There is a healthy and honest way to appreciate communism, Russia, the CCP and even DPRK.
And then there are people who are completely shilling the CCP Russia DPRK as communist uptopias. These people are tankies.
If you are unable to recoginze the atrocities commited at any point in history, by the USA China, Russia , or any other country for that
Matter. You're a chump.
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.
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.
I don't think I called you racist to start with, but my point was that just because something is called by X name in one context by one group of people and Y in another context by another group does not mean both names are equally valid. When it comes to political entities, typically the belief is that the group itself decides on its own name (like Kiev officially becoming Kyiv in English, to take a recent example). The CPC says that its name is the CPC. Western journos who want their readership to hate the Party call it the CCP. These are not equally valid bases for what to call something.
You're arguing that it's okay to call a group a term used almost exclusively by their political enemies who want them completely destroyed, I think it's pretty obvious that you're a racist.
We're mainly waiting for you to say "Yes, I was wrong, Hexbear doesn't shill for Russia/China/DPRK and call them communist utopias, and I guess tankies is kind of a meaningless term.". I think that was the point.
I mean as I stated in other comments i went to hexbear a few months ago and saw a bunch of people doing this very thing. So if you want yo say that experiance was a fluke ok. But stop trying to paint me as a liar.
Also tankie has real meaning to anarchist. So I dont feel it is meaningless.
Putin does not care about the well-being of Ukrainian citizens
Of course not, he has never. He is acting in self-interest because Ukraine and the US are escalating violence. Do you remember the lethal aid Biden sent? Where do you think that lethal aid went? Who do you think it was shot at?
we’re teetering on Putin apologia and sharing RT news uncritically.
Putin is a corrupt bastard. I think many on this site cannot tell the difference between not viewing him as satanic vs licking his boot. I wasn't going to try to argue this until your post came up.
https://hexbear.net/comment/290125
So, China is clearly better than the US, considering that workers in BRI countries complain about price dumping, but countries in the American sphere complain about death squads. That said, we need to listen to workers and socialists who aren't in power. The NPA says they're getting shot with Chinese bullets. Workers in China still go on strike. Class struggle still exists in China, even if the state and party buffer it.
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.
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 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?”. '
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
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
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.
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.
You're not a tankie. Tankies deny the oppressive nature of Russia, China, North Korea etc., deflecting all critique with whataboutism by pointing at shortcomings or atrocities of Western nations. Some like to call you Nazi or imperialist if you disagree with them, while in many aspects their ideology and that of their paragon countries is much closer to Nazism than that of liberal democracies like the ones you mentioned.
Your not doing very good job. Your just coming off as an idiot too me.
Do you think maybe he should have exercised more authority, better strengthened defenses and built up a stronger base for combatting imperialism, that he could have avoided this (I don't have an exact policy path, and it's not like Sankara didn't put down certain reactionary movements when necessary)?
Can you be more concise? Your run on sentences make me want to stop talking to you.
Im not here to go over the specifics of Sankaras's
Decisons: But From what I do know. He fought corruption, he pushed literacy programs and fought malnutrition. All While resistsing western imperialsm.
Im sure he made mistakes and did some problematic things. As an anarchist I can appreicate the good things he did and be open to the concept that he also did bad things as well.
Just like the USSR CPC and other communist governments.
I'm sympathetic to Sankara of course, but if your ideal system of resisting authority succumbs to counter-authority, then maybe you don't have grounds to condemn greater authority exercised to these ends.
Your going to have to rewrite, this i dont understand what you are saying. Are you referring to me or Sankara?
Other people understood that I was being sarcastic as well.
Well you got me. Maybe im not in the mood for jokes. I am so tired of having these conversation. It makes me so sad to see people supporting these countries.
Russia and china are not examples of a good government. Neither is the usa. I feel like im taking crazy pills.
Why did you single Sankara's Burkina Faso out when speaking of exceptions to authoritarian communism
Because i know about him and agree with many things that he did. Not everything, but he didnt build an imperialst nation. He fought for literacy and nutrition and anti corruption.
He didnt build a survelence network or invade another nation to my knowledge.
He fought for his people using the principles revolutionary communism and ML. This I support.
Just like i can recognize that the CPC does provide many valuable things to it citizens . While also recognizing that they are still authoritarnian.
Rephrased: If your one exception to "authoritarian communism" is a government that was overthrown by imperialism, what does this say about the use of authority in revolutionary states?
