edit: this is now closed future comments won’t be counted
I keep seeing this instance is overrun with tankies so hey, lets do an informal survey like I’ve seen on hexbear
respond with YES or NO in the first line of your comment and i’ll tally everything in a couple of days, lets say I’ll try and collect everything on the sunday the 9th (10+gmt sorry)
not sure thisll work, be nice, have fun
YES
They would have burned me as a heretic in the middle ages.
- Carl Jung
Just like calling someone a “witch” or heretic in the middle ages, a “barbarian”, or “savage”, or “commie” or “pinko” in the 20th century, these terms are less about the actual meaning, and more about a demonization, scapegoating, or a power relation between the dominant class, and a group they seek to malign and rally their people around.
Creating a useful enemy promotes group bonding, unity, a sense of strengthened identity, and self worth.
“Tankie” had a meaning that generally referred to non-pacifist leftists (or those that agreed with using violence to defend socialist projects), but now it just means, “any leftist I don’t like”.
It functions in the exact same way that “commie” did in the the McCarthy era, as a xenophobic and western-supremacist scapegoating of socialist countries, and an internal purging of the working-class communist movement.
It’s additionally useful because it deters people from reading or engaging with the worldwide communist / socialist movement.
If someone uses this term, this is what they’re doing without realizing it:
My only regret in that photo is not seeing Bhagat Singh, because him and his Marxist comrades were responsible for liberating India from British Raj. Bhagat seems to be less recognised or celebrated among the poster boy global Marxist figures.
None of them are considered Marxist or even Socialist in the country now unfortunately. They have been successfully whitewashed as nationalist heroes.
Bhagat Singh has an entry on Marxists.org, which is even more absurd. There is no way these were nationalist people. If that is the case, every socialist is basically a nationalist, every nationalist a patriot, and every patriot a rightwinger. Whoops, did I do something wrong?
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Don’t like people putting up a mirror to you?
now it just means, “any leftist I don’t like”.
With respect, there’s a bit more to it than that.
The way political discussions are often policed on ML instances (This one, Lemmygrad, and Hexbear) is not conducive to helping new people see your point of view. If a, let’s say, social democrat says something critical of the CCP and then is immediately censured or banned, they are going to be left with a very negative impression that feeds into the stereotypes that already exist about these instances.
Creating a useful enemy promotes group bonding, unity, a sense of strengthened identity, and self worth.
Aren’t people on ML instances also doing the exact same thing when they shout down and decry the wretched “liberals” (which seems to refer to anyone left-of-centre who doesn’t support communist party rule)? Whether it’s “tankie” or “liberal”, it only further entrenches the us vs them mindset.
It’s a shame that leftist infighting exists to such a degree when we often share about 95% of the same views, compared to the general public.
The way political discussions are often policed on ML instances (This one, Lemmygrad, and Hexbear) is not conducive to helping new people see your point of view.
If you ask in earnest, you’ll get good responses. A good number of people ask questions not to learn a different point of view, but to reinforce their own existing biases, which naturally becomes exhausting. Kind of like how POC get tired of justifying their existence to white supremacists, communists often for good reason get tired of trying to justify the existence of countries who choose to follow their own path, outside of the model of bourgeois democracy.
Aren’t people on ML instances also doing the exact same thing when they shout down and decry the wretched “liberals” (which seems to refer to anyone left-of-centre who doesn’t support communist party rule)? Whether it’s “tankie” or “liberal”, it only further entrenches the us vs them mindset.
Liberal, unlike tankie, has a fairly precise meaning in political discourse. It can be used too loosely IMO, but it generally means pro-capitalism, pro-individual freedom (including to exploit labor power to earn surplus value), pro free-market, pro-free speech (for all including reactionaries), pro wage-slavery, as well as specific limitations imposed on those considered outside of the “community of the free”. Its important to realize that even the US mis-definition of liberal (as vaguely socially progressive) includes all of the above, and the internationally accepted definition of liberal, is right wing (for example, the right wing party in Australia is the liberal party). The best book I can recommend here, is Losurdo’s Liberalism - A counter-history.
Not only that, but liberals rule most of the world, and especially most of the economies and governments of anglo-speaking countries, extracting a surplus from the sale of their labor power (who are mostly extremely poorly paid proletarians in the global south), and are responsible for most of the suffering of working-class people worldwide.
If you ask in earnest, you’ll get good responses.
This is not the case. Every time I’ve asked in earnest, I’ve faced mobs of lunatics.
[Citation needed]
If you ask in earnest, you’ll get good responses. A good number of people ask questions not to learn a different point of view, but to reinforce their own existing biases, which naturally becomes exhausting.
That is understandable, however I was more talking about good-faith attempts to express views that are contrary to ML orthodoxy being dogpiled, removed, and banned. I have personal direct experience with this, as do many others who have attempted to engage in political discussions in ML communities. Perhaps users of the ML persuasion are used to being attacked and this why contrarian views are so heavily moderated on ML instances, but quite often this defensive response only leads to alienating other leftists who could be sympathetic to your point of view.
