I got banned from memes@lemmy.ml for basically saying the same exact thing. Apparently there’s a lot of Chinese propaganda on this platform.
I apparently responded to the literal creator of Lemmy asking if they discussed any topic other than tankies, leftists, etc.
Pretty obvious answer was a hard no.
Meanwhile the Anarchists are like…
Anarchism? Wasn’t that made illegal in the US after the Haymarket bombing?
Well you see the thing about Anarchists…
I wish I could create an alternate reality where anarchy reigns and transport all these “anarchists” to it and watch them drown the entire reality in their tears as they suffer and die.
Without the Government and Capitalism, everything would collapse and it would just be like Mad Max!
If Bosses and Cops are the only thing stopping anyone from going all Mad Max, then we would already be in that Anarchist Dystopia you’re imagining because the Mad Max Style Hooligans you imagine wouldn’t care about what the Law or some Rich Guy says.
If the only thing stopping you from going all Mad Max are cops and bosses, then I think you should examine why and maybe, perhaps, seek help, because the average person doesn’t go about going “I wanna kill people but the only thing stopping me is the Cops.”
One could argue that most of the people who want to go all Mad Max do in fact break the law to do so, and are now in jail. Or do you think that disturbed people who want to do harm to the general populace don’t exist?
I think it’s a bit straw-man-y to say that people who argue that “without law there would be chaos” are saying they want chaos. In fact, it’s the opposite. There is clearly some minority slice of humanity that just wants to cause others harm, and we need some sort of structure/order to keep those people from causing harm. I find that most people advocating for anarchy don’t really have a good answer to how we handle antisocial behavior.
There is clearly some minority slice of humanity that just wants to cause others harm, and we need some sort of structure/order to keep those people from causing harm.
I work in a position that enables me to actually confirm this to be true. There are A LOT of criminals out there. And if society started collapsing a lot of previously good people would turn into criminals out of desperation or opportunity. I honestly don’t think the average person understands how many people there are out there that have no problem with the idea of taking advantage of others and even just the threat of law enforcement is what stops them.
I find that most people advocating for anarchy don’t really have a good answer to how we handle antisocial behavior.
No, they certainly do not. Every time I’ve gotten into an argument with an anarchist their ideology falls to pieces as soon as I start asking the difficult questions.
For anarchism to work, there has to be similar enough values and cultures among different communities to trust each other. But the world is too diverse at the moment for that to happen. I mean, anarchism is possible like the Fremens in Dune, but it would take a long time for a planetary wide cultural convergence to allow anarchism to thrive.
Fremen aren’t anarchists. They’re more like a thousand tiny military dictatorships with each community picking a leader with absolute authority via trial by combat. Then Paul turns them into a theocracy.
which is exactly what happens to real world anarchy too, but there is a particular subset of leftists who like to delude themselves into thinking that that only applies to ancaps
I mean we have multicultural anarchism at the global scale, there is no single world government and international law is more a set of recommendations
I mean it wouldn’t devolve into mad max (at least not for long) because people would naturally organize into some sort of structure (like a government). This happens every time IRL.
Not sure what you’re going on about. You seem to have quoted something I didn’t say.
I’m not sure if you thought I meant I actually want to kill anarchists using magic. Clearly I was being sarcastic and just want them to learn from suffering under the form of existence they appear to want so badly.
And to be crystal clear, while I do have many qualms with law enforcement, I promise you that if law enforcement ceased to exist tomorrow our society would very quickly begin to collapse. Because there are A LOT of criminals out there and way, way more normal people that would become criminals out of desperation or opportunity if society began collapsing. To disagree with that is an admission of not being remotely aware of how many criminals actually exist or any familiarity with the human condition.
I mean I don’t want to watch people suffer and die, but yeah it wouldn’t go well. I wish we could simulate or otherwise test theories like this and get probable answers without, you know, condemning hundreds to die for their flawed views.
I don’t actually want them to die. That was obvious sarcasm as creating an alternate reality isn’t…real. But it’s not like I was saying we should send them to a concentration camp. I just want them to live under the conditions they desire so they can experience it utterly fail, because of course it would, and then come crawling back to contribute to society in a meaningful way.
