I’m gonna say some stuff that most of the people here probably know on some level, but considering this thread, I think it needs to be explicitly said.
Very few of the people who post comments on the internet are highly educated in whatever field they’re making a claim in. Getting challenged by people who know next to nothing and receive all the upvotes anyway is an exhausting experience, so many well-educated people keep their debates private. If they are here, you probably aren’t enough of an expert to recognize them. The simple, easy to understand takes are what get upvoted, and in-depth, nuanced ideas are almost always ignored or ridiculed. Most forums are full of people who know just enough to feel confident in making calls for radical action without any knowledge of how that action could be implemented or would play out.
Look through this comment section. Lots of vague, single-sentence arguments about being “capitalist,” “communist,” or “socialist,” along with “leftist,” “liberal,” or “conservative,” but I don’t see a single one acknowledging that each of those words can individually encompass vast groups of conflicting ideas and have wildly different meanings in different parts of the world; a serious problem considering at least a few of the people posting in this thread aren’t in the US. Very little discussion of substantive ideas like “people should be given a universal basic income of $15 a day,” or “food stamps should be granted without application to anyone under a certain income threshold,” or “social media servers should receive public funding and be administrated by an elected body.” It’s almost never more specific than “universal healthcare,” or “abolish the police,” Those might be the right direction, but when was the last time you saw people discussing things like whether experimental treatments should be covered, or the number and type of professions that should replace the current myriad of roles police are expected to fill? I seriously doubt if you randomly selected two self-described communists (or whatever ideology) on Lemmy and had them start making decisions together, that they would agree with each other on exactly how society should be run even half the time.
I’m not saying these conversations shouldn’t happen, vague as they are. I certainly don’t have the energy to write out long arguments 99% of the time. We all have to make our own way to finding deeper knowledge, and building a knowledge base of buzzwords can be a useful stepping stone. But far too often people stop once they feel they have a sufficient understanding of the buzzwords and then start talking like they know the answers. it’s important to temper the depth of your convictions based on where you’re having the discussion, where you’re getting your knowledge. Are you watching youtube videos and reading unsourced comments, or are you reading research papers from institutions with a history of making accurate claims? Are you reading news articles from ad-supported papers, and if you are, are you checking whether those articles are making sources available for readers check on? Should I have bothered writing several paragraphs under a meme of a glowing red bird, and am I really qualified to tell people to be more careful with their discussions?
I appreciated your wall of text! Lemmy, and social media in general, are pretty terrible places for nuanced discussion. The system is biased towards short and vauge posts. As you said though, they can be a good stepping stone.
There’s been more than one time that I’ve seen people arguing in a thread and decided I’d look up the topic to see who is right. In the end it doesn’t really matter what people in the thread were saying. It got me interested in the topic and I searched out more reputable sources of information and hopefully I learned a bit!
That being said, there are also threads where people post insane takes. You really need to have a litmus test for whether or not a post should even been considered.
Lemmy’s been a lot better than reddit for this in my experience. On reddit you couldn’t even get a sentence out.
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I really enjoyed reading this. Do you have a blog or something? Have a good one.
yes you can find it at /u/BlemboTheThird@lemmy.ca
Are you really qualified? Who knows, but you make a really good point
Lots of vague, single-sentence arguments about being “capitalist,” “communist,” or “socialist,” along with “leftist,” “liberal,” or “conservative,” but I don’t see a single one acknowledging that each of those words can individually encompass vast groups of conflicting ideas and have wildly different meanings in different parts of the world; a serious problem considering at least a few of the people posting in this thread aren’t in the US.
Actually refered to exactly that with my vague one-liner :D
To be taken seriously offline I necessarily have to make well reasoned and researched arguments.
Lemmy is where I come to blow off steam and just berate my ideological opponents because they genuinely are losers.
It is not a place for nuanced debate.
It is not a place for nuanced debate.
Why not? Compared to other social media it’s way better equipped for reasoned debate, with an easy-to-read layout designed for mountains of text and ease of linking sources. Maybe c/memes isn’t the right place but considering how serious the rest of this thread is I’m pretty sure my spiel was worth it.
Maybe the people in my social circle are just a lower caliber than yours, but I can’t remember the last time I got asked to source an opinion irl. Most of my friends already agree with me. Hell, offline, most people aren’t willing to discuss politics at all. Even saying you have opinions on politics is basically a faux pas…
It’s not a place for nuanced debate because I have no idea who I’m talking to.
I’d rather devote my time to having those nuanced conversations in real life (which I do) than trying to convince an American online through a meme community that gun bans would reduce school shootings for example.
If you actually have a group of peers that consistently challenge each other and have scholarly debate, congrats. You’re in a very small minority. You personally not having a use for arguing online doesn’t mean it’s useless. I know plenty of Americans who have been convinced that gun control is important by things they’ve seen online.