I dont know. Im not here to tell you how sankara could of avoided assassination. But I do feel that acting like Sankara is the same as the cpc/russia in any real way is kinda absurd.
Cuba is better example of communism than cpc. Once again they have problems.
Ultimately i am an anarchist, i dont think communism is the solution long term, but i would work with communists, As long as they didnt support large authoritarian governments.
but stating that “communism isn’t the solution long term” makes no sense. Do you understand the distinction?
I feel this is like syamtics. Anarchist are socialists as well. but if some told me "I dont think anarchy is the way foward"
I dont think it would be fair for me to say to " no you mean socialism, Anarchy is the
Goal! not the current situation"
It doesnt make sense to think that communism isnt the solution? This makes me feel like communists are unable to have real discussion with anarchists about the flaws within communism.
I feel anarchy is the only real way to gaurentee long term that people will be continually liberated.
I think that any real hierarchical system will enventually turn back into a police state. We saw this in the USSR. And we see in in the CPC too.
They once had revolutionary components which I support. But those begin to dwindle the minute they took power and likey before.
From the origins of revolutionary communism came a police state.
How do MLs deal with the flaws shown in
The USSR? By saying that it wasn't communist?
This is what I mean when I say i dont think communism is the solution long term. That communists governments have a tendency to turn toward police states. Call it what you want but lenin was a marxist from my understanding and marxist are considered communists. Right?
"But of all the revolutionary elements in Russia it is the Anarchists who now suffer the most ruthless and systematic persecution. Their suppression by the Bolsheviki began already in 1918, when — in the month of April of that year — the Communist Government attacked, without provocation or warning, the Anarchist Club of Moscow and by the use of machine guns and artillery “liquidated” the whole organisation."
Yeah the racist Republicans in the US use whataboutism all the time to skirt around actual critiques. They really hate it when you call them out on it
Did anarchist attack and kill communists during that time period? Yes. Does that make thier critiques about soviet authoritarianism invalid or make emma Goldman letters false. No. It just means there is nuance in history.
I dont categorically support emma goldman. And Im not surprised they said some racist things.
Thats why I am able to separate the good things they did while critizing the bad.
You should try it!
It is a known fact that the USSR consolidated power within russia after the october revolution.
They killed and jailed anarchists and many other opossing groups.
And when lenin died and stalin took over, he did it too. This is what large goverments must do to maintain power.
The fact that you can't admit that means you a defintiately a tankie.
By merely mentioning an informal fallacy I have torn your argument asunder! You are the one who has proven nothing.
You sound like a jackass when you write this way. imo.
The last part reads as being in reference to you, since the socialist states you hate took measures to survive whereas ones like Allende's Chile folded and their progress brutally reversed.
If Sankara had been more effective in protecting the revolution, you very likely would hate him too because he would be smeared just like Fidel and the rest as "authoritarian" etc. Imo this wouldn't be because of whatever specific measures he took, but the mere fact that he would have posed a more substantial ideological threat to the west for living and being able to keep making progress.
We've read plenty of Sankara, time you to to read a little Jakarta Method
This was another very difficult question I had to ask my interview subjects, especially the leftists from Southeast Asia and Latin America. When we would get to discussing the old debates between peaceful and armed revolution; between hardline Marxism and democratic socialism, I would ask:
“Who was right?”
In Guatemala, was it Árbenz or Che who had the right approach? Or in Indonesia, when Mao warned Aidit that the PKI should arm themselves, and they did not? In Chile, was it the young revolutionaries in the MIR who were right in those college debates, or the more disciplined, moderate Chilean Communist Party?
Most of the people I spoke with who were politically involved back then believed fervently in a nonviolent approach, in gradual, peaceful, democratic change. They often had no love for the systems set up by people like Mao. But they knew that their side had lost the debate, because so many of their friends were dead. They often admitted, without hesitation or pleasure, that the hardliners had been right. Aidit’s unarmed party didn’t survive. Allende’s democratic socialism was not allowed, regardless of the détente between the Soviets and Washington.
Looking at it this way, the major losers of the twentieth century were those who believed too sincerely in the existence a liberal international order, those who trusted too much in democracy, or too much in what the United States said it supported, rather than what it really supported—what the rich countries said, rather than what they did. That group was annihilated.
