this post was submitted on 20 May 2024
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Lefty Memes
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An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of the "ML" influence of instances like lemmy.ml and lemmygrad. This is a place for undogmatic shitposting and memes from a progressive, anti-capitalist and truly anti-imperialist perspective, regardless of specific ideology.
Serious posts, news, and discussion go in c/Socialism.
If you are new to socialism, you can ask questions and find resources over on c/Socialism101.
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0. Only post socialist memes
That refers to funny image macros and means that generally videos and screenshots are not allowed. Exceptions include explicitly humorous and short videos, as well as (social media) screenshots depicting a funny situation, joke, or joke picture relating to socialist movements, theory, societal issues, or political opponents. Examples would be the classic case of humorous Tumblr or Twitter posts/threads. (and no, agitprop text does not count as a meme)
1. Socialist Unity in the form of mutual respect and good faith interactions is enforced here
Try to keep an open mind, other schools of thought may offer points of view and analyses you haven't considered yet. Also: This is not a place for the Idealism vs. Materialism or rather Anarchism vs. Marxism debate(s), for that please visit c/AnarchismVsMarxism.
2. Anti-Imperialism means recognizing capitalist states like Russia and China as such
That means condemning (their) imperialism, even if it is of the "anti-USA" flavor.
3. No liberalism, (right-wing) revisionism or reactionaries.
That includes so called: Social Democracy, Democratic Socialism, Dengism, Market Socialism, Patriotic Socialism, National Bolshevism, Anarcho-Capitalism etc. . Anti-Socialist people and content have no place here, as well as the variety of "Marxist"-"Leninists" seen on lemmygrad and more specifically GenZedong (actual ML's are welcome as long as they agree to the rules and don't just copy paste/larp about stuff from a hundred years ago).
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The only dangerous minority is the rich.
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We must constructively learn from their mistakes, while acknowledging their achievements and recognizing when they have strayed away from socialist principles.
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6. Don't idolize/glorify previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.
Notable achievements in all spheres of society were made by various socialist/people's/democratic republics around the world. Mistakes, however, were made as well: bureaucratic castes of parasitic elites - as well as reactionary cults of personality - were established, many things were mismanaged and prejudice and bigotry sometimes replaced internationalism and progressiveness.
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I'm not disagreeing with you here on whether or not the USSR is good or bad, that's not my point.
My point is that if both person A and person B want worker ownership and person C wants a dictatorship of Capitalism, then person A and B should ally, even if temporarily.
Person B is also a fascist, and should be let nowhere near power because they will purge person A the first second they can.
Even if they want 94% of the same things?
We aren't talking about MAGA Communists or PatSocs.
Let's say you and I align politically 99%. Our only point of contention is that I want to kill or jail you specifically. Are you going to ally with me and hope I change my mind later?
This is exaggerated to make a point, not a direct analogy.
What are the foundations of wanting to kill or jail me? Seems important, no?
You're saying if I have a good reason, you're OK with it?
Not necessarily, I'm saying your hypothetical lacks necessary information.
Presently, you've framed it in an Idealist manner, not a Materialist one. People's views aren't selected by a Random Number Generator in real life, they are the consequence of their Material Conditions. Matter creates thought, ideas do not create matter.
Looking at our hypothetical, you have a Leftist with the currently unexplained ideal that I personally should die for no reason. This doesn't make any practical sense, so we cannot apply this theory to practice.
In the case of this entire meme, there exists a divide, generally, between Marxists and Anarchists. Using your example of a Stalin defender, which situation is more realistic?
A: A Leftist believes everything the US state department has levied against Stalin is true, he killed 200 million people and murdered puppies, and believes that this is good, actually, and we should do more of it?
B: A Leftist believes nothing the US state department has said is true, and believes Stalin to be the second coming of Jesus Christ and Marx himself, and believes this to be a good thing?
Neither are realistic, but A makes far less internal sense, and cannot be reasoned with, as mass cruelty is the point. Person B, however, could be misled and instead worked with. Person B has good intentions with a faulty understanding, person A has bad intentions with a faulty understanding.
Do you see my point? Without knowing the origin of views, how can we hope to address them and how to deal with them?
You left out C.
Ostensible leftist that knows what horrific things Stalin did, but thinks they weren't that bad or even good, somehow. It's even more detached from reality than example A. Spend some time on lemmygrad and you'll see what I'm talking about.
That didn't really answer my question, did it? Do you agree that the why of views matters in many ways more than the views themselves when it comes to seeing if someone can be swayed or not?
