The Democratic People's™ Republic of Tankiejerk

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Dunking on Tankies from a leftist, anti-capitalist perspective.

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We allow posts about tankie behavior even off fedi, shitposts, and rational, leftist discussion. For a more general community [email protected] is recommended.

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What do you define as a tankie. (lemm.ee)

submitted 4 days ago by [email protected] to c/tankiejerk

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I know for a lot of people a tankie is just something that they know it when they see it, however I think that it is important to think about the reason that you define something as being tankie vs just a leftist.

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[–] mydude -2 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (2 children)

It's just name calling. The words have lost their meaning. "It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words."

[–] FlyingSquid 7 points 4 days ago

No, no it isn't. I have given a very concise description of a Tankie elsewhere in this post. Perhaps you should read it.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Why are you here then?

[–] mydude -3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I like to challenge ideas.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 days ago (1 children)

What "ideas" are you here to challenge? This is a libertarian socialist community that is against tankies, if you don't fit that criteria then this isn't a good place for you.

[–] mydude -4 points 4 days ago (3 children)

I like libertarian socialists, I might be one myself. I just think that the word tankie gets thrown around a lot. If everyone (I don't like) is a tankie, no one is.

Let me put it this way; If Bernie is a sexist (and he was called sexist many times from different groups of people), then everyone can be called a sexist, and the word has lost it's meaning.

[–] FlyingSquid 8 points 4 days ago

You really think the word sexism has no meaning anymore?

Do you think the same about racism?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

It is still a real term, and it is a problem.

It can be thrown around by liberals sometimes but most tankie criticizers ARE leftist in my experience. This place is one of them, and if someone disagrees with basic leftist sentiment us mods will take action.

[–] mydude -3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

"More recently it has seen a less specific use of the term" from wiki 2020 (oldest I found, kinda weird)

But yeah, it was just a gut feeling, now "verified" by wiki... Doesn't give much more information though...

https://web.archive.org/web/20200923023209/https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tankie

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 days ago

I have no idea why you won't use the current Wikipedia page, but it says:

referring to hardline authoritarian or Marxist–Leninist positions on the left.

Yeah? It was saying it deviated from the original meaning which was supporting the crushing of the Hungarian revolution and Prague spring. And there's a huge venn diagram between MLs and "actual" tankies.

As for the actual Wikipedia page:

It is commonly used by anti-authoritarian leftists, including anarchists, libertarian socialists, left communists, democratic socialists, and reformists to criticise Leninism, although the term has seen increasing use by liberal and right‐wing factions as well

I'm not going to argue about this anymore. This is not a debate community, and this is your final warning.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago

I feel you may have misjudged this group then. That is part of why I made this post to try and get a consensus as to what the people of this community define as tankies and it is surprisingly consistent for something that you claim has lost all meaning.