• davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Liberals often think that if someone has different opinions from them, then they must be a conservative, because they have no idea that socialists exist.

    • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Sometimes liberals think that socialists are the leftmost liberals, but we’re not liberals at all: we want nothing short of the abolition of private ownership of the means of production.

        • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Usually when people say that they mean what Bernie Sanders means when he says socialism, which is liberalism with a social safety net.

          Americans have forgotten what socialism actually means, because socialists & socialist thought were purged during the Red Scare and McCarthyism and the Cold War in general. Most Europeans I think still retain the original meaning of the word.

        • triplenadir@lemmygrad.ml
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          1 year ago

          terrifying to me that someone could look at the world around us and think a big change would be a bad thing…

    • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      Or they know that they exist but don’t really understand socialism, Marxism, historical materialism, things like dictatorship of capital etc.

  • HornyOnMain [she/her]@hexbear.net
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    1 year ago

    Very weird game of telephone happening on Lemmy rn where apparently the longest running queer instance on Lemmy is being presented as full as ‘conservative sleeper agents pretending to be queer to mock ‘real’ queer people’

  • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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    1 year ago

    lol no

    Hexbear is a big tent community that tries our best to avoid sectarian shitflinging while having three very strong points of unity: Trans rights, anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism, and relentlessly bullying reactionaries (this includes both liberals and conservatives in addition to the obvious targets: the mask off fascists).

  • Lemmygradwontallowme [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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    1 year ago

    No.

    Just to put in liberal terms, we are:

    Culturally Progressive (eg. Pro LGBT)

    Economically Socialist (eg. Pro-Economic Planning, Pro-Gift Economy, et Pro-Nationalization)

    Anti-imperialist and critical supportive of progressive forces on foreign policy (Eg. Pro-Cuba, pro-Vietnam, pro-China, though somewhat conditionally supportive of Russia, in fending off NATO and its Ukrainian proxy)

    We are thus also anti-orientalist and also kinda support ‘another kkkrakka down, unlimited genocide on the Global North’ sort of shtick…

    We’re tankies, by your definition, but normal leftists, according to other people…

    And I say this as a moderate rebel a la White Helmets…

    • some pirate@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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      1 year ago

      This all feels so contradictory, you can’t be anti imperialist and pro China at the same time. Chinese capitalists are colonizing my country right now, we can’t just say “oh it’s OK because they aren’t Americans” the outcome is the same for local people

      Also, and my main conflict here, how can someone somewhat support Russia but suddenly oppose Israel, politically they are almost the same: far right authoritarian regimes, working for the same goal, profiting from the war. My point is this messiness of been picky of what colonizers are best or worse is exactly what been used to spread misinformation, instead of focusing on colonization itself

      • axont [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        China doing commerce in your country isn’t colonization, don’t be dramatic. I have no idea where you’re from, but I know a Bolivian person who also complains that China is conquering their country, which is absolutely ludicrous compared to what the CIA did to Bolivia.

        • some pirate@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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          1 year ago

          What you saying is so messed up, they are destroying the last piece of natural resources for cheap, so you can have cheap phones while making the wealthy more wealthy, how is that not colonization? the CIA also did a coup in my country in the last century but it isn’t related

          • axont [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            Yeah the world still operates on a capitalist framework and China buys and sells things on a global market. Unless China is carving borders, installing puppet leaders, making aggressive demands for how another nation’s government should operate, forcibly moving people in other nations, using agencies like the IMF or World Bank to squeeze money out of national funds, demanding austerity, or creating a vassal state, unless China is doing a single one of those things it’s entirely dramatic to say they’re colonizing. Buying and selling things for cheap is what commerce is. Is it unfair China has a lot of money to use for trade? Is having more money in a trade agreement itself an act of colonization or what?

            It’s especially dramatic compared to the CIA, which has done multiple coups in Bolivia in the name of oil. You’re comparing a country buying lithium on terms set by Bolivia to a country funding a military revolt directed by Gulf Oil.

            Yes destruction of natural resources is regrettable and hopefully we can reach a position where there’s no longer a need to get involved in a destructive global market. Honestly the market I’d criticize China the most for is how they never boycotted Israel, and in fact have sold guns/artillery to the IDF. They also sell guns to both sides of the Kashmir conflict. You’d have a much better case to claim China is colonizing Palestine than anywhere in Latin America.

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            how is that not colonization?

            I’m going to assume good faith here and that you’ve just never actually bothered to read a book but it’s really really hard not to insult you for this shit. Colonisation is what happened to Palestine. Colonisation is settling a land, often owned by someone else, and stealing it from them, usually while engaging in ethnic cleansing.

            If this is not what you mean then you need to stop calling it this because it’s complete and utter bullshit.

      • uralsolo [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        How many countries has China invaded or bombed from afar in the last forty years? How do China’s loan conditions compare to those of the World Bank and IMF? The notion that they’re “colonizing” anyone is completely daffy - they have long-running border disputes with some of their neighbors and a long-running leadership dispute with what remains of the previous government of China, those are completely different types of conflict.

