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What's a Tankie? (lemmy.world)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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I keep hearing the term in political discourse, and rather than googling it, I'm asking the people who know better than Google.

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[–] 15 points 11 months ago (6 children)

All states are "authoritarian," in that all states are means by which one class exerts its authority over the others. Communists support the working class being in charge of that authority, all communists (unless you count anarchists) support the use of the state against capitalists and fascists, and the majority of practicing communists support socialist states.

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  • [+] -11 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (5 children)

    Ha ha yeah, the good ol "authoritarianism exists everywhere!" Argument

    You know well and good when someone says a government is authoritarian they mean things like speech being controlled and unable to criticize the government, being heavily restricted in your freedom of movement, being heavily restricted in the information you're allowed to access or possess and so on and so forth

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  • [–] 14 points 11 months ago (4 children)

    Those tactics are employed by every state in the interest of whichever class is in control, against whichever class is in opposition, to the extent necessary to preserve the existing property relations. All communists support wielding the state against capitalists, fascists, and reactionaries that would topple the socialist system.

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  • [+] -9 points 11 months ago (3 children)

    There it is again. The classic “everything is authoritarian so the word doesn’t mean anything” routine. It’s funny how that only shows up when someone calls tankies authoritarian. Communism isn’t bad because some western pundit said so, it’s bad when it turns into an excuse to justify control.

    The idea of giving power to the people is great, but pretending censorship and repression are just “necessary tactics” ruins it. If the system can’t survive without silencing people, it’s not socialism anymore, it’s just another hierarchy wearing red paint.

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  • [–] 20 points 11 months ago

    Analysis of authority isn't to "make excuses." Analysis of authority is critical in analyzing class struggle and the state. You're saying it's just as bad for workers to silence fascists and capitalists as it is for capitalists to silence workers, then hide behind phrasemongering.

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  • [–] 7 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    it’s just another hierarchy wearing red paint

    If that were the case, we would expect similar social and economic outcomes in both cases. Then, why did the USSR have the lowest recorded wealth and income inequality in history? Why did it have guaranteed employment, guaranteed housing at a cost of 3% of the average income, universal free healthcare and free education to the highest level? Why did it have walkable and public transit-oriented urban planning with services accessible by foot (look up the word "mikroraion" on Wikipedia)? Why could unions remove factory managers if they so decided, and why was there a newspaper to each workplace in which workers could write their complaints and their ideas? Why were the highest-earning individuals university professors and artists and not political bureaucrats?

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  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago

    why was there a newspaper to each workplace in which workers could write their complaints and their ideas

    In which more than just airing complaints, something would be done

    at least as far as Pat Sloan writes in ~1937

    The editorial committee of a Soviet newspaper, whether of a factory wall-newspaper or of the Government’s newspaper Izvestia, does not deal with its correspondence in this light-handed way. For on every Soviet newspaper, from the very smallest to the very largest, there are members of the editorial staff whose entire work is to deal with the complaints of readers, to investigate these complaints, and to see what can be done to remedy their grievances, if any real grievances exist.

    The editorial staff of the wall-newspaper, receiving these topical comments on the life of the factory, is under an obligation, not merely to publish them, but to investigate the complaints; and to publish the letters with a statement of what has been done to redress the grievances expressed. [...]

    The chapter "A People's Press" https://comlib.encryptionin.space/epubs/soviet-democracy/

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