Lemmy is developed by communists, and Reddit banned a bunch of leftist subreddits like r/chapotraphouse, r/GenZedong, and r/TheDeprogram. As a consequence, a bunch of communists are on Lemmy by ratio compared to Reddit, though Lemmy.world is defederated and blocks 2/3rds of the major communist instances, so you can’t actually see them. They usually are on Lemmygrad.ml or Hexbear.net if you want to see the communist side of Lemmy.

Lemmy.ml is the dev’s testing instance, so that’s why a lot of communists are here but also why it’s not defederated by Lemmy.world.

Close to nothing, at this point. Sometimes I search for answers to technical questions and find them on Reddit, but that’s about it.

It’s a spectrum and a person who supports the government having more control of their citizens is considering authoritarian. A person who wants to limit government control over their citizens is more libertarian.

These are your words. I do read what you write, as much as you insist that I’m not. I agree that this conversation isn’t very productive, but I think it’s more due to your refusal to actually engage with what I’ve been saying and instead just re-affirm the useless political compass as though it actually means anything.

Really don’t like the way you casually look down on the homeless, too.

You’ve said “authoritarianism” is about “restricting individual freedoms,” and categorized me and existing socialist states as “authoritarian.” These are contradictions, though, they both cannot be true.

I understand that you are generally categorizing socialist society as something on the left, and saying you can have a bigger or smaller state, etc. I am telling you that this isn’t how society works in real life. The state and the mode of production are interconnected, and reinforce each other. They aren’t sliders you select in a lab, you can’t just have a bigger or smaller state like that.

I’m not a bot, no. You haven’t responded to me saying class analysis is critical, you’ve brushed it aside entirely and continued to re-affirm the original statement.

This is not how any communist views authority or the state. All communists are in favor of abolishing the state. This requires erasing the basis of the state, which is class society, and that requires collectivizing production and distribution. With production and distribution collectivized, class doesn’t exist, and as such the state withers as it loses its reason to function.

It isn’t about “giving the state power.” It’s about taking state power from the capitalist class, and creating a working class state. This socialist state does not have “more power” than a capitalist state, the class it serves is what’s distinct.

Leftists usually fall into the Marxist umbrella or anarchist umbrella. Marxists are for collectivization, while anarchists are for communalization.

When I say “communalization,” I mean anarchists propose horizontalist, decentralized cells, similar to early humanity’s cooperative production but with more interconnection and modern tech. When I say collectivization, I mean the unification of all of humanity into one system, where production and distribution is planned collectively to satisfy the needs of everyone as best as possible.

For anarchists, collectivized society still seems to retain the state, as some anarchists conflate administration with the state as it represents a hierarchy. For Marxists, this focus on communalism creates inter-cell class distinctions, as each cell only truly owns their own means of production, giving rise to class distinctions and thus states in the future.

For Marxists, socialism must have a state, a state can only wither with respect to how far along it has come in collectivizing production and therefore eliminating class. All states are authoritarian, but we cannot get rid of the state without erasing the foundations of the state: class society, and to do so we must collectivize production and distribution globally. Socialist states, where the working class wields its authority against capitalists and fascists, are the means by which this collectivization can actually happen, and are fully in-line with Marx’s beliefs. Communism as a stateless, classless, moneyless society is only possible post-socialism.

Anarchists obviously disagree with this, and see the state more as independent of class society and thus itself must be abolished outright.

This is not at all about being more “authoritarian” or “libertarian.” It’s a fundamentally different understanding of class and power dynamics, and both seek a liberated society. The political compass cannot depict this, even if the liberal view of anarchism and Marxism wants to point them as two extremes on a tidy graph with most people in the middle of them. What’s important is that politics is not a bell curve, Marxism and anarchism are consistent ideologies with specific tendencies under them that fundamentally contradict. People don’t just pick what they like from each (usually), because then they cease to be internally consistent.

I’m telling you that you’re running into extreme absurdities. I have more personal freedom in a socialist society, where my needs are more assured, than I do in capitalist society, even if said capitalist society was more of a nightwatchman state. By making “authority” purely about how the state treats anyone, and removing all economics from the equation, you create absurd contradictions. That’s why class analysis is important.

The political compass makes no sense. It’s sole purpose is to affirm liberalism by pretending there’s a spectrum of libertarian to authoritarian, when such terms are utterly meaningless when looked at without understanding class. What matters is who is the state serving, how, and why, not if the state is mean or if the state is nice.

Not a single one of them praises “China and Russia for their ability to control their people.” You’re inventing ghosts and strawmen to fight.

Socialism and communism seem to be very misunderstood outside of places like Grad, Hexbear, Lemmy.ml, etc. Some thing social programs are socialism, others think the Marxist conception of communism is incompatible with administration, some think any form of market or private property has to be eradicated for socialism to exist, some think it’s about worker/employer relationships, etc. I think it would be a decent idea to form a better understanding.

For clarity, socialism is best described as a transitional status between capitalism and communism, by which public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy (controls the large firms and key industries at a minimum) and the working class is in control of the state. This fits cleanly with socialism in practice and with Marxist conceptions of socialism.

I am extremely open and honest with my views. Nobody believes “any means are justified” in order to create “a state run society.” Communists believe revolution is necessary to implement socialism, not that any means are justified nor that just any state run society is acceptable. We also don’t believe in supporting “dictatorships” in the sense that one person or an elite few control everything. We support the working class having control.

