Tankies are apologists for “communist” leaders such as Stalin, Mao and Kim. They love Russia, China and North Korea and will swear those countries can do no wrong. “Left” authoritarians… bootlickers.
From my understanding, a vatnik is specifically someone who is shilling for the russian government. Not necessarily under a veneer of leftism (because the kremlin is far-right-wing).
A tankie may or may not be directly shilling for the kremlin, but it’s always an auth-comm under a guise of leftism.
Tankie vatniks exist of course, but they’re just the center of the venn diagram.
Because I sometimes get curious and find out who they are. Either americans are less privacy conscious, or most tankies are american college kids, often with some neuropsychological disability kids like to flaunt nowadays.
The number of Chinese Marxist-Leninists alone vastly outnumbers us Western tankies. The vast majority of “tankies” live in various countries outside of the imperial core.
Even in the US, the most prominent and successful “tankie” organization was the Black Panther Party.
Which is funny because this was just the main instance when I (and many others) learned about Lemmy. I’ve been called a tankie because of my instance when I’m pretty sure tankies would call me MAGA as I’m somewhere between a leftist, a liberal, and libertarian
That’s the thing, how would I know if I am tankie, if I don’t have a clear definition. If it is defined by wether or not I am oppossed to military moving into Budapest 70 years ago. I am probably not a tankie, but I say probably, because everyone writing about seem so biased I find it difficult to see the truth of it. But my moral compass tells me it is always wrong to use military against civilians. Always.
At the end of the day the deeds define the word, not the other way around. Not everyone will use the word correctly or appropriately. It’s why only you yourself can truly categorize as such, but at that point you must come to terms with what that means, positively or negatively.
The bias thing is a real problem, but also sometimes not. It all depends on the context. Some people with unreasonable opinions will absolutely waste your time by never accepting difficult realities and talking around it, so identifying a mindset that’s immune to self reflection can be useful. But similarly if a label is all that’s needed to dismiss an opinion also is not very reasonable. But it’s how some people operate. So sometimes not standing behind a label can be more fruitful as not to entice those presuppositions.
There is another problem. People use slurs to derail the discussions. Calling people “libs” or “tankies” left, right and center removes focus from whatever is discussed and make people crawl into their foxholes. It is an easy way to devalue people’s opinions or simply derail discussions. I think I will keep on questioning when people use the word “tankie”, because once the word is on the table, the discussion has already been derailed one way or another. And maybe one day it will lead to better discourse.
“Tankie” was originally a British slang term from the 50s.
In 1956, when the Soviet Union invaded Hungary, the British Communist movement was split over whether this action was cool, or sucked.
The people who thought it sucked derided their opponents who thought its cool, as “Tankies”, because the images in the newspapers featured lots of photos of Soviet tanks rolling into Budapest.
After this, it stops being used for the most part, until it started being reclaimed by socialists online as a tongue-in-cheeck insult to throw at each other. Because, let’s be real, it’s a silly sounding word that’s fun to say, and silly words are among the UK’s biggest cultural exports.
Eventually though, Tankie breached containment and started to be used by people who had zero connection to any kind of socialist movement or history, and its meaning began to warp.
I’ve seen Marxists, even those think the Soviet invasion of Hungary was bad, called tankies. I’ve seen Anarchists called Tankies, I’ve seen right wing guys who love trad russian Orthodox Christianity called Tankies.
It’s a word that doesn’t mean much anymore. It’s like when your grandpa calls Joe Biden “Pinko Scum”
So people are “tankies” if they define “tankie” as slur meaning “left of poster”? That once again sounds like the way MAGA use “woke” about stuff they don’t like.
Not at all, and you’re not the first that tries to denaturate or change the definition of the word tankie.
A tankie is pro authoritarian, but instead of being pro fascism its being pro those who called themselves left like stalin lenin etc
So it describes the “left” Maga if you want.
I sure do understand why tankies would want to make believe the “tankie” is just like “woke” but it isn’t, it’s calling them out, showing that they are not leftists but authoritarians (so again, basically fascists).
Thank you for sharing the wikipedia article. I hadn’t read it. A lot of people find Wikipedia controversial for various reasons. But it is one of the most precise encyclopedias on the planet. And you can check out editing history etc. What I am most interested in, is the use here ofcourse. Because it seems to me people use it as a vaguely defined slur to slander people they deem to leftist.
Yeah, there’s all sorts of crazy political purity tests on Lemmy, and associated misuse of slurs.
And on Wikipedia:
On one side, my MAGA-adjacent family is starting to question it as “liberal biased”… as they leave Fox News blasting in the background.