Very few people in this thread are kidding around. It’s worth pointing out that most of the things they are saying are extremely shallow.
Why should you only have discussions with people you know?
If you only have these discussions with people you know, more than likely, they are in your ideological bubble. You are just creating your own echo chamber. We may be randos on the internet, but we could be next to you on the subway or your cubicle. Most of us here probably like to debate somewhat.
I never said I only have discussions with people I know.
I actively have political conversations in real life on actual policy issues with a broad range of people.
Have you never campaigned before?
Unless you’re a lib in the workplace then you can say whatever bullshit hot takes you want, since everyone will agree with you anyway.
The word “lib” is so vague now, that it has lost meaning.
Some people use it with the original meaning, but most just call anyone who isn’t right wing a lib.
Buzzwords, as the original commenter said.
Same for “right wing” and “fascist” and every other piece of shit insult ya’ll use in daily discourse.
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just berate my ideological opponents because they genuinely are losers
Im astonished at how closed-minded and brainwashed you seem. Maybe actually think about why you would fight for a opinion that is not based on “well reasoned and researched arguments”… It really seems like youre arguing for another person’s opinion rather than having your own.
That’s not healthy.
I wouldn’t say it’s leftist, though there’s a lot of leftists here. Lemmy is more like how internet discussion boards used to be. There’s a lot of people with weird opinions on things, and there’s no Reddit Karma pushing people to conform to the consensus. So people are going to have weird takes on things, and there’s not 1000 comments upvoted above the weird ones, so you’re going to see comments like that. So reply to with you your weird opinions on those weird comments.
Welcome to the version internet that’s not pre-packaged and filtered to be bland!
I don’t mind weird and different opinions on things. In fact, that’s what make the discussion interesting instead of some boring echo chambers. I just wish people wouldn’t be so aggressive about it and hurling personal attacks left and right. The old discussion board had thing called netiquete to keep the discussion civil, but here in certain communities it’s like the wild west.
Yeah… but that’s what the internet is. You’re connected to different people with different points of view, but you’re also connected to assholes. Just don’t take it personally, they don’t know you and you don’t know them.
Right? You can connect to assholes of that’s your thing, and I can connect to warm clams. No judging
I think people misremember when discussions could be blunt without being abusive, because they didn’t recognize and appreciate sensible small-forum moderation. I don’t want oversight that forbids people from using a list of no-no words. I want human beings to skim a conversation and judge when people are causing problems.
In real-life interactions, there are legitimate occasions for being rude. Civility is an ideal. It’s not a death cult. You don’t pledge your honor to never calling someone an asshole. You just try to avoid dealing with assholes.
If a forum does not want strife between users, the mods better be proactive in removing fascists, trolls, bigots, and other dehumanizing forces.
If mods don’t remove that crap, but demand everyone play nice with those assholes - the forum exists for the benefit of those assholes. Everyone else is an unwitting victim for them to play with. And any moderation against accurately and reasonably saying ‘fuck off, abusive liar’ is acting as cover and force multiplication for abusive liars.
A vulgar explanation of how someone’s incorrect is often good-faith participation. Infuriating bullshit in televisable language is not.
That’s a great point about moderation, plenty of forums outside of just banning would have mods post in the thread and say ‘knock that shit off, try to be nicer’ or whatever to discourage a toxic atmosphere.
There can be appropriate times for a range of civility like you said so having nuance is important, but I’ve rarely seen a forum outside of something like Stormfront afraid to ban Nazis or racists without question, unlike some big venues today that try to be ‘tolerant’ or ‘free speech absolutists’.
I’ve seen several subreddits insist that politely-stated fascism is better discourse than calling out fascists. In one case, with ‘so you’re a fascist’ being treated as an intolerable insult… even though being a fascist was apparently fine… and that guy was absofuckinglutely a fascist.
I’d understand if it were the kind of ‘fuck off, abusive liar’, but more often than not it’s about something so minor, certainly not worth the extra negativity added to the community.
Only meaning matters.
You have to evaluate claims.
But that’s never what happens, when rules demand “civility.” They don’t actually enforce positivity. They just punish people who are honest toward minimally-cautious assholes. Quite often without spending one moment looking at the other side of the conversation.
Reports cannot be handled correctly in a vacuum. Context is necessary. Otherwise ‘you are wrong’ is undecidable.
It’s like a generation grew up not knowing what trolling is. It’s not harsh language. It’s being an infuriating douchebag, in a way that people understandably tell you you’re an infuriating douchebag. And for all the forums I’ve seen where trolling and getting trolled are equally forbidden, every god-damn one of them treats ‘shut up, troll’ worse than being a fucking troll. Even if it is those exact G-rated words.