So you're saying if you think you can change my mind, you would ally with me? Or would you try to change my mind first?
If we both share the common goal of dismantling Capitalism in the short term, and your intentions come from a place that can be reasoned with, I would ally with you, rather than endanger the leftist movement overall and risk fascism.
I'm glad we reached an understanding here. Where leftists/progressives differ from your viewpoint is that we generally believe tankies cannot be allied with prior to changing their views. Authoritarian governments taking power just about always purge political dissidents. Since progressives are anti-authoritarian, that means them. Allying with authoritarians and hoping to convince them to not be authoritarian before taking power is a losing prospect.
Again, spend some time on lemmygrad and maybe give some gentle pushback on their beliefs and see what happens.
I am a Leftist, lol. Leftists do not, as a whole, differ from my viewpoint.
That's why I said generally lol. But I've heard many many more people saying "fuck tankies" than "Hey maybe we should hear them out."
I'm skeptical of anyone labeling anyone a tankie ever since an Anarchist labeled me a tankie for saying Marxism is a valid strain of Socialism.
So you're basically saying that independent thought is a myth. What heinous material conditions forced you to come up with THAT turd? 🤦
I am not. I am saying that people are products of their environment. Someone raised with no concept of "Jupiter" wouldn't think about Jupiter.
^ It's like my best friend from High School who disowned me. We were always on opposite ends of the political spectrum but always met in the middle at "everything is fucked and rigged." Of COURSE he was a capitalist conservative, his Dad owned a successful construction company, but we still saw the same flaws in the system and respected/saw what the other was saying on whatever issue we discussed.
I won't say he didn't work hard or anything, he did go to college (paid for though, of course) and work a real job in his business/bookkeeping field for a while. But sure enough after a few years with his family resources and connections he started a real estate business and now I'm a filthy commie even for just utilizing VA health care (which isn't a "freebie," but a part of the agreement when you join.)
My point is, we were able to find middle ground and agree on certain things, until his privileged position allowed him to "win." Then, all of a sudden, the system is perfect and I'm just a loser who wants winners to pay for losers and if I want healthcare (or whatever) I should just get off my ass and "win." Of course the system seems flawless and superior when you have all the material conditions to just waltz in with no struggle or strife.
((Lesser point, we were friends for like 20 years from age 14-15 and I still miss my friend))
actually, "Jupiter" would not exist as a concept if not for someone raised without it inventing it in the first place.
People are influenced by their environment for sure, but not only is the environment influenced by the people too, there are also myriad other determining factors at play.
Yes, so people's environment shapes their ideas. Brains do not secrete thought like Bile.
People's environment can INFLUENCE their ideas, sure, but it doesn't DICTATE them regardless of all other factors.
And fyi sometimes Brians DO secrete, but they'll thank you not to draw attention to their embarrassing medical issue.
Where do ideas come from?
Kuurne. It's a municipality located in the Belgian province West Flanders.
So you're ultimately uninterested in arguing anything meaningful and just want to loudly and proudly flip the table, got it.
Nah, I've just realized that there's no talking you out of your delusion, so I might as well have a little fun with it 🤷
What delusion?
That all ideas stem from material conditions and no material conditions are the result of ideas.
All ideas stem from material conditions, but just as matter shapes humans, humans reshape matter, which reshape humans who repeat the process.
That's the driving force of history.
It's absurd to think that ideas change matter without material changes.
You're FAR too fixated on matter. How old are you again? Did you recently read philosophy for the first time and it just so happened to be of a materialist nature? Because you're very much giving off that "child repeating things they don't understand" vibe.
Nope. It's MUCH more varied and complex than just people interacting with matter.
Not anymore absurd than your extreme oversimplification of the concepts of knowledge and opinion.
It is absolutely absurd to think that matter changes depending on how you percieve it. You're deeply unserious.
IDEAS change depending on how you perceive them. Matter isn't always involved at all. Not everything is arranged in neat rows to fit your silly pet theory.
And your perception is based on matter, yes. The outputs are made of inputs.
I'm beginning to think there's a fundamental misunderstanding at play here. Could you do me a favor and define exactly what you mean by "matter"?
Matter. Existing mass.
So you ARE talking about physical matter as the foundation of all ideas?
Alrighty then, no reason for me to keep wasting my time trying to talk you out of your delusion. Have a nice day.
Ideas are not made of magic.
True. Guess what? Just because you can't touch something doesn't mean that it's magic.
Nope, sure doesn't. It also doesn't mean that the metaphysical is the origin of that which shapes ideas. There are no ghosts out there giving you ideas.
Just take the L and leave me alone.