this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2026
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Lefty Memes

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An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of "ML" (read: Dengist) influence. 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, discussion and agitprop/stuff that's better fit for a poster than a meme go in c/Socialism.

If you are new to socialism, you can ask questions and find resources over on c/Socialism101.

Please don't forget to help keep this community clean by reporting rule violations, updooting good contributions and downdooting those of low quality!

Rules

Version without spoilers

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. Please post agitprop here)


0.5 [Provisional Rule] Use alt text or image descriptions to allow greater accessibility


(Please take a look at our wiki page for the guidelines on how to actually write alternative text!)

We require alternative text (from now referred to as "alt text") to be added to all posts/comments containing media, such as images, animated GIFs, videos, audio files, and custom emojis.
EDIT: For files you share in the comments, a simple summary should be enough if they’re too complex.

We are committed to social equity and to reducing barriers of entry, including (digital) communication and culture. It takes each of us only a few moments to make a whole world of content (more) accessible to a bunch of folks.

When alt text is absent, a reminder will be issued. If you don't add the missing alt text within 48 hours, the post will be removed. No hard feelings.


0.5.1 Style tip about abbreviations and short forms


When writing stuff like "lol" and "iirc", it's a good idea to try and replace those with their all caps counterpart

  • ofc => OFC
  • af = AF
  • ok => OK
  • lol => LOL
  • bc => BC
  • bs => BS
  • iirc => IIRC
  • cia => CIA
  • nato => Nato (you don't spell it when talking, right?)
  • usa => USA
  • prc => PRC
  • etc.

Why? Because otherwise (AFAIK), screen readers will try to read them out as actually words instead of spelling them


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" (read: Dengists) (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).


4. No Bigotry.


The only dangerous minority is the rich.


5. Don't demonize previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.


We must constructively learn from their mistakes, while acknowledging their achievements and recognizing when they have strayed away from socialist principles.

(if you are reading the rules to apply for modding this community, mention "Mantic Minotaur" when answering question 2)


6. Don't irrationally 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.



  1. Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

SOUTH AMERICAN ELECTIONS

[two different people are being portrayed side by side]

Gabriela Rosa Sympatica
Elementary school teacher
Beloved by her community
Wants to improve lives
[portrait of a smiling woman in overalls]

Diego Hitlerio de la Junta
Son of a previous dictator
Went to jail for corruption
Wants to sterilize natives
[portrait of a frowning nasty looking character in military gear]

Temporary results (98% ballots counted):
[Gabriela] 49.9999%
[Diego] 50.0001%

https://thebad.website/comic/south_american_elections

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[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 24 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Shit like that makes me think Americans aren't that different than they're "third world" counter parts

[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

In the US version the left side candidade would be "Identitaria Fatcatus-Loving", listed as:

  • Got several million dollar plus campaign contributions
  • Upper middle-class, never met a single poor person in her life and yet looks down on them
  • Says one thing, does something else
  • Doesn't talk about Wealth Inequality, EVER.
  • Is <list of identitarian "specificities">

At least the "third"-world places often have electable left of center candidates, not just Fascist vs Warmongering Hardcore Neoliberal.

[–] cinoreus@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

It's something expected to happen in first past the post electoral systems. It's by design things like these happen

[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Power Duopolies are better than Power Monopolies but not by much and they certainly do not represent the true breadth of political beliefs of a population of millions of people.

In countries with such systems (at least in the ones I lived in) people get trained by the Press to expect everything boils down to "one side versus a the other side", but if you actually analyse the whole thing and think about even simple choices in groups of people (say, "we're should we go to next?" when out with friends) and it's very rare that even for just one thing there are only 2 prefered choices in a group with more than 2 people, so now imagine how many possibilities there are in all combinations of preferences for all the social and political choices in a country of millions.

Representative Democracy by necessity is a heavilly reduced and simplified reflection of the preferences in the society they mean to represent and those variants of it where the representation system is Mathematically Rigged to de facto reduce that representation to just two, is literally the second farthest political system from properly representing a population, with the farthest one being dictatorship.

Personally I don't count Power Duopolies like that real Democracies: a vote alone doesn't make something a Democracy, otherwise Russia would be a Democracy.

[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 8 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Yeah first pass the post system does fucky things, but the issue is the dictator being viable and shows that there's population of that country that supports their violence and oppression...

It's like watching trump win the 2024 primaries and realizing maga is still core to the Republican party

[–] cinoreus@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The affinity towards dictators could be partially explained by this

https://youtu.be/rE3j_RHkqJc

And because of FPTPs ability to drown voices that are not popular, these dictatorial leaders tend to rise at the top, and only option becomes the other party. The equilibrium of FPTP is a two party system, exactly like the one we see in America.

Unfortunately Trump is a product of this exact machinery.

[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I say it's more complicated in that these dictators control mass media and hence why the "vote dictator" germ is everywhere and sustained.

Back in 2016 people were saying that trump is a product of decades of propaganda. Like decades of propaganda got us to trump

[–] cinoreus@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

In my opinion, the control of mass media is a problem that comes after you elect a dictator. Like we're talking orban and netanyahu here. Trump did not have Media control until 2016. While arguably he did have some in 2024, his media control wasn't this strong at any point in history.

Media control is the reason why getting rid of dictators is extremely hard. What I am talking about is what even gets them into the office in the first place

[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 8 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They’re the ones that made the Americas like that.

[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 7 points 2 days ago

Yeah but they fall for propaganda all the same. I find hilarious and also an obligation to do counter propaganda

[–] Armpitbagette@lemmy.zip 0 points 2 days ago (1 children)

uh did you miss the part where 'south america' isn't a country and that these people don't exist?

[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 0 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I'm America so I mean usa. I didn't think south Americans thought of themselves as south Americans. I south America was just a name English speakers made up

[–] explodicle@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Wait they don't? I think of myself as North American.

[–] solidheron@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

I don't, but idk what other people view themselves