On the other, tankies and some different leftist extremist leftists dismiss it as propaganda.
That’s a good sign, to me. Its never been perfect and has problems, but extremists trying to tear its credibility down is a sign of just how valuable it is.
how about one of the original creators of wikipedia no longer using his own software and encouraging everyone to also not use it? he claims that the cia have been using it as a tool of information warfare since 2007
I will admit that for shallow questions like ‘did this thing happen in this year’? wikipedia can sometimes be more useful than a plain search engine, also sometimes from wikipedia you can find links to real sources which can also be useful.
It’s basically a term people on the left use for people on the extreme outer-reaches of the left, typically unthinking, uncritical, and unreasonable supporters of bolshevism and authoritarian communism, and pretty much any oppressive regime that considers itself “anti-west.”
They love putin, jinping, kim, assad, khamenei, etc.
They stylize themselves as “Marxist-Leninists” and your instance is full of them, so if you signed up unknowingly and aren’t a tankie, people might just assume based on the “.ml”
But yeah, most people on lemmy are tired of arguing in circles with tankies, who typically rely on ad hominems, strawmen, sealioning, and other bad faith or uncharitable arguments to bully you into exhaustion. Some of them have to be bots or russian trolls, cause no one can honestly be so dense. It can feel like arguing with someone from r/conservative, just with the opposite opinions.
That is a pretty vague definition, and that is probably what irks me about the term. It can be used as a slur for anything you don’t like. Like “woke” for conservatives. I switched home when I found out .world blocks instances they don’t like. Lemmy.ml seemed the to be the broadest, left accepting instance and they block out porn by default, win-win in my book. Infact I like the fact that I can be an anti-imperialist in places like hexbear, without being called a tankie. Being against killing school children does not mean I support the iranian goverment. I hope you take this answer in good faith. It is written in honesty.
It’s not that vague if you’ve ever encountered one in the wild. You would know exactly what it’s referring to. And it’s nothing like conservatives using “woke.” They use “woke” to describe anything mildly progressive. Tankies aren’t progressives, they’re accelerationist armchair militants. They call democratic socialists fascists.
Even if your opinion aligns with them on most things, it doesn’t automatically make you a tankie. If you’re not an auth-comm intent on bullying everyone who disagrees with you the slightest bit and labeling all nuance and critical reasoning as capitalist imperialist propaganda, then you’re probably not a tankie.
That’s also different from critiquing actual imperialism and capitalism. But tankies’ overuse of those terms and others like “fascist” waters down the meanings and obfuscates the terms, making it harder for good-faith communicators to actually discuss these topics critically.
You can be anti-imperialist all you want, but tankies use western imperialism as an excuse to justify supporting imperialist regimes like Russia. They’re full of cognitive dissonance.
Go ahead and disagree with someone slightly on .ml or hexbear and see what kind of response you get.
I’ve yet to try those kinds of response, when I discuss with people. Then again I haven’t been going into discussion about Yemen for instance. Mainly because my actual knowledge is simply to small to contribute. I do support anti-imperialist struggles, even by regimes I don’t like. But that does not mean I waiver my right to call out they in turn tyrannize their populations.
And yeah, I have a feeling we have a lot of online cosplayers here in the fediverse, but I will keep treating people as if they are real, when I interact. That however also mean I will keep asking people for definitions. I.e. what do you mean when you say “fash”, “tankie”, “lib” and so on. People use the slurs to hide behind and everyone loves if we can make everything black and white.
But I am a socialist and I have been called a tankie several times and I’ve even been banned for a couple of sub because I asked about that definition. I don’t mind people not liking what I say, but I will not take being slurred without questioning it. If that means a ban, well I am happy for getting out of another echo chamber.
Mainly because my actual knowledge is simply to small to contribute
See, an actual tankie would never admit to having limitations on their own personal knowledge and understanding.
But I am a socialist and I have been called a tankie several times
I’m a socialist too and tankies have called me a fascist because I believe in democratic-socialism instead of bolshevism. They clearly don’t know what fascism is.
I’ve seen enough of your comment history, you go around spreading liberal talking points and pro empire/war progranda. You’re not a socialist, you may have some socialist ideals you’re developing, and I hope you read more, but your current arguments do more harm than good for the working class.
They don’t have any actual values or morals and will happily support the most disgusting and heinous people that opress people, are racists wexist homophobic, that murder civilians and even commit genocide as long as they say they hate capitalism, and western imperialism.
Oh, because we all know that the entire event was caught on video and it was so easy to smuggle film out of china at the time.
(Context: the video of tank man was hidden in a toilet while the authorities searched the man’s apartment after he was spotted filming from his window).