        As for Russia and Israel, the difference is that the people in the Donbas who seceded from Ukraine back in 2014 weren’t placed there to displace Ukrainians as a Russian colonial project. They’re the same people who lived in Donbas going back to the USSR’s dissolution, and they had a series of legitimate grievances when the rest of Ukraine elected a government that was actively hostile to them.

        • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          That last part also applies to Crimea.

          That happened when I was in the midst of a completely shattered understanding of geopolitics and was piecing things back together with the help of Lenin and co. but I distinctly remember thinking back then “this seems really important but I am distrustful of the narrative that Russia is this cartoon villain invading and annexing people at gunpoint without firing a shot” simply because I had seen how that works in practice the many times the US has ultimately tried to do the same thing (or at least that was always the stated intent with narratives around “Nation Building”).

          Now obviously Russia is not an altruistic actor here and the Russian government is extremely socially reactionary and corrupt, but that doesn’t matter when you’re in eastern Ukraine seeking self determination and under siege by a bunch of fascist paramilitaries with the tacit approval of their US backed government that rose to power in a CIA coup.

          • uralsolo [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            Russia is not an altruistic actor here

            Always worth bearing in mind. The reason Crimea got taken over in 2014 and Donbas didn’t is pretty clearly because of its relatively higher strategic importance - it took a lot of provocation from NATO and Azov for Putin to change his mind about that calculation, I’ll never forget how bloodthirsty the media was especially in the month leading up to the invasion.

      • Summzashi@lemmy.one
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        1 year ago

        Don’t argue with the brainwashed tankies dude. You’re absolutely correct. They will never even consider your point of view, there’s no reason in wasting energy.

            • Spooty@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              “You’re all brainwashed and won’t consider their PoV”

              “no u”

              “Excuse me you don’t know who I am!!!”

              Do you see the hypocrisy in that retort? You don’t know who any of these people are either. So don’t write them off so stupidly.

    • Concetta@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      1 year ago

      No, they are definitely not anarchist and often bring up Nestor Makhno in ways to say anarchist leanings should be stomped out.

      • macabrett[they/them]@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        I don’t know what to tell you, but there are absolutely anarchists over there. It’s mostly marxist leninists, but there’s definitely anarchists.

      • thoro@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        They are mostly MLs and they often ride the line on their rules on sectarianism, enough where I’ve often reported stuff to moderation that only sometimes is addressed.

        But there are definitely anarchists. There has been an anarchist comm for a long time

  • Franzia@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    1 year ago

    Not exactly. They’re tankies, which has its basis in appreciating the USSR and modern day China and some other governments that call themselves “Communist” while having very few if any leftist and communist qualities. Hexbear is eager to defend genocides, whitewash parts of Russian history, and tell you why America is in the wrong in every single event, and therefore America’s opponents are good. Most confusingly, they’re also trolls. They really enjoy that these arguments anger other people.

    • jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 year ago

      I would say stalinism (which is what tankies are so enamored with) is very conservative or even reactionary from a social point of view, even if it’s not from an economic perspective.

      • taladar@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        What is conservative economics anyway? It seems to mostly consist of lying about economic competence and fiscal responsibility combined with tax cuts for the rich and general corruption judging by the actual conservative parties in most countries.

      • NaN@lemmy.sdf.org
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        1 year ago

        “They” turned me into a newt. “They” took our jobs. “They” are really just pretending and are actually far right. The number of strongly opinionated “they” messages from blahaj users any time hexbear is mentioned is impressive.

        The patriotism is always surprising to me too. I never knew America being shitty on the world stage was controversial. Like, I figured that out when they overthrew democratic governments to support dictators.

    • cwagner@lemmy.cwagner.me
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      1 year ago

      call themselves “Communist” while having very few if any leftist and communist qualities

      Yes, that does sound a lot like hexbear. I defederated them because all I saw was fascist bullshit.

    • NaN@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 year ago

      There is a rumor that it’s all a game and you’re really just there LARPing in mockery of the type of people you’re pretending to be.

      • axont [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        Pretending to be communists for 3 years and thousands of comments as high concept performance art

        In fact we’re so dedicated to this joke we read Marx and Engels and joined socialist organizations

        • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          Doing an actual communist revolution because we are just that committed to the bit.

          Some stubborn liberal that’s mad we had to [REDACTED] a few billionaires and war criminals as is necessary in revolutions comes in to the free gender affirmation clinic having just finished brunch at the local free kitchen and bursting into the reception area shouting “BUT AT WHAT COST?!” Then claiming the clinic isn’t actually real, and storming out mutter about paid Russian actors and Trump, who had since been posthumously convicted by the previous liberal government after having died choking on a McRib two years prior.

          • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            Doing an actual communist revolution because we are just that committed to the bit.

