policies, goals, and guiding framework" would you be referring to, exactly?
Here's a very short list.
Equality of outcome above all
Violent overthrow of capitalism
Establishing an authoritarian socialist state that rules with an iron fist to bring about the social climate necessary to achieve communism (aka dictatorship of the proletariat)
Forced seizure of property
Killing of the owner class and bourgeoise (aka the middle class)
A planned economy
The flawed communist utopia that disregards reality and human nature
The imperialist idea that Marxists need to spread their ideology everywhere to "save" the workers all around the world.
There is a reason why Marxism is a colossal failure. Every Marxist revolution has resulted in horrific atrocities that are some of the worst in recorded history. Every Marxist state has either collapsed or was forced to adopt some form of capitalism. Every Marxist attempt has failed to even get socialism to work, let alone achieve communism. Such a rigid, delusional, violent, and authoritarian ideology has no room in the modern world. It belongs in the books of history that warn future generations of what not to do.
In ML traditions the dictatorship of the proletariat is quite literally a dictatorship, regardless of how you want to mince words or draw questionable equivalency with your favorite modernist screed. Lenin wrote about this at length - the need to protect the revolution by any means necessary, and how civil war is good because it gives the proletariat "practice at arms." He also put it into practice through the curtailment of civil liberties. You can also see this in the practical rejection of liberal values (eg, the curation of political agency through individual liberty) in most leftist spaces.
What are you trying to prove here? That Marxism isn't evil, violent, and oppressive or that it is but that's okay because you're a part of the cult? Because you're failing on both ends. Everything that I said stands because it's factual.
Marxism is evil. I understand that a subjective word, but considered how Marxism is inherently violent, hateful, authoritarian, and oppressive then I think it fits the standard necessary for this term to apply comfortably. Also confirming that what I said is true, then denying it and saying I'm factually incorrect is beyond stupid. We both know that everything that I said stands. You can lie, deny, and cry all day long. Marxism is an evil ideology. It is just as bad if not worse than fascism, anarchy, or theocracy. It's in the tier of the worst ideologies in human history.
And like I said, you can lie, deny, and cry all you want the reality is going to remain the same. No amount of cope is going to change the fact that Marxism as a I describe it.
Would you say you have concerns about authoritarian wokism?
Wut?