https://i.imgur.com/FYeoXx4.png
anti communist propaganda and misinformation about virtually every communist revolutionary leader and movement throughout history has always been one of the most serious impediments to leftist growth in the west. It has created such a deeply ingrained rhetoric that anti communist propaganda has also been actively used by libertarian socialists to coopt movements and take advantage of this deeply ingrained hatred in the west by acting as a surface level alternative. The fact that there is so little pushback against anti communist rhetoric and propaganda among these leftist spaces is telling enough to its usefulness and the rhetoric largely centering around it.
In media you only ever see communism portrayed as the evil Russians that need to be killed and anarchism as the cool defiant and rebellious crowd fighting back against the oppressing government. Its dishonest to dismiss it as nothing important when this continual peddling of misinformation pushed by imperial media at the behest of capitalist interests always finds its way into the left and isn’t only not actually pushed back against, but also actively embraced opportunistically in many cases. I've seen it in many mainstream places including anarchist subs, dsa groups, iron front type antifa groups irl and online, and general "leftist unity" spaces. Its by far the most pervasive narrative on the western left today, and therefor the most harmful.
I'm tired of it being defended, brushed aside, normalized, and rationalized away as just "difference in tendencies", and I find it deeply dishonest to actively enable and not call this out in the name of some presumed "leftist unity". Where is this so called unity exactly? I see only antagonistic and opportunistic use of this anti communism and never any push back against it because its been such a useful rhetoric for this brand of western leftism. How are people still not understanding that this state department pushed rhetoric is an immense impediment towards any large leftist movement?
This is not sectarianism or anti whatever, no one has to be a communist, i have no problem against other tendencies even if we disagree strategically on what the best way forward is. This is just a call for leftists to do better and learn to deprogram themselves and be more critical of their own biases and understand that having grown in a world that has declared war on communism and has engrained in the collective consciousness of the west a deep seethed hatred that they themselves are also exposed and influenced by this. Its everyone's duty on the left to fight back against this petty reactionary rhetoric and get people to stop peddling state department approved narratives.
I've seen it. Even in official moderation, for example sidebar of /r/completeanarchy literally states communists are pro hierarchy and any defence of that is apologia. They also state "Promoting "Left Unity" is also considered apologia." so their position is essentially incompatible with literally every single person that uses ChapoChat and believes in the goals we have here. Almost every single day in that space there's some uncomfortable anti-communist content and it's deeply worry how much of it is being pushed. What's important to understand here that a lot of the time they're just conflating tankie and communist as exactly the same thing, they're against hierarchy, they're against any kind of socialist state, period, and therefore consider communists themselves to be the enemy if any person believes in a transitionary state.
It is definitely a serious thing to be concerned about.
What's important to note here is that I have only seen this in ONLINE anarchist spaces. I have literally never seen it from an anarchist in public that actually does praxis, the one time I saw someone remotely insinuate anything negative like that other more experienced people slapped the remark down. This is an online propaganda. The fear is that it could be limiting actual organising activity if socialists are involved by people that have been sucked into this stuff online not going to them. And by people generally building weird and distorted views.