But denying massacres of civilians is so in character for someone from .ml, so nobody is surprised, really…
You can see from the very question that poster asked that, whatever clear definition about authoritarianism or whatever you think it has, that’s just not how people are actually using it. Centrists will use it for Mamdani supporters, DSA-types will use it for Marxist-Leninists, and anarchists will use it for almost literally anyone.
No one calls Mamdani a tankie, but I have seen tankies calling Mamdani a fascist. They clearly don’t know what fascism is.
Centrists also don’t use the term “tankie.” If anything they call everyone on the left a socialist (as if it’s a bad thing) or a communist or a radical leftist.
“Tankie” is specifically a word people on the left use to refer to auth-comms.
I find it very interesting that you get downvotes for this comment. My experience is that this is the way most people use the term and they get so angry, when you point that out.
Not even a little bit, but typical tankie rhetoric is to call anyone who isn’t at least as far to the left as them (read: approaching infinity) a fascist, so I’m not surprised to hear this from an .ml account
I am trying to get someone to explain what tankie means. People call me tankie from time to time, but I have no love for the iranian goverment.
You’re probably being called a tankie because you’re from lemmy.ml .
Tankies are apologists for “communist” leaders such as Stalin, Mao and Kim. They love Russia, China and North Korea and will swear those countries can do no wrong. “Left” authoritarians… bootlickers.
Mostly cringe american kids who confuse authoritarianism for socialism.
Tankies exist around the world, I don’t know why you’re making it an american thing. It’s not limited to just americans.
Yeah but closer to the eastern bloc you’re likely to hear the term “vatnik” used instead.
Tankies and vatniks have a lot of overlap.
From my understanding, a vatnik is specifically someone who is shilling for the russian government. Not necessarily under a veneer of leftism (because the kremlin is far-right-wing).
A tankie may or may not be directly shilling for the kremlin, but it’s always an auth-comm under a guise of leftism.
Tankie vatniks exist of course, but they’re just the center of the venn diagram.
Because I sometimes get curious and find out who they are. Either americans are less privacy conscious, or most tankies are american college kids, often with some neuropsychological disability kids like to flaunt nowadays.
A decade ago, it was “as a black man in america…” Now I suppose it’s “as an autistic person in america…”
Still the same troll farms operating out of russia.
The number of Chinese Marxist-Leninists alone vastly outnumbers us Western tankies. The vast majority of “tankies” live in various countries outside of the imperial core.
Even in the US, the most prominent and successful “tankie” organization was the Black Panther Party.
Assuming you’re not a tankie, I would guess it’s your instance, which is the main one where all the tankies hang out lol
Which is funny because this was just the main instance when I (and many others) learned about Lemmy. I’ve been called a tankie because of my instance when I’m pretty sure tankies would call me MAGA as I’m somewhere between a leftist, a liberal, and libertarian
That’s the thing, how would I know if I am tankie, if I don’t have a clear definition. If it is defined by wether or not I am oppossed to military moving into Budapest 70 years ago. I am probably not a tankie, but I say probably, because everyone writing about seem so biased I find it difficult to see the truth of it. But my moral compass tells me it is always wrong to use military against civilians. Always.
At the end of the day the deeds define the word, not the other way around. Not everyone will use the word correctly or appropriately. It’s why only you yourself can truly categorize as such, but at that point you must come to terms with what that means, positively or negatively.
The bias thing is a real problem, but also sometimes not. It all depends on the context. Some people with unreasonable opinions will absolutely waste your time by never accepting difficult realities and talking around it, so identifying a mindset that’s immune to self reflection can be useful. But similarly if a label is all that’s needed to dismiss an opinion also is not very reasonable. But it’s how some people operate. So sometimes not standing behind a label can be more fruitful as not to entice those presuppositions.
There is another problem. People use slurs to derail the discussions. Calling people “libs” or “tankies” left, right and center removes focus from whatever is discussed and make people crawl into their foxholes. It is an easy way to devalue people’s opinions or simply derail discussions. I think I will keep on questioning when people use the word “tankie”, because once the word is on the table, the discussion has already been derailed one way or another. And maybe one day it will lead to better discourse.
Are you in some way pro Putin, Stalin, Lenin, Mao, Kim ? Then you might be a tankie.
If you think they are/were despicable mass-murderous dictators then you’re not.
“Tankie” was originally a British slang term from the 50s.
In 1956, when the Soviet Union invaded Hungary, the British Communist movement was split over whether this action was cool, or sucked.
The people who thought it sucked derided their opponents who thought its cool, as “Tankies”, because the images in the newspapers featured lots of photos of Soviet tanks rolling into Budapest.
