I just checked, and even genzedong, who are all 14-year-old USSR fans that haven't read any theory, don't support Putin. Where are all these pseudo-leftist tankies, are they in the room right now?
They conflate being against NATO, as well as side-eyeing how comfortable Ukraine is with neo-nazis, with being pro-Putin. Very much "you're either with us or against us".
Vaushites would be eating Freedom Fries if this was 2003.
Twitter specializes in producing and distributing extremely bad takes, an idea being expressed on twitter is pretty low-quality evidence that it actually exists in any way that matters.
They definitely exist I have to imagine a lot of it is is “if you’re not with us your against us shit” wrt nato as well. Acknowledging faults the west made to get us here but still not liking the Russian federation doesn’t fit neatly in the black and white narratives western media likes to push
eh... "acknowledging faults" still makes it sound like a series of well-intentioned mistakes rather than an intentional and sustained campaign (edit: by the U.S. and NATO) to destabilize Ukraine and start a limited war there.
Also Putin bad, to be clear
The slightest skepticism of the NATO position is now supporting Putin.
Last I checked genzedong was full pro Putin and posting videos straight from the Russian ministry of defence about how POWs were treated humanely.
Their attitude is "if you're not with us, you're against us". Anything other than full support for a Ukrainian insurgency means your a Putin lover.
This is just an attempt at stealing the oxygen from obvious, more nuanced conversations around the Ukranian conflict. The pro-Putin left is real but it's such a minor contingent being overblown in importance precisely to bury pointed criticism at the circumstances that led to this, but more dangerously, it's also sabotaging any real attempts at de-escalation and off-ramping. Notice how supporting the Ukranian people should be by way of supporting Zelensky and it's war against Russia, even as his attempts at fighting off Russia may be hurting Ukranian people just as much in the long term. There's obviously little concern towards the victims of war, and seems more preocupied with the whodunnits and the viscisitudes of exacting fair punishment to the responsible.
Thank you for stating this clearly. It is driving me mad how Liberals are making it so that if you dont 1000% support Ukraine then you are a pro putin fascist. Like fuck putin for the right wing reactionary he is, and his horrifically stupid invasion, but I am not so stupid as to assume that the us's prodding and poking and funding of right wing nationalists in ukraine isnt JUST as responsible for this tragedy. Like sometimes there isnt a good guy and the only solutions are a choice between bad and less bad.
I am just glad I am not the only person out there. The empires propaganda is so fucking powerful it feels like it is bending reality around me, makes me feel completely insane.
If you are baby to marx I recommend Marx Madness's season on capital and David Harvey's online lectures. They helped me to listen to before I read it, reading it alone without some previous introduction to ideas and concepts is fucking hard.
Yes you could argue it's moralizing in lieu of actual solutions, a solution that very ironically hinges on the US intervening as little as possible. A way to scrub off the nasty images of war now buried deep in your conscious is to Support the Right People.
Responsibility for this war rests with Russia and Russia alone. But that should not obscure the fact that NATO, led by Washington, laid the groundwork for confrontation with a series of missteps after the breakup of the Soviet Union, provocations that fueled Russian resentment and fears of Western encirclement.
"Responsibility for this war rests with Russia and Russia alone. Except where it doesn't. I am very intelligent."
This entire article is filled with contradictions like that:
Ukraine led by Nazis? The president, Volodymyr Zelensky, who was elected in 2019 by a landslide, is a Jew whose relatives were murdered in the Holocaust. Though there are fascist militias in Ukraine, just as there are in the U.S. and other Western countries, Ukrainians have repeatedly and decisively rejected neo-Nazis and right-wing extremists at the polls
1.) Just because the West curiously won't deal with their nazi problem, that just makes it okay I guess lmao. 2.) They didn't vote for a nazi, therefore the country has rejected nazism... except for those militias... which are okay because the west enables their nazis too... anyway, shut up tankies
There was an official Ukraine propaganda image of women in the army and one had full on Nazi patches on her plate carrier.
That same official Ukrainian account posted a photo of one of their soldiers with a Rhodesia flag patch yesterday as well
Are those photos still up? I need receipts to show some people I know IRL who were blindly defending/parroting the Ukrainian ultra-nationalists' fascist slogans
It's here although I think i was confusing two accounts for being the same one, the flag is on the last soldier. https://twitter.com/ArmedForcesUkr/status/1497101285690163242
Waiting for the old South African flag or AWB flag to appear in the propaganda photoshoots
I wonder why this is never mentioned any time western media concedes that maybe there are a few nazi militias!
have repeatedly and decisively rejected neo-Nazis and right-wing extremists at the polls
Yeah right. To denazify, one only needs to :vote:
Big "there is no racism in America because Obama won twice" vibes
There's certainly no precedent of centerist forces collaborating or handing power to fascists which is why it's definitely not a problem.
