If your point is that they’re pro-CCP, you’ll probably get your point across better by calling them “tankies” than “communists.” I identify as a communist, but I’d be first in line to say “fuck tankies.”
Stalin and Mao were good actually, the CCP has never done a bad thing ever, and Russia should roll over Europe with their invincible tanks, because the west is bad, therefore anyone who disagrees with the west is flawless.
That may be an uncharitable exaggeration, but surprisingly not by very much.
Originally, a “tankie” was a Stalin apologist, but in more modern times, it’s come to mean just authoritarian communist. I don’t think it’s a self-applied term. More a derisive term used by anti-authoritarian leftists.
The anti-authoritarian communists tend to call themsleves anarchists, anarcho-communists, anarcho-syndicalists, left libertarians, etc. And they’d strongly tend not to have anything good to say about Stalin, Mao, or the CCP.
(There are right-wingers who call themselves “anarchists” or “anarcho-capitalists” or “voluntarists” or “minarchists” or “Libertarians” (note the capital “L”) or whatever, but they have pretty much nothing to do with the hard-left-wing anarchist movement that they appropriated the terms “anarchist” and “libertarian” from.)
The term seems to have originated within British communist groups in the post-war era, when “the tanks” were sent in to crush dissent in Czechoslovakia and Hungary. Thus, the “communists” supporting the CCCP party line were called “tankies” by the communists who opposed it. From there, it came to evolve into calling out “authoritarian communists”, although that term alone is super vague and not always useful. As with any insult, review the context of where it is used and by whom against whom.
But yeah, the kind of self-proclaimed “communists” who haven’t read Marx beyond maybe the manifesto, wish they could just follow (or lead) a religious cult instead, but also want to look materialist and think communism is all about “anything that opposes the West is good”, that’s what usually falls under the “tankie” umbrella.
As for the lemmy devs/lemmy.ml admins, I can’t say what exactly their views are, there might be some pretty bad stuff with their stances on Chinese policies, didn’t look into it - but the server is from my experience a good general instance, userbase probably relatively left-leaning, but definitely not manipulated or with an agenda forced on them. And beyond that, they very clearly and authentically stated, that their commitment to making lemmy open source is set in stone, so if anyone disagrees, they can always create their own bubbles if they can’t live with them.
If your point is that they’re pro-CCP, you’ll probably get your point across better by calling them “tankies” than “communists.” I identify as a communist, but I’d be first in line to say “fuck tankies.”
Ok, what in the world is the eli5 version of a tankie?
Stalin and Mao were good actually, the CCP has never done a bad thing ever, and Russia should roll over Europe with their invincible tanks, because the west is bad, therefore anyone who disagrees with the west is flawless.
That may be an uncharitable exaggeration, but surprisingly not by very much.
Oh dear lol
Originally, a “tankie” was a Stalin apologist, but in more modern times, it’s come to mean just authoritarian communist. I don’t think it’s a self-applied term. More a derisive term used by anti-authoritarian leftists.
The anti-authoritarian communists tend to call themsleves anarchists, anarcho-communists, anarcho-syndicalists, left libertarians, etc. And they’d strongly tend not to have anything good to say about Stalin, Mao, or the CCP.
(There are right-wingers who call themselves “anarchists” or “anarcho-capitalists” or “voluntarists” or “minarchists” or “Libertarians” (note the capital “L”) or whatever, but they have pretty much nothing to do with the hard-left-wing anarchist movement that they appropriated the terms “anarchist” and “libertarian” from.)
The term seems to have originated within British communist groups in the post-war era, when “the tanks” were sent in to crush dissent in Czechoslovakia and Hungary. Thus, the “communists” supporting the CCCP party line were called “tankies” by the communists who opposed it. From there, it came to evolve into calling out “authoritarian communists”, although that term alone is super vague and not always useful. As with any insult, review the context of where it is used and by whom against whom.
But yeah, the kind of self-proclaimed “communists” who haven’t read Marx beyond maybe the manifesto, wish they could just follow (or lead) a religious cult instead, but also want to look materialist and think communism is all about “anything that opposes the West is good”, that’s what usually falls under the “tankie” umbrella.
As for the lemmy devs/lemmy.ml admins, I can’t say what exactly their views are, there might be some pretty bad stuff with their stances on Chinese policies, didn’t look into it - but the server is from my experience a good general instance, userbase probably relatively left-leaning, but definitely not manipulated or with an agenda forced on them. And beyond that, they very clearly and authentically stated, that their commitment to making lemmy open source is set in stone, so if anyone disagrees, they can always create their own bubbles if they can’t live with them.
Ok, just don’t kill people in reeducation camps
you get to pick. round up people and reeducate them after they’ve bombed shit for years, or, kill hundreds of thousands after they blow up two towers.