As a leftist its also important to keep in mind we do differentiate between leftists who hold some opinions we disagree with compared to a Liberal who disagrees with us on nearly everything. Especially when said Liberals demand to be treated like leftists yet support imperalism, genocide, apartheid, capitalism, bigotry, and yet constantly call people "fake leftists" or "tankies".

[–] TheTechnician27@lemmy.world 32 points 13 hours ago (12 children)

You had me until "tankies". Tankies are scum and don't need defending.

[–] InquisitiveApathy@lemm.ee 2 points 12 hours ago (3 children)

What's a tankie?

[–] Forester@pawb.social 12 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago) (1 children)

It's a political slang word. It refers to those who support leftist authoritarian regimes such as communist, China. Regimes where the state can do no wrong and the people do all the wrong so the state must step in to crush the people and "protect them" from dangerous, Western and capitalist ideas. Pretty sure the name derives from the 1989 tiananmen square incident.

[–] InquisitiveApathy@lemm.ee 16 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

The term has nothing to do with Tiananmen square and it's usage actually predates the massacre by almost 40 years.

[–] Forester@pawb.social 10 points 12 hours ago

Yeah you're right. I was for some reason conflating the USSR invading Hungary

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