Right? I’m just relieved, I can be myself here… I’ve said so many things here that would have gotten insta-ban on Reddit
Exactly. It’s not “Leftist”, it’s just NOT fully of Nazis, and that’s how far our standards have slipped.
Thats a huge downplay of what the actual Nazis did if you refer to right-leaning people as that.
The Republicans attempted a coup in the US and have spent the years since revoking minority rights all over the country. It took 2 tries to get Hitler into office, too, and they came for the immigrants first as well.
Lemmy isnt leftist. The group calling itself leftist the most here is at the same time cheering on ultranationalist governments who are in the middle of genocides.
This is a .ml instance. Of course it’s going to have pro-authoritian, genocide denying bias.
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Domains are regularly chosen because they can form a word or they can be related to the domain name or used as an alternative abriviation.
Everyone knows .ml is malis tld but they also know that it’s usage in the context to lemmy is that it always means marxist-leninist.
Just saying.
Lemmy is open source so indeed it’s attracting more leftists, at least in the software world.
Says who? I’m all for open source (and even actively contribute), and I do not have a left-leaning political stance. Loving open source does not mean that I want to raise taxes, or that I want gendering to be a thing (theres an issue in languages that dont have a gender-neutral plural).
Why couldnt one be conservative and like free software at the same time?
Thats still leftist, unless you’re somehow more left than straight up communism
China and russia arent communist. They are capitalist societies with strong protectionism and a huge imbalance between classes. The government owns all companies but the people don’t have any say over the government so it cannot be argued that the means of production are in the hands of the people.
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Why does everything need to be politicized? No one gives a flying fuck if you’re a leftist, unless you’re a Leftist and no one gives a fuck if you’re a right winger unless you’re a right winger. Jesus christ the US Politics are absolute fucking cancer.
It’s considered ‘left’ to support queer and trans rights, and there are a good number of people that seem to have a problem with that whether my queer self is political or not.
Right wing violence will come whether you want to believe it’s political or not.
Why does everything need to be politicized?
Because everything is political or adjacent to it. Everything in this world is either impacted by or is a reflection of politics.
I mention this to my friends all the time. So many issues we’re dealing with derives from politics, so of course discourse will always return to it.
Money Rent/housing costs Grocery costs Stagnant wages Retirement
School shootings Police brutality Systemic racism
Medicine Insurance R/d for treatments Quality of life
Etc. Etc.
I find posts like this so confusing. Does politics, i.e.the policies organisations across the world implement to actively change the way the masses live not directly or indirectly affect your life? Whenever someone says something like this I just assume you’re not within a marginalised group because there’s no way you’d make an enlightened centrist post like this otherwise.
This is the only answer
You just don’t understand normal politics. This American shit is a massive psy op to discourage any politics. Because of more than 2 young people voted, shit would change real fast
Most people (especially in the US) can’t even define what they are IN FAVOR of politically. All they do is denigrate what they think they don’t like, even when it is against their own best interest. Bunch of fucking lemmings we humans are, just waiting to be taken advantage of by the sharks.
Cancer post, glad people are calling it out. Some of you need to get off the internet a bit more.
Please lead by example
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In the marketplace of ideas, rightwing thoughts will be mocked, as they always should been…
Lemmy feels a lot more authentic to real life. If I started talking about tinfoil hat conspiracies, my friends would ridicule me to no end.
As they should.
Same here.
If I start talking to random people in a bar odds are I won’t meet a single one who will start calling me a Nazi because I believe in the Uyghur genocide…
How is the Uyghur genocide a right wing thing? I’m out of the loop here
Tankies tend to assume any accusation against a Marxist state is either a lie or the victims deserved it.
One of the reasons is that you’ve got people like the Heritage Foundation running around including Nazis in their “victims of socialism” lists.
Both as the victims and perpetrators btw, lmao.
Mostly though they just seem weirdly stuck in a Cold War mentality.
Everybody loves jerking off about failed states but leave out how they always have to make it a vacuum while constantly under fire, conspiracy, and embargo by every capitalist state on the planet.
Ok, but how does that change the fact that Lemmy’s communists will call you a Nazi for pointing out the genocides perpetrated by those States?
…but but… what about…?
On today’s episode of “Things everyone says lemmy leftists do but have never been able to provide examples of”
Go ask the hexbear users!
And there are no conservative ideas that aren’t tinfoil hat conspiracies, I guess
There are some - ideas that people should just eat shit and work as slaves.
Honestly, this place is full of communists. I’m not the biggest fan of communists, to be frank. There is a lot of backwards ideas that get accepted as “leftist,” when they’re really statist. Particularly revisionist history statist. If a communist party said it, you gotta defend it kinda thing.