You are making up ghosts and strawmen to fight. These “tankies” as you describe them do not exist.

Nobody praises “China and Russia for their ability to control their people.” These people do not exist, they are ghosts and strawmen you are fighting.

Again, you need to look at things from a class analysis. There is no such thing as “libertarian capitalism,” capitalism requires the state, and freedoms for citizens are restricted because they don’t have as much access to necessities and democracy doesn’t extend to the economy.

Socialist countries that provide better access to necessities have more freedom for the average person than capitalist countries. They don’t have the same privledged class of capitalists with unlimited political power, but the people have more power.

This is a false-binary. It isn’t a strawman, the political compass is entirely bogus and cannot accurately depict ideology or structure as they exist in the real world. It does more harm than helps.

I’m not dancing, I’ve said it firm: I want the working class to use the state in their own interests, against capitalists and fascists, to meet the needs of the people and liberate society.

When you utterly erase class analysis, and just group everyone under “citizens,” you run into utter contradictions. Socialist states have been far more liberating for their populace overall, even if they’ve been oppressive towards fascists, capitalists, etc, meaning they would technically belong in the “libertarian” quadrant if we define it the way you claim we should. The entire idea of a “libertarian-authoritarian” spectrum, or even a left-right spectrum and not just various right and left ideologies that cannot be abstracted into a graph-based system, is actively harmful to our understanding of political ideology.

Anarchists want communalism, whereas Marxists want collectivization. Neither is more or less “authoritarian” or “libertarian,” in that even horizontalist systems actually erase the democratic reach of communities to within their communities and immediate surroundings, while collectivization spreads power more evenly globally. This isn’t something that can be represented on the graph in any way, yet results in fundamentally different approaches and outcomes.

All states are authoritarian in that they uphold one class and oppress others. It’s a good thing when the class in charge is the working class, throughout history socialist states have resulted in dramatic improvements in living standards for the vast majority of society. These socialist states, and the ones who support them, are labeled “authoritarian” whenever these states practice land reform, nationalize industries, etc, and are met with mountains of hostility and slander from the west.

Even an anarchist revolution is “authoritarian,” as it involves violently taking control. In practice, “authoritarianism” is more of a vibe than an actual thing we can measure or a policy to be implemented. It’s used as a club against socialist states by those who’ve lost property to land reform or nationalization.

Nobody fits that definition, though.

I don’t know what you mean by “hypocrisy,” communists support China as a socialist state and critically support Russia to the extent that they trade with socialist countries, oppose western imperialism, and have a populace increasingly sympathetic to socialism. Nobody supports Russia the same way communists actually support China, the USSR fell 3 decades ago. I also don’t know what you mean by saying “tankies” aren’t communists, “tankie” is just a pejorative for communist, nor do I know what you mean by the so called “actual communism” these supposed “tankies” would violently oppose.

Not a single communist is “enamored by” the Russian Federation, we all wish the USSR had never dissolved. Communists do tend to support China, as it’s the world’s most developed socialist country. Further, 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.

The problem here is that “tankie” is just a strawman with ready-made characteristics. In the minds of viewers, a tankie is exactly what McCarthy described, yet also someone who believes that the McCarthyian version of a communist is a good thing. The problem is that this doesn’t describe real people. Communists disagree with common western, liberal viewpoints on existing socialist states, and believe them to be unfairly represented in western media. Communists aren’t paid trolls, we aren’t in it for ego. Many of us are members of communist parties, volunteer in our communities, etc.

You say these supposed “tankies” identify with crimes against humanity, but that’s demonstrably false. I can say that, for example, the idea of the 1930s famine in the USSR being intentional is utter mythology. That doesn’t mean I support the famine, it means based on evidence from the opening of the soviet archives, we know that it was a tragedy caused by adverse weather conditions made worse by kulaks destroying grain and livestock as resistance to collectivization, and that food output grew with collectivization. None of that “identifies with” the idea that the famine was intentional and is somehow good.

Even your points on the Russian Federation are wrong. Nobody thinks they are still socialist, critical support for the Russian Federation lies in the fact that it’s forced into trade with socialist countries, resists western imperialism, and has a rising socialist public that wishes to reimplement socialism. The DPRK isn’t the dystopian nightmare the west pitches it to be, and we know this by measuring up defector testimonies and comparing them to reporting both internally and externally. China is socialist, public ownership is the principle aspect of its economy.

All of this is to say, yourself and others are getting downvoted because you’re treating the McCarthyite strawman as if it’s a real thing.

I think every instance has pretty strong political views

You asked with a .world account, meaning you’re defederated from 2/3 biggest communist spaces on Lemmy, on Lemmy.ml, the last third. As such, it became quite a mess, because communists are outnumbered by anti-communists if you cut out 2/3s of communists.

The ones that had their comments removed were picking a definition that does not correspond to reality.

It’s kinda like asking what the word “woke” means. MAGA people are going to give you this elaborate strawman, and others are going to tell you that it’s just a pejorative strawman.

If you want to see all sides, read the wikipedia page for “tankies,” first, as it’s the liberal understanding. Then compare that to the prolewiki entry for “Tankies,” for a communist perspective on it, then read “Tankies” by Nia Frome to get someone to elaborate on how it’s actually used today, beyond its origins and the strawman characteristics it holds.

Yep, the comm is .ml but the poster is .world, ao it’s like it’s invisible to anyone that can’t see both .ml and .world.