My vision for anarchy basically functions like an average friend group, there is no “leader” of the group, anyone can organize an event, whether its a hangout, a dinner, or asking for help with a project. Nobody is forced to go to any given event. If a conflict comes up, then we talk about it like adults, and come to a beneficial resolution. Each person chips in in their own ways. Honestly its pretty fucking awesome and I think the world would be a lot better place if we had this mentality.
What happens when someone selfishly refuses to contribute to the common good? Or worse, actively attempts to disrupt it?
Then their ideology completely falls apart. Lol.
Anarchism does not require everyone to be a doormat. If someone is a sabotaging asshole, nobody is compelled to associate with them, the problem person learns very quickly that you dont exactly do well if nobody likes you and won’t associate with you.
Or, they do super well by beating people up and taking their things? The person who happily takes from those weaker than them is often not terribly bothered by you giving them the cold shoulder. And they probably have their own coterie of hangers-on to provide them companionship. How do you handle such a person, since simple disfellowship is insufficient?
They are cast away from the community. There’s no common ground. It’s impossible to meet their needs when their needs is going against everyone else’s needs.
They’re free to go elsewhere. Maybe they’ll like Japan.
Addendum: I personally see rehabilitatioe as the true path but you guys love strawmaning the shit out of that. As if rehabilitation is not worth it, even in our current political climate.
And if they refuse to leave? If they simply take your things by violence? What then?
Historically, the answer is to have them lynched, which does solve the problem, but I think most reasonable people would agree that isn’t something we want to bring back.
They the community moves on without them.
Historically Anarchists have not done that because anarchists have not had a societal opportunity to do their own thing away from other socioeconomial models, you’re thinking of tribal or even conservative communities.
I like how you had to invent a scenario to force your point across. You can do better, but it was a nice try. 6/10
You say “invent a scenario” as if people don’t use violence to get what they want all the time.
You can’t “move on without them” if they refuse to leave and continue recidivate. How do you deal with such a person in your ideal, anarchist society? It seems like your solution is to just pretend it wouldn’t be a problem, which is absurd on its face. You’re basically saying no one would decide to steal your food because everyone would just make their own instead. History shows that being incredibly unlikely.
How do you distinguish between tribal organization and anarchist society. Both are small communities that are “self governing.” What is the key difference in your mind?
Historically Anarchists have not done that because anarchists have not had a societal opportunity to do their own thing
Thank the gods. You just made it sound significantly more awful than I had already imagined.
While your version of anarchy works on a micro level amongst friends, unfortunately, it would not work on a macro national level. Or even state level. Or even city level.
You’re also basically describing voting. People come together and express their opinion and the opinion with the most support wins.
So, not anarchism.
The downside of creating political shitposts in this community is feeling obligated to read the parapgraphs on paragraphs of seemingly serious political theory that no one asked for.
JuSt ReAd tHeOry bRo!
I wish I had it saved but this one time a commenter basically said “I don’t have time to explain this to you” and then came back 6 hours later with 1000 word reply.
lemmy gold
Best I can do is a golden ban:
feeling obligated to read the parapgraphs on paragraphs
Fuck that shit, AVOID AVOID!
At some point, you have to lean into the shit part of shitpost and accept that you’re posting in a troll thread
Yeah I really try not to engage with Godric rage bait anymore. Nobody here is ready to be deprogrammed, it’s a waste of time.
Praxis
Godric is always asking for it in these posts. Their entire purpose is to bait MLs. And it’s not like we’re just going to let lies be spread, so it always works.
Wait, what’s the lie in this post?
More bait?
And it’s not like we’re just going to let lies be spread, so it always works.
when you’re not spreading 'em yourself lol
honestly, based. marx was cool af, he had impeccable insights into the problems we would be facing today. adding that authoritarian coward lenin is how you turn a commie into a tankie
Bait? In my Christian shitposting community?
I would never!
It’s a Godric post. What else would you expect??
Ok, but now do libs. You can just reverse the frames.