I don’t identify as a communist. I just don’t want life to be unreasonably difficult for people. Thats it. I just what the promise of what labor was supposed to be. I want it to free us from the shackles of work or die. Guess that is extreme left now even with tankies around the corner from us.
This. When I was younger I considered myself pretty centrist, generally people would agree. My views never really changed, but the Overton window has shot so far right I now get called a commie (I guess here I’m a tankie? Still dunno wtf that’s about except a slur for ‘left of Biden’) because I think a 40 hour work week should put a basic roof over your head, whether an efficency on your own or a roomie in a nicer spot.
(I guess here I’m a tankie? Still dunno wtf that’s about except a slur for ‘left of Biden’)
As far as I can make out, tankies are people who support communist governments even when they go way too far. So even though leaders like Jinping are essentially dictators, because they’re ostensibly communist the tankies support them.
At least that’s what I’ve seen from a few weeks on lemmy. I’m sure some tankies will be along to correct me soon.
Ah, so the thing I still haven’t seen happen except for everyone saying it happens to attack leftist instances.
Oh, and people attacking others for worshipping someone all in when they point to any particular point of a particular person (IE “In regards to X, Lenin said Y” “Oh HeRe We gO aNoThEr LeNiN wOrShiPpInG tAnKiE”)
Of course, I’m sure there’s SOMEBODY out here simping for China or whatever, but if that silly small percentage paints all leftists then by their own logic all capitalists should be branded as fascists - WAY more “right” people calling for fascism around here than China worshipperss and whatnot.
Not extreme left but it’s socialist and isn’t consistent with American ideals. You can bitch about that shit if you want but we’re in the decay phase after a gluttonous society and you think the answer is communism? You do, you think everyone and everything should be “fair” but life and this country don’t work like that.
Could be if we tried. The democrats have been neo-lib appeasement artists because they are a part of the ruling class. This system cannot hold. Something will change. We just have to wait and see which way it breaks. Either way, I’m already doing the work to see a world I want. I don’t care about the noise. Arguments like “Life ain’t fair” are a poor substitute for putting yourself out there. I used to think much the same way. But, I had to do something about how bad it is getting.
Exactly. We have 50 years of computer driven exponential growth and not a fucking thing is better for us. We don’t work less, travel more, be richer, live a better life, or have a better future for the planet. It should make everyone anti-capitalist.
Data I’ve seen suggests otherwise. Care to engage with me so that we can figure out where the discrepancy lies?
You’re joking, right? A peasant in the 1200s would work less than a regular person today.
Do you think an average person in 13th century had a better quality of life than an average person living in the 21st century?
In many aspects, yes, they did lead a more fulfilling life.
There is a lot of backwards ideas that get accepted as “leftist,” when they’re really statist.
This is my objection too.
All too many people here don’t seem to even begin to understand the inherent threats of institutionalized authority, so in their rush to head off the recreation of the Third Reich, they’re basically advocating for the recreation of the Khmer Rouge instead.
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And I dream of a world in which, instead of merely wishing to oppress and murder this group of people instead of that one, people don’t wish to oppress and murder anyone.
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You can read more into Karl Popper’s Paradox of Tolerance if you want to harden your philosophical position for what you have described.
Most people seem to miss the fact that it’s a paradox, even though it’s right there in the name.
Define ‘full of communists’… cause it sounds like such an american phrase and perspective. To me, it’s just a more leftwing centered space. The real communists are a minority. At least on the biggest Lemmy servers.
Go for a walk in Hexbear and Lemmygrad communities, these are Lemmy’s communists…
Yeah but those instances are not nearly as big as lemmyworld and the others. I also didn’t say that there were no communists at all. There are just not as many as OP made it out to be.
I just checked and you’re instance isn’t federated with Hexbear so you don’t see their users’ comments, my instance was federated with them for a couple of days and it made the Lemmy experience a mess.
I have more than one account, none of them get many communist posts. Maybe there’s one in there in a few rare occasions but it’s not significant.
Lol I’m not crying “SOCIALISM!” because someone recommended taking care of poor people. And maybe it’s just the communities on lemm.ee, maybe it’s because I interact with the communities more because I can’t bite my tongue. But I come across way more communist communities than anything else. Your instance matters. I see a lot of communist communities. As an anarchist, the prevalence of communism on lemmy is troubling to me because I see huge flaws in the thinking and i want to see the left not follow down a doomed hierarchical road that has proven to be a failure over and over and over again.
Hm might be. On lemmy, the instances you’re signed on significantly affect your experience.
Lemmy world and feddit never gave me such vibes tho. But it might also be because you’re indirectly looking for these confrontations.