Zelensky defending the fascist Nazi collaborator and ultra-nationalist Stepan Bandera, who was instrumental in helping to carry out the Holocaust in Ukraine:
There are indisputable heroes. Stepan Bandera is a hero for a certain part of Ukrainians, and this is a normal and cool thing. He was one of those who defended the freedom of Ukraine.
A national survey conducted in Ukraine in 2009 inquired about attitudes by region towards Bandera's faction of the OUN:
In Galicia (provinces of Lviv, Ternopil, and Ivano-Frankivsk) 37% had a "very positive" opinion of Bandera, 26% a "mostly positive" opinion, 20% were "neutral", 5% "mostly negative", 6% "very negative", and 6% "unsure". In Volhynia, 5% had a very positive opinion, 20% a mostly positive opinion, 57% were neutral, 7% were mostly negative, 5% very negative and 6% were unsure. In Transcarpathia 4% of the respondents had a very positive opinion, 32% a mostly positive opinion, 50% were neutral, none had a mostly negative opinion, 7% had a very negative opinion and 7% were unsure. In contrast, in central Ukraine (comprising the capital Kyiv, as well as the provinces of Zhytomyr, Cherkasy, Chernihiv, Poltava, Sumy, Vinnytsia, and Kirovohrad) attitudes towards Bandera's faction of the OUN were 3% very positive, 10% mostly positive, 24% neutral, 17% mostly negative, 21% very negative and 25% unsure. In Eastern Ukraine (the provinces of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia) 1% each had very positive or mostly positive attitudes towards Bandera's OUN, 19% were neutral, 13% mostly negative, 26% very negative and 20% unsure. In Ukraine's south (the Odessa, Mykolaiv and Kherson regions plus Crimea) 1% each were very or mostly positive, 13% were neutral, 31% mostly negative, 48% very negative and 25% were unsure. In Ukraine as a whole, 6% of Ukrainians had a very positive opinion, 8% a mostly positive opinion, 23% were neutral, 15% had a mostly negative opinion, 30% had a very negative opinion, and 18% were unsure.
A 2021 poll regarding views of Stepan Bandera conducted by the Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation together with the Razumkov Center's sociological service:
a positive attitude prevails in the western region of Ukraine (70%); in the central region of the state, 27% of respondents consider his activity positive, 27% consider his activity negative and 27% consider his activity both positive and negative;[116] negative attitude prevails in the southern and eastern regions of Ukraine (54% and 48% of respondents consider his activity negative for Ukraine, respectively).
An article detailing some of Zelensky's ties to the far-right in Ukraine.
series of missteps
:citations-needed: relvant episode. It's alway "oopsie woopsie" foreign policy blunders. Not something anybody could have predicted, just "good intentions gone awry".
Every American thinks 50-100% of our leaders are wicked ghoul pedophiles, yet when those ghouls do something terrible in the world, and come away even richer than before, it's because America made a well intentioned mistake.
ya, defanging this term by talking about 'capitalist tankies' seems off-putting initially - but I really think it is an effective tactic that will ultimately need to be embraced
they even did it first for completely economic reasons during the partition of Germany
In addition, the Marshall plan forced German companies, as well as those in all of Western Europe, to modernize their business practices, and take account of the wider market. Marshall plan funding overcame bottlenecks in the surging economy caused by remaining controls (which were removed in 1949), and opened up a greatly expanded market for German exports. Overnight, consumer goods appeared in the stores, because they could be sold for higher prices. While the availability of consumer goods is seen as a giant success story by most historians of the present, the perception at the time was a different one: prices were so high that average people could not afford to shop, especially since prices were free-ranging but wages still fixed by law. Therefore, in the summer of 1948 a giant wave of strikes and demonstrations swept over West Germany, leading to an incident in Stuttgart where strikers were met by US tanks ("Stuttgarter Vorfälle"). Only after the wage-freeze was abandoned, Deutschmark and free-ranging prices were accepted by the population.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Mark#Economics_of_1948_currency_reform
edit: more interesting context
Eugene Keller writing about German 'denazification' and the Stuttgart Riots from 11/1948 https://www.marxists.org/history/etol//newspape/laboraction-ny/1948/v12n46/keller.html
TIL the OG 'tank man' was a West German striker standing in front of a US tank in 1948
if anyone has NYT sub - can you get the text of this article PLZ!!!
