Basically someone that apologizes for war criminals.
Its existence stems from people defending the massacre at Tiannenmen square.
These days tankies appear in many forms. On Lemmy most commonly as people such as OP apologizing for Joe Biden being complicit in Genocide.
It’s been pointed out to them that “tankie” predates the Tiananmen riots by a generation, but they persist with their pet definition, which literally no one shares.
Mostly they seem to use it to mean anyone who has in any way supported any genocide, including any apologia or denial. And they believe in a genocidal Holomodor & Uyghurmodor as much as in the German Nazi ones & the ongoing one in Gaza.
If lemmy.world weren’t defederated from Hexbear, I would ask them to confirm.
Edit to add: they seem to flip-flop on whether or not Uyghurs have been / are being genocided
Their bespoke definition is:
It’s been pointed out to them that “tankie” predates the Tiananmen riots by a generation, but they persist with their pet definition, which literally no one shares.
Mostly they seem to use it to mean anyone who has in any way supported any genocide, including any apologia or denial. And they believe in a genocidal Holomodor & Uyghurmodor as much as in the German Nazi ones & the ongoing one in Gaza.
If lemmy.world weren’t defederated from Hexbear, I would ask them to confirm.
Edit to add: they seem to flip-flop on whether or not Uyghurs have been / are being genocided
I think they might be making fun of how meaningless the word 'tankie' is by calling everything a tankie