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
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
If those are your beliefs then they are infantile, and its no wonder you are openly against AES and people who support real world projects in socialism. The new world will be built by people around the world while left anti-communists whine about how they are doing it wrong because they don't understand the theoretical basis communist are using in these states, and they refuse to understand the real material contexts in which these societies struggle to survive against the US imperialist world order.
There are many anarchist comrades on Hexbear who regularly get called "tankies" by people like you and are able to understand the difference between criticizing some AES without being anti-communist. We have a non-sectarian rule there so we don't argue about our specific tendencies. You should maybe soeak to some of them to form a more nuanced view of AES. As an ML i can't really do that, because i do have some fundamental theoretical differences, such as veiwing the term of authoritarian as kind of pointless, thst hoes back to Engels arguing with anarchists about the Paris Commune basically.
If you're open to a book about left anti-communism and how its driven a wedge between yourself and people you call tankies, i recommend Micheal Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds
https://mltheory.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/michael-parenti-blackshirts-and-reds_-rational-fascism-and-the-overthrow-of-communism-2001.pdf
In fact I find it is a better measure of oppressive goverment than most indicators.
What you really mean to say is most goverments are oppressive and authoritarian.
Show me a country with a large prison population and I will show you an authoritarian country.
Please see the zapatistas. For non police state goverment.
"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
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.
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.
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 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?
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?
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.
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]
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.
Tbf The person who said it is probably a teenager and they engaged in good faith, but yes.
Their definition of "tankie" apparently revolved around a state killing its own people so when someone presented evidence of Ukraine's shelling of Donbas they described it as Ukraine going, "Tankie Mode." Someone then asked if they thought Lincoln was a tankie and they considered it and wrote out a whole thing, ultimately concluding no, but that it was fair to describe Sherman as a "proto-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
You asked for more communists i support and I listed some and now Im anti-communist because I don't support the ones who created police states.
Were you just waiting for me to engage so you could call that?
Lol you make me want to call more people like you tankies because it is so applicable.
MLs who think the only path to revolution is thru police states, are authoritarian by nature.
I wouldn't consider any AES a police state. They are states, they utilize state power to defend themselves from threats from the capitalist class both internally and extermely, because those threats are reality.
Thats why Sankara was assasinated, Rosa Luxembourg was assassinated, why the Black Panthers were assassinated or imprisioned. The capitalist class kills its enemies utilizing the power of the state. And the Black Panthers, Sankara, and Luxembourg were well aware of that.
Believing in using the power of the state is part of ML doctrine, not creating police states, but utilizing that power for the proletariat. I don't think you actually differentiate between state and police state, or a capitalist state from a socislist one (since you conflate the Russian Federation with the USSR which are not the same thing).
Except, you do seem to able to differentiate, but only in cases were our revolutions failed, like in Burkina Faso, the Black Panthers, and Luxembourg. I'm not sure why all the communists you support are one's who failed.
What's bullshit about it? You just say its bullshit but not why.
That's why you get called a
Do you even read the Wikipedia articles you link people to? The Afghans were asking for Soviet aid against insurgents backed by the US. The invasion happened when the USSR feared their allies in Afghanistan were not capable of handling the US supported insurgency that they thought would institute a theocracy there as had happened in Iran. Which is exactly what ended up happening there.
That's not what happened during the US invasion of Afghanistan. That invasion was a cover for war profiteeering, mineral extraction, and opiate production. Rhe US extracted value and resources from that region to enrich capitalists in the imperial core. That's what makes it imperialist.
Soviet period (1979–1989)
Edit
After a Soviet-backed left-wing government in Afghanistan failed to gain popular support, the Soviets decided to invade. A number of resistance leaders concentrated on increasing opium production in their regions to finance their operations, regardless of its haram Islamic status, in particular Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Mullah Nasim Akhundzada, and Ismat Muslim. The production was doubled to 575 metric tons between 1982 and 1983.[15][16] (At this time the United States was pursuing an "arms-length" supporting strategy of the Mujahideen, the main purpose of which was to cripple the Soviet Union slowly into withdrawal through attrition rather than effect a quick and decisive overthrow.) Hekmatyar, the leading recipient of aid from the CIA and Pakistan, developed at least six heroin refineries in Koh-i-Sultan in southwestern Pakistan, while other warlords were content to sell raw opium. Nasim Akhundzada, who controlled the traditional poppy growing region of northern Helmand, issued quotas for opium production, which he was even rumoured to enforce with torture and extreme violence. To maximise control of trafficking, Nasim maintained an office in Zahidan, Iran.[17]
Its bullshit to paint an invasion as aid. This is what imperialist do.
