this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2026
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Who said atrocities are justifiable? Didn’t I just agree with you it was bad?
You’re the one that brought up Hong Kong as a “this was bad therefore it’s totally ridiculous to say anything positive about China.” I agree with the first part, but not the second nor the connection.
Maybe it’s not a majority, I don’t know, but at least some of the protesters were wishing to stay a UK colony; the Union Jack was much in evidence (which is pretty wild really). Or were those CPC provocateurs or something? If you tell me that was a vocal and ridiculous minority, that’s fine, I wasn’t there, I’ll believe you.
Look man, I’m happy people were brave and cool and protested for what they believed in, even if it’s not what I believe in, and it’s bad Chinese cops/authorities/whatever hurt them for it. I don’t know why that would mean I should think that saying good things about China is wrong. I also think the surveillance and mistreatment of the Uyghurs is bad…like way worse than what happened in Hong Kong. There are also lots of good things to say about China.
You don't seem to understand the greater context.
This is a propaganda piece which intends to use America's blatant authoritarianism, atrocities, etc as an opportunity to white wash China's government as "comparatively good".
It's fine to talk about the good aspects of China. There's no need to directly compare it to America unless you're making propaganda.
Propaganda likes to ignore inconvenient truths and propagandists tend to downvote them.
Edit: tell me more about the Union Jack stuff. AFAIK Hong Kong had a locally elected government and it cooperated with the Chinese government as part of the Chinese government. No idea what you're talking about, or why there was even a notion of them staying a "UK colony". That just sounds like propaganda to me because, again, they literally had a locally elected government? Were there people that wanted to REJOIN the UK government?
I mean, I do understand that context; it is a propaganda piece portraying China as comparatively better than the US.
China is comparatively better than the U.S.
Making propaganda to that effect is good.
Everything is propaganda. You’re doing anti-China propaganda; I’m doing pro-China propaganda. with a veneer of nuance or whatever but my words have political meaning and so do yours…
I’ve never understood how any expression of political thought could not be propaganda… or that there’s an especially good/principled way to separate what you and me are doing from whatever you mean by propaganda…if it’s a government paying for it I really don’t think OP qualifies…or else the PRC should get its fuckin money back lol
The difference is the target, the intention, and the means of transmission.
I'm making a comment on a thread. Maybe 3 people will read this. I am coming in without a pro- bias of any kind, only with anti-atrocity bias.
Atrocities are something both governments are guilty of.
Yet the prevailing opinion (among tankies, anyway) is "China is the best and everything is okay and this is considered critical support because when pushed I cannot defend those things and will be forced to admit that they did bad things... but forget those bad things, look at how bad America is!"
I'm actually not doing anti-China propaganda. I'm interested in Chinese policy in a lot of ways and am not always opposed to them. What I am doing is pointing out the hypocrisy and inability for some people to hold authoritarians accountable because it's THEIR brand of authoritarianism.
Edit: also, making propaganda which intentionally white washes authoritarian regimes with a penchant for violence against those who protest is... nope, still not good. Listen. Just grow a fucking backbone. Just gain some moral consistency. Maybe not you? But you can't tell me the prevailing opinion around here isn't "fuck Blue MAGA they support genocide, I'd rather just not vote". And guess what? Those people aren't keeping that same energy when their favorite "communist" state is under the microscope.
I don’t think tankies think what you think tankies think. Maybe I’m wrong, but my impression is that when Marxist Leninists get together, criticism of “AES” countries is a perfectly fine topic of conversation “inside” the group, but when it’s done “outside” it serves the interest of the US/capital/imperialism. And I think there’s something to that; it does! A little full of yourself to think it could matter more than looking reasonable to outsiders or educating your insiders…but it’s not totally crazy. I don’t know, there is plenty though, like look at bad empanada (I think he’d be considered a tankie, right?). Guys done quite a bit on the Uyghurs.
I say all this as a Marxist Leninist (I assume I’m a “tankie” to people who use the word “tankie” lol).
Of course, I’d also say it’s a bit silly to think one could “hold [China] accountable” by the opposite means.
We disagree about what propaganda means, I guess. I don’t think “doing anti-China propaganda” means you hate China or something, I think it just means you’re conveying a political message that runs counter to their political message. I don’t understand the distinction between political messaging that is or isn’t propaganda?
Tankie is a pejorative for authoritarian communists.
This isn't inside the group? It might be publicly viewable, but it's still .ml. This is .ml territory. It specifically shouldn't be an echo chamber.
I understand what you're saying, but this is the in group.
I don't think it's full of yourself at all to consider time and place when being critical, but I think also that this whole idea of "strategic criticism", simply put, looks- no, is- incredibly dishonest.
Is bad empanada a tankie? I'm not completely familiar. I don't follow any big political content (I've seen hasan clips on youtube and like liberal stuff like dean on tiktok). I try to avoid being parasocial. It sucks bcos I didn't know Andrew Callaghan was a sex pest or whatever bcos I was really into his on the ground independent reporting. I also have never read any theory. I'm not a particularly educated person- certainly lightyears ahead of the average American citizen just by merit that I did "gifted kid good" in k-12 and took some college courses.
I don't know that all marxist leninists are tankies. Idrc much. Are you all authoritarian? If so, I do think I understand why mls would think a state authority (ran by the people) is good or at least can be good, but I also think a lot of them are inclined to be intellectually dishonest when it suits them. Me, too, sometimes.
I use tankie, personally, more often to refer explicitly to authoritarian communists who are willing to overlook atrocities committed by "their side".
I understand it could be applied to any authoritarian communist, however, but I really don't know that it would be fair to call you ALL tankies.
