As a leftist its also important to keep in mind we do differentiate between leftists who hold some opinions we disagree with compared to a Liberal who disagrees with us on nearly everything. Especially when said Liberals demand to be treated like leftists yet support imperalism, genocide, apartheid, capitalism, bigotry, and yet constantly call people “fake leftists” or “tankies”.
It’s a strange state of affairs, there is a right wing recruitment pipeline deticated to making fun of liberals for being “cringe but also wrong”™.
An interesting experament you can do, replace “leftist”, “the left” and “liberal” with “SJW” (swap the insider and outsider language) and ask yourself how much and in what interesting ways does the sentimate of the post change.
I’ve seen conservatives lob the word tankie around before like they do with other scary sounding political words. But not here on lemmy. “Tankie” has a very precise meaning on lemmy that everyone here seems to understand, despite a few tankies trying to gaslight people into thinking the term has “lost it’s meaning”.
It’s not about defending tankies it’s about people who are constantly shifting the focus of conversation to the most mockable section of online lefties.
The ruling class don’t waste their time distancing themselves from qanon, they focus on furthering their class interests and emiserating the poor.
Liberals who are constantly calling people tankies are helping the ruling class.
I’m not taking cues from the far-right in not denouncing our worst aspects when I see them and letting them take up shop in our spaces. I don’t see the need to whataboutism to them either and will call that out, but I don’t want them in spaces I’m in either.
No one’s defending tankies, nor saying we shouldn’t call them out. The original commenter was saying liberals call all manner of leftists “tankies” when they actually aren’t in order to derail them.
The next commenter stated: “The ruling class don’t waste their time distancing themselves from qanon, they focus on furthering their class interests and emiserating the poor.” Distancing themselves includes calling them out. So it sounds to me like they’re saying we need to be pragmatic like the ruling class and not distance ourselves from tankies, which is absolutely not something I’m ever going to do for those slimeballs. Actively doing it like some sort of performance apropos of nothing? Sure, maybe not. But if a tankie ever tries to associate with us, they need to be given the boot over their disgusting ideals.
I’m saying the need to instantly and constantly denounce tankies is tedious and counterproductive. I’m saying that policing the boundaries of leftism based on dumb shit said online is a reactionary distraction.
It’s a common strategy used to distract from the core issues. It’s like when supporters of israel go “but do you condemn hamas?!” or “oh, I notice you don’t criticize hamas as much (therefore you must support them)”
It’s a political slang word. It refers to those who support leftist authoritarian regimes such as communist, China. Regimes where the state can do no wrong and the people do all the wrong so the state must step in to crush the people and “protect them” from dangerous, Western and capitalist ideas. Pretty sure the name derives from the 1989 tiananmen square incident.
This is the internet, everyone is as anonymous as they want to be. Lots of people find these posts by browsing by All, so they’re not likely to be aware of (or care about) the rules for a particular instance. If a Liberal and a Leftist wander into the same community, it can be hard to tell them apart unless they’ve made politics their whole identity.
As a leftist its also important to keep in mind we do differentiate between leftists who hold some opinions we disagree with compared to a Liberal who disagrees with us on nearly everything. Especially when said Liberals demand to be treated like leftists yet support imperalism, genocide, apartheid, capitalism, bigotry, and yet constantly call people “fake leftists” or “tankies”.
It’s a strange state of affairs, there is a right wing recruitment pipeline deticated to making fun of liberals for being “cringe but also wrong”™.
An interesting experament you can do, replace “leftist”, “the left” and “liberal” with “SJW” (swap the insider and outsider language) and ask yourself how much and in what interesting ways does the sentimate of the post change.
Maybe I’m in a bubble, but I have yet to see anyone who’s not genuinely a tankie being accused of such.
I’ve seen conservatives lob the word tankie around before like they do with other scary sounding political words. But not here on lemmy. “Tankie” has a very precise meaning on lemmy that everyone here seems to understand, despite a few tankies trying to gaslight people into thinking the term has “lost it’s meaning”.
Ive seen people be called tankies for not supporting Kamala and opposing Liberal Democracy
That’s wild. I’ve never heard that take and have a difficult time believing that it is common.
What alternative were they in favor of?
You had me until “tankies”. Tankies are scum and don’t need defending.
You cant use your favorite strawman argument? How sad
It’s not about defending tankies it’s about people who are constantly shifting the focus of conversation to the most mockable section of online lefties.
The ruling class don’t waste their time distancing themselves from qanon, they focus on furthering their class interests and emiserating the poor.
Liberals who are constantly calling people tankies are helping the ruling class.
I’m not taking cues from the far-right in not denouncing our worst aspects when I see them and letting them take up shop in our spaces. I don’t see the need to whataboutism to them either and will call that out, but I don’t want them in spaces I’m in either.
No one’s defending tankies, nor saying we shouldn’t call them out. The original commenter was saying liberals call all manner of leftists “tankies” when they actually aren’t in order to derail them.
The next commenter stated: “The ruling class don’t waste their time distancing themselves from qanon, they focus on furthering their class interests and emiserating the poor.” Distancing themselves includes calling them out. So it sounds to me like they’re saying we need to be pragmatic like the ruling class and not distance ourselves from tankies, which is absolutely not something I’m ever going to do for those slimeballs. Actively doing it like some sort of performance apropos of nothing? Sure, maybe not. But if a tankie ever tries to associate with us, they need to be given the boot over their disgusting ideals.
I’m saying the need to instantly and constantly denounce tankies is tedious and counterproductive. I’m saying that policing the boundaries of leftism based on dumb shit said online is a reactionary distraction.
It’s a common strategy used to distract from the core issues. It’s like when supporters of israel go “but do you condemn hamas?!” or “oh, I notice you don’t criticize hamas as much (therefore you must support them)”
I feel like you thought they were disagreeing with you, when they were pointing out the hypocrisy of Liberals but I dunno…
What’s a tankie?
It’s a political slang word. It refers to those who support leftist authoritarian regimes such as communist, China. Regimes where the state can do no wrong and the people do all the wrong so the state must step in to crush the people and “protect them” from dangerous, Western and capitalist ideas. Pretty sure the name derives from the 1989 tiananmen square incident.
The term has nothing to do with Tiananmen square and it’s usage actually predates the massacre by almost 40 years.
Yeah you’re right. I was for some reason conflating the USSR invading Hungary
And how do we do that?
This is the internet, everyone is as anonymous as they want to be. Lots of people find these posts by browsing by All, so they’re not likely to be aware of (or care about) the rules for a particular instance. If a Liberal and a Leftist wander into the same community, it can be hard to tell them apart unless they’ve made politics their whole identity.
Its pretty simple, do you support genocide?