Kinda doesn’t work so good if you step down 2 or 3 orders of magnitude with the total amount of people killed between frame 1 and 2.
bit of a straw man, no?
Is it? We’re happy to shit on Obama and Biden, for all the awful stuff they have done, but if you rightfully call out the shit any of those other people do, we get banned from .ml coms.
Also I like how American leaders set the bar for their leaders at either developing countries or failed/failing countries.
Sure Biden is better than whoever is running Pakistan, but dude you’re the US of A #1 ever in the history of the universe, maybe have better leaders/policies than Norway or Finland?Sure Biden is better than whoever is running Pakistan
Sure, casual racism and imperialism get upvoted in liberal circles.
I am the same race as Pakistanis, just fyi.
man I’d love it if we could get norway levels of competence in the whitehouse…
Sure Stalin and Mao committed crimes against humanity, they were managing a country through massive revolutions, but surely Bill Clinton can do better than bombing kids for oil in a country that most of his citizens can’t point on a map.
If it wasn’t clear this was like a hyperbolic joke. Clinton is an example, but the point is almost every American leader has done evil shit despite America not being in any crisis since ww2 as far as I can tell.
lot of presidents bombed places for oil. I don’t recall clinton doing it. certainly put troops in somalia…
can you give an example or is this just hyperbole?
Off the top of my head, Bill Clinton bombed an Asprin factory, which seems quaint now.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_pharmaceutical_factory
That being said, fuck all the despots, regardless of the flag they fly.
Bill Clinton can do better than bombing kids for oil
fuck that aspirin it’s a threat to democracy
Asprin almost killed the heir to the tsar Nicolas dynasty! It was a tool of the proletariat
Stalin 6-20 million people dead.
Mao 40-70 million people dead.
Bill Clinton about 2,000 people dead.
The US kills far more people through sanctions than military action. It is estimated that US policy has lead to the death of around 40 million in the last 50 years.
Can’t tell you how many times these twats have called me a genocider.
It used to be a pretty serious word, but these losers are working overtime stripping it of all its meaning by using it on everyone that disagrees with them.
I’ve been called a zionist genocider for pointing out mass-murder is evil. People are fucking NUTS!
They sure are, and I think some of them are here to brigade this post.
The usual pattern: one, then two, then ten to defend the honor of Comrad Slaughterhouse and bury us all in bad-faith brigades.
I just respond I’m anti genocide, including, Russia’s kidnapping and trafficking Ukrainian children and China’s genocide of the Uyghars. It shuts them up or they immediately start defending them and then I call them genocides.
You can use Tibet as well with the CCP propagandists, that gets them to say wild shit. And then you can call out them for being racist too!
I don’t take sides because nobody is on my side.
[Edit: --Treebeard]
Can I be on your side?
Enlightened Centrism, then?
No, enlightened centrists have representation.
I’m a socialist in the United States and AOC is gonna vote for Hakeem Fucking Jeffries for Speaker, so who is really on my side at this moment?
But in the context of the US vs China, it seems like people are always explicitly making me pick a side. Almost all the China-bashing is motivated by wanting to keep the US hegemonic, and every time I say, “Hey, why are we saying China shouldn’t rule the world but never challenging why we allow the United States to rule the world?” I get called a tankie.
It really does feel like AOC is a career politician with too deep ties with super pacs that fund most of the “moderates” in democratic party.
Please vote her out as well.
Yes let’s eat ourselves guys, it’s the only solution am I right fellow comrades? Quickly let’s fuck ourselves as hard as we can, it’s ideological purity that people need, not results!
It’s not ideological purity. I don’t have anything against her, but if she votes Jefferies then the blue wave will have little effect imo.
If america had an actual multi-party system this wouldn’t have been a problem in the first place. You get your preferred candidate and I get my preferred one, most likely in a coalition together.
So you think if Jeffreys gets to keep his job, and bearing in mind I agree with you that he is a fucking waterproof teabag, you think that this entire election cycle and all of the new people brought into congress, will have “little effect”?
I mean it would be a blow, but don’t you think that this kind of hyperbolic overreaction is unhelpful? Like, if he does, are you gonna give up? I’m not in a competition to be the most leftist, I want to push our wins and recover from our losses.