After this, it stops being used for the most part, until it started being reclaimed by socialists online as a tongue-in-cheeck insult to throw at each other. Because, let’s be real, it’s a silly sounding word that’s fun to say, and silly words are among the UK’s biggest cultural exports.
Eventually though, Tankie breached containment and started to be used by people who had zero connection to any kind of socialist movement or history, and its meaning began to warp.
I’ve seen Marxists, even those think the Soviet invasion of Hungary was bad, called tankies. I’ve seen Anarchists called Tankies, I’ve seen right wing guys who love trad russian Orthodox Christianity called Tankies.
It’s a word that doesn’t mean much anymore. It’s like when your grandpa calls Joe Biden “Pinko Scum”
Thank you. I had an idea, that it was something like that. It seems that on lemmy it means everyone left of poster (or OP), the poster disagree with.
That’s usually how the tankies try to convey it, but otherwise I haven’t seen that argument.
So people are “tankies” if they define “tankie” as slur meaning “left of poster”? That once again sounds like the way MAGA use “woke” about stuff they don’t like.
Not at all, and you’re not the first that tries to denaturate or change the definition of the word tankie.
A tankie is pro authoritarian, but instead of being pro fascism its being pro those who called themselves left like stalin lenin etc
So it describes the “left” Maga if you want.
I sure do understand why tankies would want to make believe the “tankie” is just like “woke” but it isn’t, it’s calling them out, showing that they are not leftists but authoritarians (so again, basically fascists).
You have a child’s understanding of the world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tankie
And if one points out Wikipedia (while very imperfect, yes) is just Western Propaganda, well, that’s a pretty good indicator, too.
Thank you for sharing the wikipedia article. I hadn’t read it. A lot of people find Wikipedia controversial for various reasons. But it is one of the most precise encyclopedias on the planet. And you can check out editing history etc. What I am most interested in, is the use here ofcourse. Because it seems to me people use it as a vaguely defined slur to slander people they deem to leftist.
Yeah, there’s all sorts of crazy political purity tests on Lemmy, and associated misuse of slurs.
And on Wikipedia:
On one side, my MAGA-adjacent family is starting to question it as “liberal biased”… as they leave Fox News blasting in the background.
On the other, tankies and some different leftist extremist leftists dismiss it as propaganda.
That’s a good sign, to me. Its never been perfect and has problems, but extremists trying to tear its credibility down is a sign of just how valuable it is.
how about one of the original creators of wikipedia no longer using his own software and encouraging everyone to also not use it? he claims that the cia have been using it as a tool of information warfare since 2007
I will admit that for shallow questions like ‘did this thing happen in this year’? wikipedia can sometimes be more useful than a plain search engine, also sometimes from wikipedia you can find links to real sources which can also be useful.
It’s basically a term people on the left use for people on the extreme outer-reaches of the left, typically unthinking, uncritical, and unreasonable supporters of bolshevism and authoritarian communism, and pretty much any oppressive regime that considers itself “anti-west.”
They love putin, jinping, kim, assad, khamenei, etc.
They stylize themselves as “Marxist-Leninists” and your instance is full of them, so if you signed up unknowingly and aren’t a tankie, people might just assume based on the “.ml”
But yeah, most people on lemmy are tired of arguing in circles with tankies, who typically rely on ad hominems, strawmen, sealioning, and other bad faith or uncharitable arguments to bully you into exhaustion. Some of them have to be bots or russian trolls, cause no one can honestly be so dense. It can feel like arguing with someone from r/conservative, just with the opposite opinions.
That is a pretty vague definition, and that is probably what irks me about the term. It can be used as a slur for anything you don’t like. Like “woke” for conservatives. I switched home when I found out .world blocks instances they don’t like. Lemmy.ml seemed the to be the broadest, left accepting instance and they block out porn by default, win-win in my book. Infact I like the fact that I can be an anti-imperialist in places like hexbear, without being called a tankie. Being against killing school children does not mean I support the iranian goverment. I hope you take this answer in good faith. It is written in honesty.
It’s not that vague if you’ve ever encountered one in the wild. You would know exactly what it’s referring to. And it’s nothing like conservatives using “woke.” They use “woke” to describe anything mildly progressive. Tankies aren’t progressives, they’re accelerationist armchair militants. They call democratic socialists fascists.
Even if your opinion aligns with them on most things, it doesn’t automatically make you a tankie. If you’re not an auth-comm intent on bullying everyone who disagrees with you the slightest bit and labeling all nuance and critical reasoning as capitalist imperialist propaganda, then you’re probably not a tankie.