            We’re method actors. I’m actually a neo-paleo-retro-Whig, but I took the job of being a communist crisis actor and I have integrity.

            Lying on my deathbed in 2176, my life having been radically extended by medical research in a prohuman economic environment, My weakened eyes gaze out the window at the cities floating gently above the planet-wide food forest. I gather my descendents around me and croak out “It was all a prank, bro. It’s just a prank. I’m not really a communist. I helped build 100$ of communist as a joke. Just for a laugh.”

        • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          thousands of comments

          literally millions of comments and hundreds of thousands of posts lol.

          This is why they are so afraid of us. They could never match our posting power think-mark .

      • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        Some people just can’t fathom the possibility that we actually mean it.

        It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism — Fredric Jameson

        • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          Check the lower right of this authentic vintage Frank terror meme. So many people just cannot accept how embarassingly sincere most of us are.

      • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        It’s true I am actually a 63 year old paleo-conservative living in rural Iowa pretending to be a communist with my Republican friends at hex.bear.parody. I believe in guns, going to church several times a year while accusing everyone I don’t like of being a satanist, voting in every election for the worst human being imaginable, and sports.

              • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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                1 year ago

                more and more I feel like people who are both transphobic, and also project that on China are really telling on themselves about what they would do if they were in power. It always feels like “you’re lucky our FREEDOM LOVING government lets DEG*NERATES like you exist!” It’s almost more terrifying than the typical right wing blue hair enby boogieman memes.

                • I feel like there’s a lot of people along for the ride when it comes to these narratives- like people who will seriously believe some military guy that spent the last two decades airstriking muslim weddings when he says with a straight face that he’s really concerned about the freedom of east Turkistan

          • good_girl [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            Oh no I never considered that a place I’m critically supportive of might not be perfect. Guess it’s time to throw away all my beliefs and buy NFTs while sucking down whatever the dems are pushing in amerikkka.

          • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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            1 year ago

            It’s fucking bizarre people keep hammering on this when the US is engaged in, I cannot emphasize this enough, anti-trans genocide as defined in international law. Like bruh. Bruh. Clean up your own house.

            • It’s that brazenness which makes me feel compelled to respond. If you live in the US, claim to be on the left and can’t even call for an end to your own government for its crimes I have no interest in your contributions.

            • Summzashi@lemmy.one
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              1 year ago

              It doesn’t matter. There’s no way you would even consider any point that doesn’t fit in your bubble. You and all the other idiots in your fantasy world of an instance are a waste of energy. You are lthe same as any Facebook Trump supporter. Your politics are different, but the brainrot isn’t.

              • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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                1 year ago

                I’m pretty sure it’s you who’s never explored outside their ideological bubble, because I was a bog-standard American liberal for over 40 years, until I actually read a book or listened to a point of view outside of that bubble.

      • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        Reading hundreds of communist theory books and joining a democratic centralist party just to fool the libs.

        Not sure exactly what we’re supposed to be achieving by doing Hexbear and so perfectly engaging in communist discourse and advocating for literally every single downtrodden and oppressed group on the planet if it’s all fake? For what purpose? Surely doing that all so perfectly is just… Advocacy. Digital activism. It’s not a game if you do it so hard it just becomes exactly what you’re doing.

    • some pirate@lemmy.dbzer0.comOP
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      1 year ago

      Some of the arguments/memes I’m seen there are been shared by conservatives, using the same talking points, I was struggling to detect what comments were sarcastic but now it’s clearer

      • LiberalSoCalist@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Some of the arguments/memes I’m seen there are been shared by conservatives, using the same talking points

        such as…? People can’t respond if you keep being vague about it.

      • Infamousblt [any]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        Sometimes too it’s that the right and the left come to similar sounding conclusions but for entirely different reasons. I think the Isreal/Palestine conflict is a great example. Both the right and the left agree that Isreal is bad, so it sounds like we “agree”. However the right thinks Isreal is bad because they hate Jews, whereas the left thinks Isreal is bad because we hate genocidal apartheid states. So although it sounds like we agree because we both say “Isreal bad”, the reality is that our viewpoints couldn’t be more different, and as a result what we mean when we say “Isreal bad” are actually completely different things.

        I think you will find this is true for a lot of things that perhaps you think sound conservative on Hexbear. It’s why people think that the horseshoe theory of political viewpoints is valid; because they hear something high level that sounds similar between two seemingly different groups and just immediately jump to “well they must be the same!” rather than investigate why two different groups might be saying something that sounds similar. So if you see something you aren’t sure about I would suggest you ask about it rather than jump to an incorrect conclusion about it. Lots of opportunity to learn even if you don’t agree.

      • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        We’re like Bane “The Venom is the only thing keeping him alive” levels of irony poisoned here. Add almost 7 years of in-jokes, memes, obscure conspiracy theories, and thousands of emojis possum-party and I can only imagine this place is a nightmare to navigate for visitors.