The soviets invaded aremovedanistan for the same reasons as the us did later and Briton did before.
To protect their borders from afar,
To create and protect trade deal favorable to their country,
To spread their ideology.
And by the way I read a book about the history of aremovedanistan called: Games Without Rules: The Often Interrupted History of Afghanistan.
It outlined how the three main invasion of Afghanistan all followed the same basic lines, motivations and results. They devastated Afghanistan and created a situation where they would be invaded again.
How could the USSR have invaded Afghanistan for the same reason as the US?
The USSR was there to oppose the US by fighting their proxies and defend the socialists in Afghanistan who supported them during the invasion.
The US invaded under the War on Terror pretext as a war profiteering entrerprise. They brought Unaco, Haliburton, KBR, PMCs, and other contractors in to extract value from the region to bring profits to the imperial core.
The issue is that it isn't imperialist. You are unable to demarcate between what you consider unsavory actions and imperialism.
I'm not saying that i agree with all of the USSR's actions. I never said i was in support of this particular action for that matter. I am saying that the USSR was not imperialist because it did not engage in capitalist extraction or monopolization.
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).
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
Found the tankie.
Honestly What bullshit.
Tankie is a slur for authoritarian communists.
There is a healthy and honest way to appreciate communism, Russia, the CCP and even DPRK.
And then there are people who are completely shilling the CCP Russia DPRK as communist uptopias. These people are tankies.
If you are unable to recoginze the atrocities commited at any point in history, by the USA China, Russia , or any other country for that Matter. You're a chump.
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.
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You have obviously never been to hexbear.
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imagine actually reading marx and understanding how he literally wrote an essay about how marxism is not utopian
Nah im good. Ive seen it myself and im not interested in going back to that cesspool.
Why dont you show me an example of someone on hexbear critizing russia or ccp?
Literally one example.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Communist_Party
Its both. Be less of a dick.
Thanks for post examples of modern day russia being authoritarian, homophobia is usually a sign of authoritarianism.
So i guess you got me. Russia still sux.
What was your point again?
Thank you for confirming that you asked this in bad faith.
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Literally the first line!
No, it's just one, but western press likes to use the other
Ok
"In English they call themselves the Vietnamese, but everyone in my neighborhood calls them ****s. It's both."
I dont understand what you are saying here are you calling me racist again?
I don't think I called you racist to start with, but my point was that just because something is called by X name in one context by one group of people and Y in another context by another group does not mean both names are equally valid. When it comes to political entities, typically the belief is that the group itself decides on its own name (like Kiev officially becoming Kyiv in English, to take a recent example). The CPC says that its name is the CPC. Western journos who want their readership to hate the Party call it the CCP. These are not equally valid bases for what to call something.
I did not know that was the case. So I see your point.
I will from now on use CPC.
You're arguing that it's okay to call a group a term used almost exclusively by their political enemies who want them completely destroyed, I think it's pretty obvious that you're a racist.
Ok. I wasnt argue to use it. I was just going off of what wikipedia said. Lol
I can change the term. Cpc it is
We're mainly waiting for you to say "Yes, I was wrong, Hexbear doesn't shill for Russia/China/DPRK and call them communist utopias, and I guess tankies is kind of a meaningless term.". I think that was the point.
I mean as I stated in other comments i went to hexbear a few months ago and saw a bunch of people doing this very thing. So if you want yo say that experiance was a fluke ok. But stop trying to paint me as a liar.
Also tankie has real meaning to anarchist. So I dont feel it is meaningless.
I still have to meet an anarchist IRL who 1) knows about the term 'tankie' let alone 2) uses it
You're not gonna find any utopian communists on hexbear, they're almost all marxists.
https://hexbear.net/comment/2175192
https://hexbear.net/comment/290125
Fuck off and stop lying.
we are hexbear
We can stop talking.
Weren't you just about to give us examples of evil tankies?
Hexbear, not even once.
But why would you believe your lying eyes? /s
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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
Nope. Because the argument always goes like this:
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
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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
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.
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.
You can speak for us comrade @Zuzak@hexbear.net
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
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.