That’s also different from critiquing actual imperialism and capitalism. But tankies’ overuse of those terms and others like “fascist” waters down the meanings and obfuscates the terms, making it harder for good-faith communicators to actually discuss these topics critically.
You can be anti-imperialist all you want, but tankies use western imperialism as an excuse to justify supporting imperialist regimes like Russia. They’re full of cognitive dissonance.
Go ahead and disagree with someone slightly on .ml or hexbear and see what kind of response you get.
I’ve yet to try those kinds of response, when I discuss with people. Then again I haven’t been going into discussion about Yemen for instance. Mainly because my actual knowledge is simply to small to contribute. I do support anti-imperialist struggles, even by regimes I don’t like. But that does not mean I waiver my right to call out they in turn tyrannize their populations.
And yeah, I have a feeling we have a lot of online cosplayers here in the fediverse, but I will keep treating people as if they are real, when I interact. That however also mean I will keep asking people for definitions. I.e. what do you mean when you say “fash”, “tankie”, “lib” and so on. People use the slurs to hide behind and everyone loves if we can make everything black and white.
But I am a socialist and I have been called a tankie several times and I’ve even been banned for a couple of sub because I asked about that definition. I don’t mind people not liking what I say, but I will not take being slurred without questioning it. If that means a ban, well I am happy for getting out of another echo chamber.
See, an actual tankie would never admit to having limitations on their own personal knowledge and understanding.
I’m a socialist too and tankies have called me a fascist because I believe in democratic-socialism instead of bolshevism. They clearly don’t know what fascism is.
Lol you’re not a socialist, you’re a liberal.
You don’t know shit about me, so you aren’t in a position to decide what I am.
I’ve seen enough of your comment history, you go around spreading liberal talking points and pro empire/war progranda. You’re not a socialist, you may have some socialist ideals you’re developing, and I hope you read more, but your current arguments do more harm than good for the working class.
Tankies are basically maga but for “socialism”
They don’t have any actual values or morals and will happily support the most disgusting and heinous people that opress people, are racists wexist homophobic, that murder civilians and even commit genocide as long as they say they hate capitalism, and western imperialism.
Doesn’t the term come from the Tiananmen Square massacre when the army drove tanks over students?
Laughing at all the tankies getting butthurt in the comments
Somebody shared this link. It helped me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tankie
this isn’t 1995 man, you can just watch the full video of that not happening anytime you like
Oh, because we all know that the entire event was caught on video and it was so easy to smuggle film out of china at the time.
(Context: the video of tank man was hidden in a toilet while the authorities searched the man’s apartment after he was spotted filming from his window).
But denying massacres of civilians is so in character for someone from .ml, so nobody is surprised, really…
“Tankie” is just a derogatory term for anyone to the left of the person saying it
You guys are easy to spot these days.
You can see from the very question that poster asked that, whatever clear definition about authoritarianism or whatever you think it has, that’s just not how people are actually using it. Centrists will use it for Mamdani supporters, DSA-types will use it for Marxist-Leninists, and anarchists will use it for almost literally anyone.
Great logic. Almost as if you’re speaking shite, unless anarchists are on the right now…
No, I’m just accusing them of throwing around words that mean nothing and thinking everyone is authoritarian. Just a little joke.
Kinda like how tankies think everyone is a fascist (except for other tankies, of course)?
Can you show an example of people calling Mamdani supporters tankies please?
Can’t, because it didn’t happen.
Sorry, I don’t save links to random stupid internet comments
You should probably start doing that if you’re going to use them as core components of your online arguments.
Nah lol
I mean, yeah? Like the most basic understanding of anarchy is that hierarchy is a bad thing, so it applies to a lot of political philosophies
No one calls Mamdani a tankie, but I have seen tankies calling Mamdani a fascist. They clearly don’t know what fascism is.
Centrists also don’t use the term “tankie.” If anything they call everyone on the left a socialist (as if it’s a bad thing) or a communist or a radical leftist.
“Tankie” is specifically a word people on the left use to refer to auth-comms.
“If they don’t lick bolshevik boots, they’re a fascist” -average tankie
I find it very interesting that you get downvotes for this comment. My experience is that this is the way most people use the term and they get so angry, when you point that out.
Exhibit A:
Not even a little bit, but typical tankie rhetoric is to call anyone who isn’t at least as far to the left as them (read: approaching infinity) a fascist, so I’m not surprised to hear this from an .ml account
Oh, come on now, they’d never call Putin a fascist.
Oh true, I forgot to add that they’ll complain about literally anyone except for actual fascists…
There!