this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2024
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Lefty Memes

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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, and discussion 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, upvoting good contributions and downvoting 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)

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,

as well as 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 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.

7. Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:

(This is not a definitive list, the spirit of the other rules still counts! Eventual duplicates with other rules are for emphasis.)

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 hours ago

Not really, it's just a thinly veiled excuse so that any criticism of our current neocolonialist policies can be treated and swept up under the rug just like centuries before, except the rug is painted in the color of supposed religious intolerance (oh shit, guess I still can't be atheist in the 21st century).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 hours ago

It’s the same bs Russia uses to validate their invasion and theft of land like Crimea

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 day ago (2 children)

No. The real reason is to keep an ally in the very Muslim middle east and because they believe that it's a prerequisite for the rapture.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

At this point, I don't think anyone involved believes in a loving God, or even a God that will punish sinners. Neither of them would want this.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 17 hours ago

Oh, they figured their way out of that painted corner a long time ago. All they need is Matthew 5:17 and the Old Testament in order to justify any atrocity.

Whenever they are tired of the whole love thy neighbor/turn the other cheek/cast no judgements side of Jesus, they just bring up Matthew: he didn't come to DESTROY the OT law he came to FULFILL it!

That's all it takes to make it OK for them to smite enemies and hate people for their sexuality.

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[–] [email protected] 78 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Zionism is inherently racist. This movement has nothing to do with Judaism. One of the greatest misdeeds of the Netanyahu regime - tho it pales in comparison to their other misdeeds - is to present their inhumane actions as the Jews' point of view. Israel's strategy in the last couple of year was to portray all completely justified criticism of Zionism, and especially of the state of Israel's inhumane approach to its realization, as anti-Semitism. There is no truth in this whatsoever. Zionism is not Judaism and the state of Israel does not stand for the Jews as a religious group - these days Israel only stands for a criminal regime that murders helpless people and breaks international law. This is not about religion, but about crimes against humanity committed by a sovereign state, by Israel, their criminal regime and all their henchmen.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 21 hours ago

Religion is certainly a powerful weapon in politics which is especially obvious with the trump situation. I agree that Israel don't represent them but I could definitely see how they can use it for their own agenda and some religious people will happily support them and their propaganda.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Linus Torvalds - ban Israel developers from linux

[–] [email protected] 2 points 22 hours ago (5 children)

Israel isn't knee deep in an information war against the US and Europe, is it? The ban didn't happen because of the war against Ukraine. It happened because of the ongoing cyber war against democracy.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago

Israel isn’t knee deep in an information war against the US and Europe

You're right, they're trying to spread their pro-genocide propaganda all over the world

[–] [email protected] 11 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

Israel isn't knee deep in an information war against the US and Europe, is it?

Um, isn't it? If anything, they are worse than Russia on this count.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

Absolutely not. Russia's propaganda efforts are unparalleled. They directly or indirectly fund many authoritarian movements across the globe and systematically spam social media with false information.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 hours ago

Israel doesn't need to spam social media because they dominate mass media and have most of our politicians by the balls between AIPAC (the biggest funder of authoritarianism in the US) and straight up blackmail. That's not to offer any legitimacy to your implication that Israel doesn't also run massive disinformation campaigns on social media, because they excel at that as well.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 12 hours ago

They directly or indirectly fund many authoritarian movements across the globe

So does US.

Russia's propaganda efforts are unparalleled.

This is true, Israel doesn't do propaganda, it directly buys the lawmakers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 21 hours ago

Dude, be fuqin real.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 22 hours ago

Israel doesn't currently have sanctions pending against them that the Finnish government has a vested interest to enforce.

They should, don't get me wrong, but I don't believe Linus' decision is rooted in politics - they'd have to vet each contribution anyway.

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[–] [email protected] 52 points 1 day ago (8 children)

A unified and stable middle east would be and would have been a global superpower with the ability to influence independent control over major global trade routes and energy supply.

This is why the Israel is and has been imperative to U.S. foreign policy.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Money, guns and oil baaaabbbbyyy. Everything else is propaganda and distractions

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

Thanks, Dr. Rockzo!

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[–] [email protected] 41 points 1 day ago (8 children)

The jewish people have never wholly owned that area. Persians, Arabs, and many other races have also always lived there. It’s literally in the bible.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Also remember that the bronze age Jews were not at all special among the tribes of the area, their story about themselves is aggrandizing fiction that all the tribes did, it's just the Jews' stories survived and became popular

Also bronze age. Those that left left so long ago, the only right they have to the place is military might and the legal right given based on lobbying and the racism of the law makers in question.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Iron age, the Hebrew age of myth was set during the bronze age and in the immediate period of the bronze age collapse. Moses was bronze age, david was post bronze age collapse, the first diaspora was during the early Iron age, and the second diaspora was during antiquity.