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This post is proof Tom Lehrer was wrong about exactly one thing
You're not a tankie. Tankies deny the oppressive nature of Russia, China, North Korea etc., deflecting all critique with whataboutism by pointing at shortcomings or atrocities of Western nations. Some like to call you Nazi or imperialist if you disagree with them, while in many aspects their ideology and that of their paragon countries is much closer to Nazism than that of liberal democracies like the ones you mentioned.
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No you are not a tankie. You are very painfully a liberal.
Please keep reading and understand there is a difference between authoritarian communism and communism
Please see Thomas Sankara.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sankara
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Your not doing very good job. Your just coming off as an idiot too me.
Can you be more concise? Your run on sentences make me want to stop talking to you.
Im not here to go over the specifics of Sankaras's Decisons: But From what I do know. He fought corruption, he pushed literacy programs and fought malnutrition. All While resistsing western imperialsm.
Im sure he made mistakes and did some problematic things. As an anarchist I can appreicate the good things he did and be open to the concept that he also did bad things as well.
Just like the USSR CPC and other communist governments.
Your going to have to rewrite, this i dont understand what you are saying. Are you referring to me or Sankara?
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Well you got me. Maybe im not in the mood for jokes. I am so tired of having these conversation. It makes me so sad to see people supporting these countries.
Russia and china are not examples of a good government. Neither is the usa. I feel like im taking crazy pills.
Because i know about him and agree with many things that he did. Not everything, but he didnt build an imperialst nation. He fought for literacy and nutrition and anti corruption.
He didnt build a survelence network or invade another nation to my knowledge.
He fought for his people using the principles revolutionary communism and ML. This I support.
Just like i can recognize that the CPC does provide many valuable things to it citizens . While also recognizing that they are still authoritarnian.
I dont know. Im not here to tell you how sankara could of avoided assassination. But I do feel that acting like Sankara is the same as the cpc/russia in any real way is kinda absurd.
Cuba is better example of communism than cpc. Once again they have problems.
Ultimately i am an anarchist, i dont think communism is the solution long term, but i would work with communists, As long as they didnt support large authoritarian governments.
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So is the USSR not communist by your definition?
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I feel this is like syamtics. Anarchist are socialists as well. but if some told me "I dont think anarchy is the way foward"
I dont think it would be fair for me to say to " no you mean socialism, Anarchy is the Goal! not the current situation"
It doesnt make sense to think that communism isnt the solution? This makes me feel like communists are unable to have real discussion with anarchists about the flaws within communism.
I feel anarchy is the only real way to gaurentee long term that people will be continually liberated. I think that any real hierarchical system will enventually turn back into a police state. We saw this in the USSR. And we see in in the CPC too.
They once had revolutionary components which I support. But those begin to dwindle the minute they took power and likey before.
From the origins of revolutionary communism came a police state. How do MLs deal with the flaws shown in The USSR? By saying that it wasn't communist?
This is what I mean when I say i dont think communism is the solution long term. That communists governments have a tendency to turn toward police states. Call it what you want but lenin was a marxist from my understanding and marxist are considered communists. Right?
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https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-alexander-berkman-bolsheviks-shooting-anarchists
"But of all the revolutionary elements in Russia it is the Anarchists who now suffer the most ruthless and systematic persecution. Their suppression by the Bolsheviki began already in 1918, when — in the month of April of that year — the Communist Government attacked, without provocation or warning, the Anarchist Club of Moscow and by the use of machine guns and artillery “liquidated” the whole organisation."
Emma goldman
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Do you have any evidence that this is false or do you just not like it?
Alls I hear is a lot of what aboutism.
"Emma goldman is writing about anarchist being murdered but whatabout the the bad things anarchists did? "
Emma goldman was a russia born anarchist critiquing The USSR.
Are you going to respond the to claims they are making or are you going to cherry pick out the racist stuff?
We can stop honeslty. if you believe that anarchism is eurofacism we have very little to talk about.
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Yeah the racist Republicans in the US use whataboutism all the time to skirt around actual critiques. They really hate it when you call them out on it
Did anarchist attack and kill communists during that time period? Yes. Does that make thier critiques about soviet authoritarianism invalid or make emma Goldman letters false. No. It just means there is nuance in history.
I dont categorically support emma goldman. And Im not surprised they said some racist things. Thats why I am able to separate the good things they did while critizing the bad.
You should try it!