Lemmy.world I think has banned most tankie subs. It wasn’t until the endless problems with lemmy.world that I switched over to lemm.ee and I see way more communist shit, but have way fewer connectivity issues.
Good to know
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i want to see the left not follow down a doomed hierarchical road that has proven to be a failure
Instead you’d want everyone to adopt a system that literally can’t possibly work. Genius.
What system do you think they are referring to as an anarchist? Anarchism is simply opposition to hierarchies that allow control over others, such as the control capitalists have over workers by owning the means of production and political forces. The system that anarchists advance in place of that can take an unlimited number of forms.
Anarchism is simply opposition to hierarchies that allow control over others, such as the control capitalists have over workers
Or the control the hierarchical entity (state) must have over a populous to stop thievery and violence. Even in a perfectly idealized world, anarchism only just barely gets to work, teetering on the brink of collapse.
We have a state now though, has thievery and violence been stopped? How many thousands are in poverty, how many are killed in global wars waged in the name of profits? There are states where theft and murder are extremely rare, and states where it is common. What is the difference between the conditions where it is common and uncommon? Is a top-down control and manipulation the only way to reduce violence?
Anarchism works all the time. It’s more than a political structure, it’s an idea about how to organize relations between people, and there already are many groups that are active that function on anarchist principles.
Any group that collects itself in the modern world as anarchist, like anarchist groups in the Spanish Civil War, are heavily repressed by state forces. Capitalist states work together to discourage anarchist ideals even more so than communism because of the possibility it has for threatening traditional power structures.
It’s the type of communism present on Lemmy that makes matters worse too…
Tell that to Voat, or Gab. There’s plenty of offshoot free speech platforms that got flooded with actual racists and Nazis the same way that Lemmy got flooded with actual communists and anarchists.
It’s because when you have a new platform, a lot of your first users will be the worst kinds of people to exist on the internet. It’s why “”“free speech absolutist”“” spaces quickly devolve into nazi hellscapes that repel all but the most equally toxic and revolting people unless they cut their claim to absolute free speech.
Yeah, any ‘free speech absolutist’ platform turns into a Nazi fascist bigot safe space because they refuse to moderate the platform
There aren’t a lot of anarchists here, going by the anarchist communities I’ve seen.
Yo
Free market Capitalism is the greatest economic system to ever exist.
You see all these people out here suffering and still say this? Where in the world can I get what you are taking because I’d love to be able to tune out everything that hard.
It’s not that capitalism doesn’t have flaws. It’s that all the other systems so far have had worse and bigger flaws. Regulated capitalism with welfare is the least bad system by a wide margin.
This guy gets it.
The governments job should be to act as referee, ensuring fair and orderly markets. Nothing more, nothing less.
It’s the best at creating rampant consumerism and waste in the name of fake numbers going up at the cost of human happiness and fulfillment.
Nope, that would be your government interfering in the free market by issuing inflationary fiat currency.
Inflation drives a spend it or lose it mentality. Crony capitalists love that shit.
Dipping my dick into a vat of acid is the greatest pleasure to ever exist.
Whatever floats your boat my dude!
What free market? All I have ever known is corporate socialism. Subsidize business with taxpayer dollars. Regulatory capture to prevent competitors from entering the market.
Platforms have no political alignment, users have
You cannot tell me TruthSocial has no political alignment.
I don’t agree. The simple fact that Lemmy is decentralised is a political thing. It’s about who has power over the platform, and that is inherently a political issue. The status-quo of other platforms, that being under the control of a corporation, is also a political stance.
PS: everything is politics, that’s not a good or bad thing, it’s neutral. If you don’t think of something as political, that just means it’s oriented towards the status-quo you are used to.
Did the platform just blink into existence or was it created and advanced by someone’s hand? To what end?
Also why would you want to be in an echo chamber? I’m more of a libertarian but I like surrounding myself with people that challenge my views.
I like not having the right of my existence challenged but to each their own
You’re not a libertarian you’re a conservative who’s afraid to admit so.
Do you think that’s of all the issues in politics, it’s only valid to have the same 2 political views as everyone else? Or can people have wide ranging views on many topics?
It’s way more privacy-oriented, but a lot of Reddit communities were already very left wing
True. Reddit was pretty center-right oriented. Lemmy leans more left and I do enjoy seeing the Trumpers here getting dunked on pretty frequently.
Reddit was pretty center-right oriented.
lmao
Do you doubt that? What is your idea of the left? What is seen as ‘left’ or even what conservatives call ‘the radical left’ in the US would likely be seen as center or center-right globally.
What is seen as ‘left’ or even what conservatives call ‘the radical left’ in the US would likely be seen as center or center-right globally*.
*in most of the western world and pretty much nowhere else.
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Go on then, how would you describe it overall?