Sorry if im being anal about it but one of the few good things about the old testament is that it tracks the evolution from bronze to iron pretty well, also Cyrus the great works as a solid historical reference point. But yeah there was about 700 years between the end of the bronze age and the end of the first diaspora, and about a thousand years to the second diaspora. For reference the Roman empire still existed seven hundred years ago.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Thanks, I'm not great on biblical history, so corrections and detail are welcome

[–] [email protected] 4 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

Oh I aint either, but certain groups and events mentioned work as solid reference points. The Philistines were most like Bronze age Greek settlers set up by the Egyptians to work as a march for example. I just know a lot about the Bronze age collapse and the Bronze age. Also when I say set during its in the same way Red dead 2 is set during the late 1800s, Moses at best is the faint memory of a legendary story that was mythologized similar to King Arthur.

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[–] [email protected] 117 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (60 children)

Lol... Their ancestors only lived there after they ethnically cleansed the people who were already living there. They've been doing this crap for a long time.

Edit: to clarify, I'm talking about the Jewish people of Israel

[–] [email protected] 56 points 1 day ago (10 children)

When you say "they," are you referring to all humans throughout all of human history? Not conquering/displacing people is a much more recent international norm

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

More of a recent virtue signal we've been propagandized to believe, while continuing the conquering and displacement without skipping a beat.

While the west was writing the UN declaration of human rights, they were hard at work creating the state of Israel, directly denying Palestine their right to democracy and displacing a million of them.

At the end of WW2 America, and the rest of the anglo-allies, assisted France in trying to reclaim their colonies, rejecting hundreds of millions their "basic human right" to democracy; all of this went on for decades after the declaration was ratified, as if that meant anything.

Human rights don't apply as long as you are labelled a communist, terrorist, separatist, extremist, pedo, etc, etc. Then they can torture you in a black site all nice and legal.

Most of our history has been written by sociopathic criminals.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 12 hours ago

...they were hard at work creating the state of Israel, directly denying Palestine their right to democracy and displacing a million of them.

There was no Palestinian sovereign state prior to Britain's decision to establish a Jewish homeland in the region. It was briefly under shared British and French control following a revolt against the Ottoman Empire during WWI; then the League of Nations assigned Britain control over the region as "Mandatory Palestine".

Mandatory Palestine was explicitly intended to be temporary, with Britain providing "administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone". Additionally, it was always intended to provide a home for the Jewish people without displacing Palestinian Arabs. Of course, this didn't really work out. There was a lot of conflict between the Palestinian nationalists and the Jewish nationalists.

The UN's action in 1947 was to partition the region into separate Jewish and Palestinian sovereign states. The reason this didn't actually happen was because Arabic leaders both within the region and nearby rejected the idea of a sovereign Jewish state in the region. Israel declared independence anyway, and as the Palestinian Mandate expired, the 1948 Arab-Israeli war began as an effort to destroy the newly formed Israel. But of course Israel got support from other countries, and the war ended with Israel controlling most of Palestine and believing its neighbors to be a constant existential threat.

The Palestinians did not declare an independent, sovereign state until 1988, at which point they actually declared Jerusalem to be the capital of Palestine. There has never been a proposal for a two-state solution that Palestinian leaders have endorsed.

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (5 children)

In addition to the first Israeli migrants being Europeans, they displaced the actual indigenous population that was native to the land. The Muslim and Christian populations are mostly descendents from ancient Israelis that converted.

Israel is basically just the US, which is why they're such strong allies. They have the same roots.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 day ago (4 children)

they displaced the actual indigenous population that was native to the land.

They also sterilized a bunch of Ethiopian and Mizrahi Jews, on the grounds that these non-European ethinic cohorts were having too many kids.

Incidentally, Israel government has been grappling with a big childlessness crisis which threatens to tank their Jewish population.

One big reason for the genocide in Gaza (which has been in effect since 2006, but recently hit a fevered pitch) is that - despite their best efforts - the Israeli government has failed to neuter the Palestinian population growth rate.

So much of Israeli policy boils down to white nationalist eugenics.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 day ago

Don't I deserve to seize my childhood home, or the one I sold last week? no anti-semitic replies please.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 day ago (25 children)

"their ancestors"

The first Jews to move to Palestine were European Jews, they can't use the "our ancestors" card.

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