It is a known fact that the USSR consolidated power within russia after the october revolution. They killed and jailed anarchists and many other opossing groups.
And when lenin died and stalin took over, he did it too. This is what large goverments must do to maintain power.
The fact that you can't admit that means you a defintiately a tankie.
You sound like a jackass when you write this way. imo.
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Think on it until you do, because as of now you're useless
How could it be bad trolling if you fell for it
The last part reads as being in reference to you, since the socialist states you hate took measures to survive whereas ones like Allende's Chile folded and their progress brutally reversed.
If Sankara had been more effective in protecting the revolution, you very likely would hate him too because he would be smeared just like Fidel and the rest as "authoritarian" etc. Imo this wouldn't be because of whatever specific measures he took, but the mere fact that he would have posed a more substantial ideological threat to the west for living and being able to keep making progress.
Sankara was ML, like me and all the people you're calling "tankies" or "authoritarian" communists
We've read plenty of Sankara, time you to to read a little Jakarta Method
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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
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.
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
I disagree it has real implications usually the existence of a police state.
I am an anarchist . I am against police states.
China russia and the USA are all police states. They all suck. They all oppress their own people and others.
There is much nuance. But my beliefs boiled down to a sentence is this:
Fuck police States and fuck the people who support them.
If those are your beliefs then they are infantile, and its no wonder you are openly against AES and people who support real world projects in socialism. The new world will be built by people around the world while left anti-communists whine about how they are doing it wrong because they don't understand the theoretical basis communist are using in these states, and they refuse to understand the real material contexts in which these societies struggle to survive against the US imperialist world order.
There are many anarchist comrades on Hexbear who regularly get called "tankies" by people like you and are able to understand the difference between criticizing some AES without being anti-communist. We have a non-sectarian rule there so we don't argue about our specific tendencies. You should maybe soeak to some of them to form a more nuanced view of AES. As an ML i can't really do that, because i do have some fundamental theoretical differences, such as veiwing the term of authoritarian as kind of pointless, thst hoes back to Engels arguing with anarchists about the Paris Commune basically.
If you're open to a book about left anti-communism and how its driven a wedge between yourself and people you call tankies, i recommend Micheal Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds https://mltheory.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/michael-parenti-blackshirts-and-reds_-rational-fascism-and-the-overthrow-of-communism-2001.pdf
All existing countries are police states, it's not a useful term.
Disagree.
In fact I find it is a better measure of oppressive goverment than most indicators.
What you really mean to say is most goverments are oppressive and authoritarian. Show me a country with a large prison population and I will show you an authoritarian country.
Please see the zapatistas. For non police state goverment.
How is it a useful measure of oppressive governments when it applies to all of them?
The Zapatistas are not a state government and they do police their territory.
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.
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.
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
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:cracker:
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.
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?
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.
You think trying people for corruption make you authoritarian?
Are you a liberal?
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?
oh god oh fuck
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.
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.
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.
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"?
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Exactly. They won't answer the question though.
Sankara was a tankie
What do you think about Bakunin?
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.
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
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wait what im crying ZELENSKY A TANKIE WHAT
Tbf The person who said it is probably a teenager and they engaged in good faith, but yes.
Their definition of "tankie" apparently revolved around a state killing its own people so when someone presented evidence of Ukraine's shelling of Donbas they described it as Ukraine going, "Tankie Mode." Someone then asked if they thought Lincoln was a tankie and they considered it and wrote out a whole thing, ultimately concluding no, but that it was fair to describe Sherman as a "proto-tankie."
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.
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
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?
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
MLs like you are the reason I am an anarchist.
You asked for more communists i support and I listed some and now Im anti-communist because I don't support the ones who created police states. Were you just waiting for me to engage so you could call that?
Lol you make me want to call more people like you tankies because it is so applicable.
MLs who think the only path to revolution is thru police states, are authoritarian by nature.
I wouldn't consider any AES a police state. They are states, they utilize state power to defend themselves from threats from the capitalist class both internally and extermely, because those threats are reality.
Thats why Sankara was assasinated, Rosa Luxembourg was assassinated, why the Black Panthers were assassinated or imprisioned. The capitalist class kills its enemies utilizing the power of the state. And the Black Panthers, Sankara, and Luxembourg were well aware of that.
Believing in using the power of the state is part of ML doctrine, not creating police states, but utilizing that power for the proletariat. I don't think you actually differentiate between state and police state, or a capitalist state from a socislist one (since you conflate the Russian Federation with the USSR which are not the same thing).