Also, I already understand quite well the differences between classical, social, and neo-liberalism, and how the term is used in the US; I have a degree in political science. My point was that users on ML instances weaponize the term in the same way that other users utilize the term “tankie” in order to dismiss people who disagree with them, ad hominem.
social democrat says something critical of the CCP
You mean the same ones that support their western establishment and its narratives? Or the anti-China/Russia rhetoric that CIA, Bilderberg, USAID and Murdoch invent and push, that these socdems also help in pushing? Such people can never be aligned ultimately, and are subservient to western empire.
You think Bernie supporting the bombing of Yugoslavia was a one off incident? Name one US president that has not been a warmongerer.
I do not want the likes of Bernie, Vaush, Destiny, Keffals and such clowns to be representative of, and make the Left a populist thing.
YES
Everybody to the left of biden is considered a tankie nowdays, and I’m proud of being to the left of (and opposed to) genocide enablers.
Not so. There are many progressives who stand with Marxists on issues like social justice, LGBTQ issues, and Palestine but who do not feel welcome on instances like Hexbear because they also criticize the CCP.
And they sometimes get called “tankies” too by people to the right of them. That’s why I both think it’s a useless term (if everybody is a tankie, then nobody is) and why I think I fall in the definition (as most leftists do, I’ve seen pretty mild social democrats being called “tankies” by liberals)
Plus ultimately these blanket descriptions are pretty useless IMO, you’ll find extremely heated debates between “tankies” themselves on many topics, there’s no consensus, and there are many different ideologies “tankies” subscribe to. It would be like saying that Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians and Greens are all the same thing. We could call them “dronies” maybe.
Oh, I agree - calling people Tankies/Liberals/Dronies, especially ad hominem, is reductive and generally unhelpful.
Liberal is a term for a real ideology, Tankie is not.
ML people often tend not to apply ‘liberal’ correctly either, so it goes both ways.
Actually we do tend to apply “liberal” correctly.
It is liberals themselves who tend to not have even a Wikipedia-level understanding of liberalism—their own ideology!—or of socialism. And that’s how a centrist liberal like Bernie Sanders can get away with calling himself a socialist despite never calling for the abolition of private ownership of the means of production, because Burgerlanders don’t know their asses from their elbows politically thanks to over a century of red scares and cold wars, which are still ongoing[1][2].
Hang on, so you’re telling me you guys lump social liberals in with classical liberals and neoliberals? That’s definitely not common, but then I suppose if you’re a communist then it kinda makes sense.
Also, while I wouldn’t call Sanders a socialist either, he is not a centrist by any standard measure. I presume you don’t consider anyone a leftist if they don’t advocate for collective ownership and a centrally planned economy?
Does it count if I’ve actually driven tanks?
Not unless you enjoyed the crunching sounds
Yes, although I personally prefer “central planning enthusiast”.
I think we’re approaching the point where the word gets taken back by the community it was used to malign, if not there already. "
What’s the definition of tankie ?
People who root for the tanks when pictures of tiananmen square are posted.
Where do people get this stuff from when Wikipedia is right there?
But since you brought it up, I’ll copypasta myself.
“The term ‘tankie’ was originally used by dissident Marxist–Leninists to describe members of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) who followed the party line of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Specifically, it was used to distinguish party members who spoke out in defense of the Soviet use of tanks to suppress the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and the 1968 Prague Spring, or who more broadly adhered to pro-Soviet positions.”
See: Tankie - Wikipedia
Explained in this post to [email protected].
Supposedly it is a pejorative label applied to authoritarian communists, particularly Marxist–Leninist socialists. I presume it is the “pejorative” part that people do not like, b/c many of the places labelled as tankies by others unabashedly do precisely that!
I’ve only used the term twice myself, both kinda self-questioning what it even means, but if it is truly pejorative, then I should stop regardless.
I wouldn’t feel bad using a pejorative for fascists. Neither do I feel bad using a pejorative for other authoritarians. Their disrespect for human dignity, liberty, and worth disqualifies them for protection against such a minor indignity.
Tankies is fine for anyone on the side of the tanks at Tiananmen Square.
As EchoCT said, do you even Wikipedia?
But since you brought it up:
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That’s not even where the term originates. Come on, if you’re going to use the term at least do the 10 second Google search.
Dealers choice, no wait thats me, colour me surprised, it feels like one of those words that basically means whatever you want it to mean ay this point, answer the question bub ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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beep beep beep
Salty takie calling others Nazi… Cope harder 😏
If you don’t want to be called a nazi, simply don’t have the same opinion of communists as adolf eichmann. it’s that easy!
Lmao
If you are commie then you must love sending people to gulags, right ?
it’s that easy!
Cool, face the wall lib.
Ahhh, only tankie haters are libs ??
I must have forgoten the memo 🙄
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It originally meant someone who supported the USSR’s intervention in the 1956 Hungarian revolution. Now it means whatever the labeler wants it to mean, usually as a means of punching left.