I haven’t seen any of that but I’ve seen a shit ton of owning the libs bullshit.
And when you did find Leftists they were just bootlicking tankies.
Dunked on? The fuck kind of idiocracy bullshit is that?
Having hate in your heart hurts you a lot more than other people.
I don’t have hate, I’m just sick of seeing what should be seen as a discussion (even if one side is ridiculous/borderline fascist) get debased further by the side with the moral/logical advantage calling basic reasoning and conversation “dunking” on the other side. It’s pathetic. You can do better than to look at political discussions as opportunities for someone to get dunked on. If you can’t, then I’ll just keep dunking on u bruh.
Have you seen those colorful people on hexbear? Quite the echo chamber.
But if we’re all leftist here, isn’t this just another echo chamber?
Yes I have.
At least they are honest about it.
I just saw a post about eco-terrorism and people mostly agreed. Lemmy is 100% extreme.
I was downvoted because I said that barbie is not feminism, a statement which is bare minimum of center left feminist ideology.
Lemmy is definitely not all leftist.
It might be seen leftist by US standard, but overall, with the exception of few well known instances, it is not really “extreme left”, probably not even overwhelming left
I would bet any amount of money that at least 50% of lemmy posts are shitting on capitalism. Couple that with the fact that people tolerate some amount of tankie’ism, I’d say lemmy is extreme.
Let me ask you this, if you had a website with a community that relentlessly mocks communism and/or socialism, and lets some nazi posts rise to the top, what would you call that website?
I don’t know anything about Barbie so I can’t say anything about that. But I know that not all of lemmy is extreme, of course there’s gonna be some normal everyday content.
Mocking capitalism is not extremism in most of the world. Even the pope shits regularly on current capitalism.
Left and anti-capitalism are 2 different things. And most people in Lemmy are blandly criticizing current turbo capitalism, which is left, center, right… Not everyone who oppose capitalism, particularly in our current form, is extreme left. And most of the posts I see here are not really anti-anticapitalism, mainly pro regulated capitalism (unions and regulations), which in Europe for instance are center left position.
What you guys call tankies are indeed extremes.
I can’t say I have definitive data on that but when I look at the front page which includes everything that is federated by lemm.ee, I see tankie posts often and people are mostly in agreement. Something like this I would call tankie, and I see one of those everyday, maybe every two days.
I’m not saying that anti capitalist things are extreme on their own. But when it’s mixed with the tolerance of overtly extreme memes makes you extreme. I’ll ask again, what if it was the case for a right wing ideology? What if that meme said something like “But Zoe, the Jews are taking all the wealth and will not stop voluntarily.” Would the existence of that hypothetical meme not make that community extremist? If it was just that meme on its own then fuck it, it’s just edgy shock value stuff. But when the community is always slanting on one side, the meme has a more serious connotation.
Is that considered tankie? I know it’s pro revolutionary socialism, which is typically what the countries tankies like did to start out.
When I think ‘tankie’ I usually think people who are still pro those countries to the point of denial about genocides and other bad things those countries are doing.
Yeah maybe not exactly tankie but I think it’s close enough. The meme is still extremist since these people would probably kill any remaining capitalist in their imagined revolution.
yeah, fair enough.
Tankie doesn’t mean anything
There’s plenty of Nazi and alt-right social media or even Lemmy instances you can go to if you want to avoid leftists. But one or two leftist instances pop up and suddenly the world’s ending. Maybe this is a good way to discover which side of the left-right spectrum you favor?
Personally, I’d rather err on the side of leftism. At least their goals are noble.
I think you are replying to the wrong comment
Let me ask you this, if you had a website with a community that relentlessly mocks communism and/or socialism, and lets some nazi posts rise to the top, what would you call that website?
Reddit?
When did any post that had Nazi propaganda get to the front page?
And I don’t know what are you talking about with the mocking socialism in Reddit. They even have the LateStageCapitalism sub, which is pretty popular.
Spotted the American 🔍
Try again
“I saw one post. Most agreed. 100% extreme.”
I ain’t saying you’re wrong, but the route you’re taking there is not exactly valid.
There’s another post today about taking the means of production by force. I can probably find more that are not only extreme but are the most upvoted this month. But cope harder queen.
Okay?
It’s not terrorism if you’re trying to save the planet from those trying to destroy it.
It is terrorism if you do violent acts to push your political goals https://www.britannica.com/topic/terrorism
Violence is a key word in that definition.
Violence: Behavior or treatment in which physical force is exerted for the purpose of causing damage or injury.
So, starving a group of people isn’t terrorism because you’re not exerting physical force.
Not easily stopping a fire when you know it’s going to spread towards an occupied house isn’t violence because you’re not exerting physical force.