Except, you do seem to able to differentiate, but only in cases were our revolutions failed, like in Burkina Faso, the Black Panthers, and Luxembourg. I'm not sure why all the communists you support are one's who failed.
Remind me, what happened to Rosa again?
Ok cool
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
Tankie nonsense.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet%E2%80%93Afghan_War
The USSR invaded aganistan. Dont worry the USA did too but it tootally isnt imerpialism when the USSR does it right?
They were supporting the socialists in Afghanistan against the CIA backed Mujahideen. How is that imperialist?
Edit clarity: an invasion is not imperialist on its own., It's not about who does it, it's about the objectives of the invasion.
Lol do you hear yourself?
Tankie bullshit friend.
Afghanistan did not want to be invaded. The Afghans fought with the soviets through guerilla warfare for a decade.
You sound just like Americans justifying the US invasion that would happen later.
What's bullshit about it? You just say its bullshit but not why.
That's why you get called a
Do you even read the Wikipedia articles you link people to? The Afghans were asking for Soviet aid against insurgents backed by the US. The invasion happened when the USSR feared their allies in Afghanistan were not capable of handling the US supported insurgency that they thought would institute a theocracy there as had happened in Iran. Which is exactly what ended up happening there.
That's not what happened during the US invasion of Afghanistan. That invasion was a cover for war profiteeering, mineral extraction, and opiate production. Rhe US extracted value and resources from that region to enrich capitalists in the imperial core. That's what makes it imperialist.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_production_in_
Soviet period (1979–1989) Edit After a Soviet-backed left-wing government in Afghanistan failed to gain popular support, the Soviets decided to invade. A number of resistance leaders concentrated on increasing opium production in their regions to finance their operations, regardless of its haram Islamic status, in particular Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Mullah Nasim Akhundzada, and Ismat Muslim. The production was doubled to 575 metric tons between 1982 and 1983.[15][16] (At this time the United States was pursuing an "arms-length" supporting strategy of the Mujahideen, the main purpose of which was to cripple the Soviet Union slowly into withdrawal through attrition rather than effect a quick and decisive overthrow.) Hekmatyar, the leading recipient of aid from the CIA and Pakistan, developed at least six heroin refineries in Koh-i-Sultan in southwestern Pakistan, while other warlords were content to sell raw opium. Nasim Akhundzada, who controlled the traditional poppy growing region of northern Helmand, issued quotas for opium production, which he was even rumoured to enforce with torture and extreme violence. To maximise control of trafficking, Nasim maintained an office in Zahidan, Iran.[17]
CIA backed insugents grew opium. What dies that have to do with anything i said?
Its bullshit to paint an invasion as aid. This is what imperialist do.
The soviets invaded aremovedanistan for the same reasons as the us did later and Briton did before.
To protect their borders from afar,
To create and protect trade deal favorable to their country,
To spread their ideology.
And by the way I read a book about the history of aremovedanistan called: Games Without Rules: The Often Interrupted History of Afghanistan.
It outlined how the three main invasion of Afghanistan all followed the same basic lines, motivations and results. They devastated Afghanistan and created a situation where they would be invaded again.
How could the USSR have invaded Afghanistan for the same reason as the US?
The USSR was there to oppose the US by fighting their proxies and defend the socialists in Afghanistan who supported them during the invasion.
The US invaded under the War on Terror pretext as a war profiteering entrerprise. They brought Unaco, Haliburton, KBR, PMCs, and other contractors in to extract value from the region to bring profits to the imperial core.
How are these two things the same?
Yes.
And also they wanted to protect thier trade and their borders from other imperialsts.
Why cant it be both?
Why are you unable to recognize that USSR could invade Afghanistan to protect socialst and to protect trade and secure thier borders?
Why cant you just admit that the USSR did some unsavory things? Do you think they are a perfect embodiment of communism?
They assassinated the communist president of Afghanistan before they invaded!
All othet arguments aside i dont support governments who use assassination that way.
The issue is that it isn't imperialist. You are unable to demarcate between what you consider unsavory actions and imperialism.
I'm not saying that i agree with all of the USSR's actions. I never said i was in support of this particular action for that matter. I am saying that the USSR was not imperialist because it did not engage in capitalist extraction or monopolization.
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?
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?