https://www.nytimes.com/1948/02/03/archives/750000-in-germany-quit-jobs-for-a-day-500000-plan-hunger-strike-in.html
umm, and while searching for pics of the Stuttgart strike ... I found the same thing was happening in Japan!
https://visualizingcultures.mit.edu/tokyo_1960/anp2_essay01.html
https://img.onl/ySmWnX
edit: not sure if that worked. Where to upload an image?
try to create a post here - paste img to the url field - then copy the img url that is generated - you don't have to make a post for the img to be hosted
https://hexbear.net/pictrs/image/uEXULMnCDd.png
Let me know if that’s too hard to read
Ok, is this any better? Have a PDF now too. We'll get there
https://hexbear.net/pictrs/image/gDVDWyzejP.png
I went looking in one of my academic institution's search engines but it didn't turn up the original source. Someone with more time is gonna have to do it unfortunately but it's never a waste of time to collect receipts
Love to be called a fascist because I don't support guys going around waving swastikas and doing ethnic cleaning.
Pretty sure that particular meme is from "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs", comrade.
All movies are the same to me anyways, flashing lights and moving pictures and all that
Uncritical support to our toddler comrades who have not yet developed complex sight o7
I'm just gonna start asking people to define tankie. I am so sick of seeing that fucking word
For reddit Atleast, a 'tankie' is a creature from the forbidden depths of genzedong. Just anti West and will support anything to own westoids.
Are China, Cuba, Nicaragua all “tankies”? Because they all are refusing to condemn Russia or even backing them.
If I have to decide between the positions of all AES states vs. westerners who have a history of social imperialism I know who I’m siding with.
China’s position is the correct one in my opinion. Urge for an end to the war and negotiations that lead to a ceasefire, with security concessions granted to Russia. No sanctions on Russia.
This effectively means that NATO and the west should not get involved whatsoever, should stop supplying arms & should encourage Zelenskyy’s government to surrender as soon as possible
A tankie is an amalgamation of Guys reddit made up to get mad at. They are so anti American they would support the nazis. They think Stalin literally did nothing wrong. They hate LGBT people. They know China is genociding Muslims but secretly think that's a good thing.
And sometimes a tankie is anyone who doesn't think Che was an evil murderer :shrug-outta-hecks:
I've heard "left-wing people who deny genocides". My reply was "Wait, so like liberals who support Israel? But liberals aren't left-wing."
Been doing that for a few weeks and none of the 10 people I've asked have been able to remotely articulate what they even think it means
Responsibility for this war rests with Russia and Russia alone. But that should not obscure the fact that NATO, led by Washington, laid the groundwork for confrontation with a series of missteps after the breakup of the Soviet Union, provocations that fueled Russian resentment and fears of Western encirclement.
FFS you cannot say Russia is solely responsible for this war alone as though it were a choice made entirely in a vacuum and then go on to tacitly acknowledge how it is fueled and largely the result of a series of CHOICES (missteps is too charitable) that the United states has made over the past few decades.
Navigating the nuance of this moment as a leftist is incredibly complicated and its stressing me out in some of my personal relationships but I refuse to believe that the right answer is the equivalent of "shut up, stand in complete solidarity with ukriane, and tell Putin to fuck himself". Even if we can acknowledge that this war is not good, that approach seems to lead only one way: escalation
It's genuinely too much to argue against. I spent a few hours arguing with my friends, being very clear on my points, and it doesn't matter because there's a constant stream of propaganda saying this is a war for Democracy against Authoritarianism. I can argue one point, then by the time I'm done two more articles have already been pooped out.
Related, I've been very disappointed with Grace Blakely, the Br*tish Marxist. Since this started, she seems obsessed with convincing the Br*tish government to take "oligarch-owned land" surrounding London. And it's gaining traction---you'll never believe this---among Swedish-speaking Twitter users (Sweden, a country which is famously not just neoliberals masquerading as social democrats).
It's like... you know the Br*tish aren't going to start co-ops and free grocery stores on the land, right? It's just gonna be given to Br*tish landlords. What the fuck makes you think it's a good idea to advocate for just stealing Russian shit? I hesitate to use very sectarian terms like "social imperialist" but I'm really not sure what else to call this. She even mentions the Br*tish government "overlooking" shady Russian money... dog, what do you think they're gonna do when they get their hands on it?
Do not use "Marxism" to goad your very capitalist government into stealing shit; I can't believe that needs to be said.
What's most bizarre here is that almost no one is taking the position he's arguing against. Sure, his actual language is a bit shitty, but the position he's advocating for is the position most people called "tankies" by people like him have taken.