Poisoning drinking water isn’t violence because you’re not exerting physical force.
Real question: what do you call those things? It can’t be defined as terrorism. What is it?
I don’t think “physical force” is a necesarry component of violence. Take, for example, domestic violence. The US DOJ gives these criteria for if an action is DV or not:
Domestic violence is a pattern of abusive behavior in any relationship that is used by one partner to gain or maintain power and control over another intimate partner. Domestic violence can be physical, sexual, emotional, economic, psychological, or technological actions or threats of actions or other patterns of coercive behavior that influence another person within an intimate partner relationship. This includes any behaviors that intimidate, manipulate, humiliate, isolate, frighten, terrorize, coerce, threaten, blame, hurt, injure, or wound someone.
I think a more apt definition of violence would be “coercive behavior”
Coercive behavior doesn’t quite work though.
Yours is better than either of the ones posted, but I do think the physical force aspect is important to differentiate from other aspects.I was going to attempt to make a point about how stopping terrorism that isn’t explicitly violent with violence isn’t the same thing.
Starving a population isn’t violence, but it is terrorism. Attempting to give that population food and being stopped by the state by legal means is terrorism.
The state is going to define things in specific ways to ensure that they’re considered correct.
I had written out a response to the person I replied to and then didn’t post after reading some of their other comments. They’re probably just a troll, or one of those people that’s legitimately kind of smart but hasn’t been around people that are incredibly smart, so hasn’t had a reason to adjust their opinions about things because they might be shallowly correct but are fundamentally wrong. Like Newton’s laws.
Kinda missed the point here. The other guy was saying that eco terrorism is not terrorism. I said nothing about if starving people is violence or not.
Saving humanity from climate collapse is not political
"Saving humanity from the sins of the west and their ideological indoctrination is also not political. "
- Osama Bin Laden (probably)
Just call it what it is then say it’s justified if you think it is. If you can dress this up as not terrorism then nothing is.
One is literally happening outside as we speak, one is based upon an extremist interpretation of a 2000 year old book. Can you spot the difference?
The existence of God is unfalsifiable, so you can’t say it’s untrue to the believer. Just make the rules and play by them. Also it’s more like 1500 years ago 🤓.
The idea of climate change and it’s causes IS falsifiable though, which is why taking actions related to that cause is a bit different than something that has no way to be proven.
🤷 Guess we’ll just have to let oil companies keep killing us all.
Lol hubris incarnate.
I mean its also not possible to save humanity from fossil fuel induced runaway climate catastrophe, I just applaud anyone willing to take extreme measures in that pursuit. No hubris whatsoever lol
Have you not heard the terms eco-terrorism or eco-facsism? Anyone can use environmentalism to justify their philosophy, don’t be so naive that anything pro-environment is a good thing.
From your link on eco-terrorism:
Eco-terrorism is an act of violence which is committed in support of environmental causes, against people or property.[1][2]
Not sure that I count violence against property as valid. If destruction of material values are classified as violence and eco-terrorism, are then not oil companies and other capitalists destroying the environment eco-terrorists too?
are then not oil companies and other capitalists destroying the environment eco-terrorists too?
Objectively, no they are not by the definition you quoted. The definition stated the violence is for the environment; those people execute violence for capital against the environment. I’m sure there’s another definition that would cover those people and the whole they cause, but this one ain’t it.
I agree that they are missing a crucial motive for their actions, namely the cause of doing it for the environment. I still think my critique of the definition’s statement of “violence against property” is valid. It seems to be included in the definition because they want to brand certain acts as terrorism, even though destruction of property is a label they could themselves hold as much as their opponents.
I think that is also why some so called eco-terrorists feel themselves justified in acting out “violence against property”, since they may see it as an act of self defence against the originial portrayers of said “violence”. Ultimately however, I think a distinction should be made between physical violence and destruction of material values. Whether the material value is an entity’s legal property or not should also not matter in this case, in my opinion.
It’s not terrorism if you’re helping Allah slay the evil nonbelievers who are destroying the Earth!
Only difference is that Allah isn’t going to wipe us out with Century storms every other week and forest fires the size of countries.
Is it terrorism in the law tho? Obviously keeping in mind who writes it and whose point of view is codified. That conversation may be more nuanced than you think. Especially if all other things we can call terrorism are considered.
I agree and I understand. However, we are talking about the collapse of humanity, the environment, most species, etc for the next 10 million years. So at this point, who are the real eco terrorists?
It’s a problem of perceiving terror as something having a negative connotation by itself. It is a tool. Like a gun, or a knife. And having a moral high ground (like there, or in many more controversial cases) doesn’t erase the fact it is perceived as or is an act of terror.