They way you talk is defeatist.
Okay, you are right. All is not lost. I am not trying to be defeatist, there will be other chances.
I just think it’s rare to see so many non career politicians win elections. It’s a good moment to shore up and solidify that base before the two party rotating system rings back in.
We have a real problem in that it’s relatively easy for establishment candidates to give off progressive signals and for the mainstream media to never challenge them, so people will happily pose as progressives and then go right back to the establishment.
Look to Susan Collins for a mirrored example of that. It’s very effective.
That said, I think we’re going to have a lot of angry primary voters in 2028 if things keep going how they’re going.
No True Progressive
If someone is a Progressive 99% of the time and fucks up 1% of the time, tHeYrE eStAbLiShMeNt NeOlIbS!!!
With this much purity testing, it’s no wonder the left has no ground to stand on in the US - the rug keeps getting pulled by people further left of whatever platform they’re on.
Meanwhile the conservatives and fascists are patting each other on the back for putting aside their differences.
I know it can sometimes be hard to see someone’s exact colors, but Schumer has voted in favor of ICE funding and Israel Defense spending consistently.
Obviously Schumer is not a progressive. We were talking about AOC.
Getting pissed off at voting for a house speaker with a history of opposing progressive causes after a once-in-century change election isn’t purist pique.
Dems have a chance to redefine the party into something people want to vote for. If we can’t do it, we’re giving racist Christofascism another shot at a permanent majority. We have a lot of work to do at every level and we can’t do it with a corpodem at the top of the hiearchy.
Getting pissed off at voting for a house speaker with a history of opposing progressive causes after a once-in-century change election isn’t purist pique.
It is when you try to argue that AOC is No True Progressive.
Dems have a chance to redefine the party into something people want to vote for. If we can’t do it, we’re giving racist Christofascism another shot at a permanent majority. We have a lot of work to do at every level and we can’t do it with a corpodem at the top of the hiearchy.
Cool soapbox, but I never said anything different; you’re acting like I disagree with you here.
Here’s to hoping.
Ah gotcha, you’re a purity tester; my mistake.
Are simplistic stereotypes the only way you can understand the world?
No, I just try to figure out whence cometh ridiculous behavior so I can point it out and others can ignore it in peace.
I can see why your account is a throwaway.
I can see why yours is incoherent nonsense.
Millions killed in purges and policy created in cults of personality.
Yeah, need to make a whole identity sh*tting on imperfect democracies while touting systems that have always devolved into dictatorships.
Or you’re just not that familiar with Capitalist and Communist history.
Killed by the British East India company famines in India and Bengal: 10 - 15 million (the company exported ALL the grain, even the grain farmers were paid with and living off. Gotta get those profits!).
Killed by the Libertarian Congo Free State under King Leopald: 10 - 15 million (but the rubber business boomed).
That’s 20 million to 30 million dead from Capitalism right there.
Killed in the USSR Gulag system? 1.5 - 2 million. Most people survived the Gulag system (18 million went in, the majority walked out alive).
Outside of that Communism had a lot of undesired and unintended famines largely contributed to by one conman scientist fabricating results to keep his job:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko#Consequences_of_Lysenko’s_views
Capitalism has in all likelihood intentionally killed waaay more people than Communism (just by the numbers)… And if you know the history, this becomes more obvious. This comment doesn’t even cover the many wars by Capitalist nations pushed and carried out in the name of profit.
Killed in the USSR Gulag system? 1.5 - 2 million. Most people survived the Gulag system (18 million went in, the majority walked out alive).
Others doing bad things, does not make you doing bad things any better. Do you really want to defend “only” around 2 million people dying, and 18 million more ending up in camps?!
It’s not really about that … I mean, we don’t live under communism, we live under the deadlier of the two systems.
Well, then we get to the definitions of communism, because neither Soviet Union nor China under CCP have been marxist communists. “True communist state” would be owned by people, not people subjugated to become possessions of a dictator too. Capitalism fucking sucks, but I will rather take the social democratic system I live under now, than a dictator throwing innocent people into camps. (And that applies to the USA too, with their dollar-store government doing their best nazi impression right now.)