No.
That said most MLs are my comrades anyway
Also liberals still always call me a tankie anyway so idk it doesn’t mean anything anymore.
Also no
I land somewhere on the anarcho side of politics, but I’m certainly not a tankie. Still get called one though.
A better world is possible and none of us can accurately predict how we will get there but if we don’t quit rehashing hundred year old ideological beefs that occurred within very different material conditions we’re all fucked anyway.
The tankies aren’t gonna murder the anarchists and at this juncture there is no revolution to speak of for anarchists to have a hand in betraying (for reasons that I have never heard a compelling case for its inevitability). If we don’t get our shit together the billionaires are gonna kill us all and who knows maybe it’s already too late but we have to at least try.
I wonder if part of it is that climate change might mean the death of modern human civilization, so could the slim hope of life as a slave seem more preferable than the greater certainty of death as a free agent?
I cannot fathom that, but then again that’s why I am on the Fediverse rather than on Reddit. :-P
We’re all fighting for basically the same thing. Various flavours, but essentially the same. I personally wouldn’t betray the revolution should it come.
1000% agree, we need to collectively get our shit together, get over the little differences between what our end goals are, that can be sorted out later, and anyone who isn’t a fucking fascist would be willing to see other collectives have their own system and still work in harmony.
Tankie is a floating signifier. If you ask twenty liberals what a tankie is you’ll get
- Twenty different answers, and
- Several people upset at being called a liberal because they don’t have even a Wikipedia-level understanding of liberalism or socialism.
100 percent agreed. They’ll group anything too far left of them under the same name. Don’t care anymore. If they want to whine then fuck it, I’ll wear the term.
Like how fascists think liberals are marxists, despite liberals and marxists both knowing how dumb that is
Great synopsis. I may have found a twenty first definition if you want!?:-P
Yes
I think people would probably call me a tankie
Why
yes.
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neither a tankie nor not a tankie
Bruh. You seem like a negative person… 🙃
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To anyone on .world, which is obnoxiously in line with the United States status quo, I am a ‘tankie’ because I do not believe that China is evil, that Russians are ‘orcs’, that the Cuban people deserve to be starved by our sanctions, that Joe Biden has to support Palestinian genocide and continue Trump’s border policy because ‘its complicated’, and anything else that is critical of my own country and its actions that continue to harm people not as fortunate to be born in my same geographical location.
I wouldn’t call you a tankie for that. The closest thing may be the Russian orc thing, but that is more a statement that Russians are still human while fighting an immoral war.
That the Cuban sanctions are still going on are stupid and support for Palestine is consistent with general leftist theory regarding freedom.
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Why?
Because it fails and morphs into an authoritarian hellhole every single time without exception?
Capitalism operated almost exclusively as monarchies for the first 200 years. Hundreds of capitalist countries have failed, but why are only the failed communist states counted against the ideology? Vietnam, Cuba, and China certainly haven’t failed. Now I don’t consider those to be socialist or communist projects, but they’re undeniably different from the capitalist status quo. What specifically do you mean when you say a country fails in the first place?
Does it? What do you consider to be a “failure?” What do you consider to be “authoritarian?”
No, i’m not a tankie, i wasn’t even born yet in 1956 not to mention i’m not British.
no. I’m probably a communist but authoritarianism can fucking shove it
Fredrich Engels, 1872: On authority
Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is. It is the act by which one part of the population imposes its will on the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannons — by the most authoritarian means possible; and the victors, if they do not want to have fought in vain, must maintain this rule by means of the terror which their arms inspire in the reactionaries. Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if the communards had not used the authority of the armed people against the bourgeoisie? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach them for not having used it enough?
Therefore, we must conclude one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don’t know what they’re talking about, in which case they are only sowing confusion; or they do know, in which case they are betraying the proletarian movement. In either case, they serve reaction.
Found the tankie! ☝️
Yeah we should never rebel, just listen to authority…
Big \ S
How about, I don’t know, establishing some sort of democracy? Just a crazy idea
Maybe capitalist states should do that, but they won’t because they’re capitalist states. They’ll form bourgeois democracies at best and fascism at worst[1][2][3].
You misunderstood me. I’m saying after the revolution. The Engels quote implies that because revolution is authoritarian, so is whatever system it implements. Which I disagree with
At what point does a leftist system become authoritarian? Where is the line? Is it just a vibe check, or is there a definitive metric we can check?
The line is when the communist system collapses as usual and a dictatorship seizes power.
So Cuba, China, Vietnam, and the DPRK are by your definition not authoritarian, got it.
Does that make you a tankie?
I mean that’s a good question but there’s no reason to apply it just to leftist governments
There is, for the purpose of this question.
You have separated “Authoritarians” from the rest of “Communists.” At what point does Communism become authoritarian?
I’m framing this question in this manner to try to understand what you believe Communism should look like in a manner that goes against what people often described as tankies want it to look like.