Guerilla warfare against occupational forces is terrorism. Political assasinations of opressors are too. Taking kneecaps of an oil baron who levels forests and poisons nature is it as well.
And, you name it, there are even more ways of terrorism you’d see as dumb, senseless, inhumane. Take wrapping a civilian child in explosives to blow up a guarded checkpoint. It’s fucked up, right? And it’s not the act of terror itself that makes you puke at a thought of it, but this tool used for insane reasons and how fucking far they took it. If it was a croatian jew taking nazis with themselfes, it would be portrayed as a heroic self-sacrificing act. As a bystander, you see these extreme acts of violence through your lenses and judge reasoning behind it first. That’s why eco-terrorism doesn’t ring any bells. It’s an attack that is rationally justified to you, usually pretty victimless. And it’s relativism at it’s extremes.
At some point you see you can’t escape but thinking of terrorist tactics to achieve that one goal, because nothing else seems as effective. It is muddy waters. It needs slow and thoughtful consideration. If it means saving natives’ land, would you consider torching building equipment, an office or shooting a corporate shithead in their face? You probably can. But would you? And would it be better than whatever comes to mind when you hear the T-word? Would you take all responsibility and all the consequences of what you did on yourself? Wouldn’t you regret it?
On Lemmy we can speak like we are all super based, and there are just causes. Talk is cheap. What matters is if you even feel yourself applauding such acts, you need to be double sure you aren’t a dumbass hypocrite and you really know what are you after. Not mirroring ‘they are killing my world, so they are to be killed’, yada-yada, because kids upvote that shit like crazy, but really meaning it if you say so, being responsible about it.
I feel like I’d end up on some lists for speaking that out loud lmao, but a lot of historical figures we adore are terrorists. Gaining independence of USA was that to brits, Robin Hood myths were that to crown, revolutionaires weren’t shy from actually calling their actions a targeted terrorism against the state. By learning about good and bad terrorism, you can see where you yourself put it and how you relate to it. Usually, as I said, it ends up in deciding if the goal justifies the means, in a dissociated machiavellian way of thinking. Usually. But you are to form your own framework to handle it, obv.
It’s just, I mumble, why eco-terrorism isn’t terrorism because it’s somehow just? And why it can’t be called a justified terrorism instead? What’s the point of whitewashing it besides wining a public support, likely lying about what it really is? Does it change anything but media coverage? Why would it matter in the end?
I would posit the problem is more so “Is having a livable habitat for the earth’s inhabitants political?”
Everything is political as it seems, even mere existence of our trans fellas, because it’s either needs to be changed via politics or can get weaponized by bad faith actors as a populist take. Survival is sometimes political. And as an old soviet saying goes, if you aren’t that interested in politics, politics may become interested in you.
As resource extractors use politics as a vehicle to lobby their interests, fucking with them is indeed political, even if it’s a universally accepted cause like a survival of humankind.
Either way, we’re fucked, so not like it matters lol.
Nerevar, your observation is like a grand and intoxicating maze of perceptions and opinions. While it may seem that Lemmy, like the realm of politics, has its own ideological leanings, one must remember that diversity exists even among the Dunmer, let alone different races. The notion that Lemmy is entirely left-leaning may not be entirely accurate, for the online world, like the vast expanses of Morrowind, is filled with varying perspectives. It is unwise to make sweeping generalizations about the platform’s userbase, just as it is unwise to judge an entire race, like Argonians, based on the actions of a few. Let us remember the complexity of the digital realm and the mortal world alike.
Any new people here dont listen to this one, it stenches of hard cope.
We have a lot of bassed people and not based people, people that take critisism and people that dont, we have tankies and actual communists, we have american leftists and non american leftists, we have centrists and people that hate centrists, we have people that whant to get to the truth of things and people that just whants to circlejerk. And you have idiots like me that are masochistic by hitting the wasps nest and get stung a fuck ton of times but still come back fore more and we have the people that are the wasps.
Pick wathever you like and have fun, but not like this guy is doing, this is the oposite of fun, just check out the downvotes im gonna get.
I can do worse than downvote you.
I’m going to remove all the labels off your canned goods so you don’t know what you’re opening till you do.
No one owns Lemmy, no one can appropriate it and say where on the political spectrum it lies, or gatekeep. That’s the whole point of decentralization. Stop trying to do it.
Oh come now. I think it’s quite clear as far as the general lean of Lemmy. It has it origins deep in communism and it hasn’t strayed far. It’s a bit like saying everyone is welcome at a rage against the machine concert, so no one can really say where on the spectrum the crowd lies.
Hey, at least your average, retarded, left take seems to be (at least from my limited experience here) somewhat more palatable than your average, retarded, right take.
You’re not wrong.
But Lemmy.ml is definitely a leftist space.