Now, if only we could stop being such meek sheep, we could perhaps figure out a system that is not based on exploitation. But that would be not like Capitalist societies, nor anything like Soviet Union or China under CCP.
Sounds like you got to that, because you wanted to rant about it out of nowhere. I don’t really get why you’re doing it me. But whatever.
I got to it, because you compared horrible systems, and claimed one to be communist, while it is not. Soviet Union and China under CCP have been, just slightly differently spiced versions of the same exploitation, that is behind capitalism too.
No I didn’t. Where do I claim to be doing a comparison of horrible systems? Where do I claim one is communist and one is not. I didn’t even originate the thread we’re on. I certainly didn’t say anything about spiced versions of each other. I didn’t come up with these terms.
Counter-revolutionaries aren’t innocent. Check mate, lib /s
REACTIONARY, REACTIONARY, YOU’RE A CIA REACTIONARY
Oh you’re not allowed to dislike both.
Since when do tankies care about authoritarianism? That’s shit liberals say
Yeah, being pro-authoritarianism is one of the wackier but consistent tankie positions.
It’s the mirror of libs being pro-capitalism.
Tankies and libs are the same thing with different imperial branding.
Comment from ml i was dealing with today:
How about not supporting any government?
This is a very silly position that isn’t supported by anybody but very naive ancaps. Even anarchists don’t support that.
What your position means is effectively just support for the most prolific invaders in the world - NATO, - who very much do benefit from the dismantlement of governments in the Global South, i.e. what you are proposing.
Anarchism = supports Nato /s
You could say this is a fringe single opinion but the votes on that thread dont support such.
oh honey. Don’t act so coy. We’ve talked to plenty of tankies. Look at their #1 leader simping for China 24/7, Mr. Hassan Piker himself
Progressives, we have to get rid of billionaires and the wealth gap. Eat the rich.
Communists, we could put them through struggle sessions and beat them in the streets?
Neoliberals, nah, let’s see what billionaires want, let them into government.
Tank man, I have had a hell of a day and just want to get my shopping home, and now there’s a tank here. I’m gonna fuck with a millitary in the 80s.
The US: Our millitary would never Kent state, or Waco, or Ruby Ridge, or Ludlow Massacre, or Battle of Blair Mountain, or extraordinary rendition anyone! This is proof that communism is bad.
The difference between the two is getting narrower and narrower. Dystopian surveillance and murderous authorities? Check. Imperialist foreign policy built on multiple genocides? Check. Pogroms and oppression of minorities? Not only check, but the US is arguably worse than China or the USSR. Though I admit that may be due to the US having an extra century to do dirt. And don’t forget America’s the world leader in Gulags.
The idea that America is benevolent is stupid. The idea that she’s benevolent by comparison is running mighty thin.
Uhh, yeah, we don’t disagree that America often sucks. Pointing that out in response to criticism pointed at other authoritarian regimes doesn’t make them good. For example, talking about gulags is guaranteed to trigger someone to bring up America’s incarceration rate. Does that magically make gulags good? No, it’s whataboutism and deflection.
Agreed, just because something isn’t necessarily being actively argued about but lies within the subtext of the argument, doesn’t mean that one is being held to a different standard or being argued as a better system over the other. The fact of the matter is that if someone is arguing that gulags are bad, as an example, then they probably think the modern prison system is also bad. The heart of the argument is that forced labor institutionalization is bad and it shouldn’t take much introspection to understand that, but when someone enters the argument with whataboutism it’s now seen as bad faith because they don’t appear to understand the argument, just who’s making it and what side it’s currently criticizing.
talking about gulags is guaranteed to trigger someone to bring up America’s incarceration rate.
I didn’t mean to imply the connection between America’s gulags and the Soviets. I meant to state it explicitly. And I also want to point out the meme itself is a whataboutism.
The difference between the two is getting narrower and narrower.
“I literally cannot tell the difference between Louis XVI and Robespierre” is a thing you can say from a very great historical distance.
