Lefty Memes
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, 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
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" 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).
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.
- Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:
- Racism
- Sexism
- Queerphobia
- Ableism
- Classism
- Rape or assault
- Genocide/ethnic cleansing or (mass) deportations
- Fascism
- (National) chauvinism
- Orientalism
- Colonialism or Imperialism (and their neo- counterparts)
- Zionism
- Religious fundamentalism of any kind
view the rest of the comments
Oh ok, so there's considerably less than one a year.
You know, due to gun control.
Compared to the modern US with over one a day.
Saying... anything positive about X is undermined by negative things about X is just completely missing the point... well, any potentially productive point.
The USSR did bad things, authoritarianism is bad.
Uh huh. Yep.
Apply that logic to any other society, ever.
Ok, I guess we don't have any societies where the state acts as a functional monopoly on the legitimate use of violence that are worth discussing as examples of anything good.
Thus apparently there are no examples of nearly any societies, ever, worth further investigation or comparison or potential, at least partial, emulation.
... Am I misunderstanding you, or is that your actual position?
Or are you just nonsenically picking on the USSR for a problem it did not really have in comparison to many other societies?
If your point is 'mass violence enabled by the state is bad'... almost no one on lemmy is going to broadly disagree with that, no one is going to ignore all the deaths, other than I guess tankies and fascists.
Its a moot point (in the US legal system sense of moot point), its a pointless point to make, amongst people with functioning consciences.
But if you're trying to have, I dunno, a conversation or commentary on ...
... what would be an ideal way for modern society to handle the nearly completely unavoidable fact that firearms exist in a modern society? who should have them, or be able to have them, under what circumstances, under which conditions? ...
... then the framing of your original comment is completely unproductive and banal.
It asserts a laughably false equivalence with no evidence.
And yes, it is still a laughably false equivalence to point at evidence of something like a 1000 degree of magnitude difference in number of yearly mass shootings... as ... evidence of equivalence.
It is not as simple as 'Don't support mass murderers.'
One person's murderer is another person's justified hero, dutiful soldier, person just doing their job, justified revolutionary, despicable terrorist, etc.
Sorry mate, I had to call in the reff
You are quoted as saying
Your opponent did then provide the evidence you asked for and then you dismissed it. A proper play would've meant admitting that these events did happen after being presented evidence. You could've carried your point afterwards and talked about the difference in scale, but you undermined your own argument by dismissing theirs.
I think that's like a ten yard penalty and a time out, take a breather and come back working together on finding a good point through dialog instead of fighting, seems like you could reach each other if you wanted.
I did admit the evidence existed.
In the first couple of sentences.
Did you miss those, ref?
I then did the thing, went forward with the rest of the discussion, considering the evidence they presented, referring to it, and making comparisons with it.
How could I discuss and make quantitative comparisons of that set of events to others... without implicitly, obviously, accepting it as existing and valid?
Was I supposed to stop and profusely congratulate them for linking a wiki page?
You've essentially penalized me for not 'admitting those events did happen' in an undefined yet apparently specific manner you find appropriate.
I acknowledged its existence by contending with it.
Further... they said 0 publicized shootings.
Go look at the references for the shootings ... many of them are contemporaneous coverage in some kind publicized media, at least one had public a memorial service occur to commemerate the victims, not long after the shootings.
So... no. They did actually prove their claim. They in fact explicitly disproved it.
All that is required to disprove a claim of 0 publicized shootings is... a single publicized shooting, contemporaneously published if we assume that as a reasonable contextual specificied definition.
And... they... provided that evidence, themselves.
Beyond that, the initial claim itself is still just a reversal of how burden of proof works, a fallacious approach to discourse.
I'm beginning to think you're not really a referee, in fact... you're nothing but a corny shit poster.
=P
... but I actually can provide non self defeating evidence of that seemingly baseless assertion.
I'm just choosing not to, because that would seem to me to be excessively mean.
Well it's clear you're not here to reason so I'm just gonna let you be a tankie
it also really is that simple
just don't support genocide
don't support powers that genocide
don't support Israel, Russia, the USA, the Reich, the USSR, or any genocide-friendly power
show me proof that any power has basis in genocide and I will shun it
because that's what normal people should do
genocide is bad and we should avoid supporting it
this is literally the most justified take ever and you're still arguing against it
Ok, so you don't have a discussion about how guns should work in a society.
You just want to use a dubious rhetorical tactic to assert that genocide is bad.
Yes, we, we all agree that genocide is bad, amongst the vast majority of people with consciences.
This isn't generally a point worth making, its virtue signalling.
Does... communal firearm training... necessarily result in genocide?
Is that what has happened in every society that has at least a temporary period of mandatory military service for broad swathes of society?
I'm trying to have a discussion, you just want to keep avoiding that discussion, and keep reasserting a point I have already accepted... because that point is so obvious it barely needs to be stated.
Again: I agree with you that genocide is bad. I don't support or endorse any of the pogroms or purges or manufactured famines or gulag archipelagos of the USSR, those are all atrocities.
But, what do you mean you will shun any power that has a basis in genocide?
Like, you'll never step foot in the USA? Or Canada? Or nearly any Western country? You'll boycott all companies that currently, actively participate in genocide?
Or are you juat saying you think genocide is icky and bad?
Something in between?
Something else?
Also I think you're the the first person on lemmy who's called me a tankie, which is funny to me because I've been banned from large sections of ml and hexbear for pointing out that the Pooh Bear Xi Jinping meme actually originated in China, and is actually a homegrown symbol of mockery of and resistance against Xi and the PRC, not a racist meme used by Westerners to attack China and Chinese people...
...generally I'm the one getting into arguments with actual tankies, who will actually defend some of those genocides and other horrific acts done in the name of some vanguard party or what not.
But I guess to you, tankie is just anyone you perceive as being mean, when the topic of discussion is the USSR.
Ok then if you can't take things I'm good humor, I'll say it directly. You're acting like an ass and flying off the handle, whether you're right or not, and maybe need to fucking chill.
I did take things in good humor, that's why I made a joke at the end.
I'm sorry if you can't handle having your ideas being directly interrogated amd critiqued, maybe you shouldn't be a self appointed referee of debates, maybe you shouldn't have inserted yourself into this situation for invalid reasons, maybe its not polite to do that, and you should chill out a bit?
If that's what you call I joke I feel pity for the few people you've interacted with at parties.
You're still being an ass, so stop throwing a tantrum when someone said you were wrong and touch grass.