However, some people (Cowbee, for example) do like to intentionally conflate being a "tankie" with being a communist- which is CERTAINLY not true. It is debatable whether anarchocommunism is feasible, not debateable whether its adherents exist. So you can definitely be a communist and not a tankie.
Oh, we can't "hold China accountable"? We can't start a people's movement to hold the bad actors accountable? Huh. Almost seems like that's a giant fucking issue. The people have no means of holding the government accountable?
I'm not saying doing anti-China propaganda has a prerequisite of me hating China. I prettttty clearly laid out to you what propaganda is. You keep saying "I don't know, what's propaganda, what distinguishes it from political messaging that isn't propaganda". And then I told you. And then you said "yeah, guess we disagree, I don't understand the difference."
I'll repeat it for you.
Target - propaganda has a target audience. It is aimed at specific people or demographics of people, or in specific locations where it will reach specific people or demographics of people.
Intention - This is done with specific intention to spread a particular political message.
Means of transmission: Who is being reached, how, how many.
A comment in a thread? Not propaganda. A singular conversation? Not propaganda. A post which creates the thread, generates attention, and is the first/main thing most people will see? Propaganda. A pattern of conversations with intention to spread a particular message? PropandaZ
"Tankie" is just a pejorative for communists, used against those with views common to communists. No socialist state is perfect, of course, but many preconceived notions about socialist states are flat out wrong, so communists get called "tankies" for giving a more accurate picture.
No, again, you are intentionally trying to mislead readers into believing something false to be true. Not all communists are tankies, and whenever we call you tankies, it's not because you're communist.
Can you give some examples of "non-tankie" communists?
😭😭 literally anyone who would call themself an anarchocommunist for starters. Let's not play dumb, shall we?
I would call myself an anarchocommunist, guess I'm not a tankie then?
Whoa! Exactly!
Lol. I'll make sure to direct the endless hoard of shitlibs that call me one to you
Genuinely, do it
Will do lol
Anarchists aren't communists in the sense that they aren't advocating for Marxist communism. When one hears "communist," they think "soviet union," not Kropotkin. Anarchism and communism are entirely different things with different goals and methods.
Anarchism is primarily about communalization of production and distribution, while Marxism is primarily about collectivization of production and distribution.
When I say “communalization,” I mean anarchists propose horizontalist, decentralized cells, similar to early humanity’s cooperative production but with more interconnection and modern tech. When I say collectivization, I mean the unification of all of humanity into one system, where production and distribution is planned collectively to satisfy the needs of everyone as best as possible.
For anarchists, collectivized society still seems to retain the state, as some anarchists conflate administration with the state as it represents a hierarchy. For Marxists, this focus on communalism creates inter-cell class distinctions, as each cell only truly owns their own means of production, giving rise to class distinctions and thus states in the future.
For Marxists, socialism must have a state, a state can only wither with respect to how far along it has come in collectivizing production and therefore eliminating class. All states are authoritarian, but we cannot get rid of the state without erasing the foundations of the state: class society, and to do so we must collectivize production and distribution globally. Socialist states, where the working class wields its authority against capitalists and fascists, are the means by which this collectivization can actually happen, and are fully in-line with Marx’s beliefs. Communism as a stateless, classless, moneyless society is only possible post-socialism.
Abolishing the state overnight would not create the kind of society Marxists advocate for advancing towards, and if anything, would result in the resumption of competition and the resurgance of capitalism if Marx and Engels predictions are correct.
None of this was specific to Marxism-Leninism, but Marxism in general.
Okay, that was great and informative, but doesn't disprove my point. Those people still identify as communist and that's just as valid as your self identification as communist. The difference is still in the nature of it being authoritative, which is what gets you called tankie, not the communist bit. If you want to stop all communists from getting labeled as tankie, then stop identifying the two things as being interchangeable, especially when they aren't interchangeable and the people using them are telling you exactly how they aren't interchangeable.
When I said "tankie is a pejorative for communist," I meant communist in the way most people think of the term. If you want to call anarchists communists, even if I think that is more confusing than clarifying due to the dramatic differences in communalization vs. Collectivization, then I'll restate it for you: "tankie is a pejorative for Marxist," then. While I have seen anarchists get called "tankie" before, it's overwhelmingly used against Marxists, and when the average person hears communist they think of Marxism, not anarchism.
I've seen anarchists like Diva get called tankies for not towing the anti-communist line hard enough though, so it seems you've been misinformed.
Idk, maybe you should just use fucking google like an adult and understand that it is aimed at auth communists and that people using it to target nonauth communists is such an incredibly small number that it's not even worth noting. The experience you are describing is within a vacuum of leftist infighting where liberals sometimes poke their head in to chime in with stupid fuck opinions. Obviously some stupid liberal fuck is going to see the criticism a genuine leftist levied at a genuine auth communist and not understand what the insult means.
Wow why do you feel the need to be so aggressive. I'm simply pointing out that no matter what Google tells you in reality it's simply used as a slur leftists who don't tow the anti-communist line right. If you don't tow the anti-communist line just right it doesn't matter what you are you will be called a tankie.
I feel the need to get aggressive because I don't need to hear this drivel you're pushing. A slur bro? Everything is a slur now? Grow the fuck up.
slur /slûr/
transitive verb
Synonym of Pejorative
To talk about disparagingly or insultingly. adjective
Disparaging; belittling.
Implying or imputing evil; depreciatory; disparaging; unfavorable.
It's a slur, or a pejorative, whichever you prefer to use. You should learn what words mean. English isn't even my first or second language yet I managed to do it before speaking on it.
English isn't prescriptivist, it's descriptivist. I'm sorry for assuming English was your first language.
A slur is like a more advanced pejorative that you shouldn't say, usually because it targets people who can't change whatever trait is being targetted. Tankie isn't a slur, because I'm allowed to call you a tankie all day. Hope that helped!