Lefty Memes
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
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.
- Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:
- Racism
- Sexism
- Queerphobia
- Ableism
- Classism
- Sexual 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
I live in a fairly conservative area that's working class.
People intuitively understand when you describe how much capitalism sucks because they're living it.
If you say "capitalism sucks", you are going to get reactionary thought and action. You have to say things in a way to engage their experience and understanding without tripping the propagandized brain worms.
If you can do that, you'll find that they're primed to reject capitalism, they just don't know it yet.
"These rich fuckers don't give a shit about us, but they have no problems helping each other out."
"Everybody's boss is the same, they want you to work harder, more hours, and do it all for less money. They want us to be able to barely survive."
"The only way we can make them change is to all work together. They'll screw over each one of us individually, but if we're together they'll know it's actually them who needs us."
To my endless frustration leftwing thought and policy is popular until someone knows it's left wing.
I spend so much time talking to people and skirting around terminology/avoiding describing things in clear terms because they set off alarm bells.
As you say everyone gets that we're screwed and pitted against each other while dipshits up top have their snouts in the trough. There is a spectrum on how far we ought to go to address this but it's also really hard to get action out of people because they'll nod along until you try point them at a union or something and then the propaganda kicks in.
Extending your metaphor, this is what your average American's brain looks like. There is a lot of propaganda and social conditioning working against you here.
I know the gif isn't from Entrament, but it reminded me of this.
https://youtube.com/shorts/i3_76dZBD-U
Extending even farther, there's nothing especially different about the American brain. Propaganda and social conditioning are natural to human cognitive bias and on the other side of the coin is our ability to learn.
Now the environment of conditioning and propaganda may be another story.
GOOD post
Well said, and thanks for including some examples at the end!
This! You can’t teach someone without appealing to their lived experiences and current understanding of the material conditions.
Shame is also important. Laugh at these people. Call them idiots and treat them like children when they start talking about politics. Shame is a great motivator and was a big part of my transition to anti-capitalism. Not joking.
That's close, but not quite correct
Guilt helps people change. Shame gets them to more deeply entrench themselves into their current behaviors because they're going to seek out ways to alleviate that shame through social connections that alleviate the pain of shame. The thing to understand is that guilt is a feeling of wrong doing, and shame is a feeling of lacking social value. When deprogramming someone from their previously held propagandized views, you have to give them an avenue to travel from their current position to where they are going. They need the opportunity to apologize and make amends. This is the process for atonement.
All that said, you also have to not give out too many chances. That just lets people continue to perpetuate their harm. If someone shows no sign of being willing to go through the atonement process you have to find ways to keep your community safe from the things that they do. How to do that is a discussion for another forum. Mostly in person discussions in mutual aid or community defense space, as this process is also context dependent.
In my experience belittling and shaming disenfranchised people results in them harboring deeper resentment.
Obviously mileage varies. It worked for you, but not everyone is willing or able to do self crit in response to their beliefs being attacked.
Many times people need to come to the shameful realization themselves.