Tankie is a pejorative label generally applied to authoritarian communists, especially those who support or defend acts of repression by such regimes, their allies, or deny the occurrence of the events thereof.

Not about communism as a political philosophy.

You are covering up the ethnic cleansing committed by Kiev against the Donbass region

This is a common myth created by Russian propaganda. I invite you to check it for yourself. Open an official website of any town that was part of Ukraine before 2022 and had Russian majority in population. Check publications before 2022. You'll see an abundant use of Russian language and culture. Even Zelenski, with Russian being his first language, often spoke it in political campaigns.

Now many of these towns are ghost towns due to shelling.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Tankie is a pejorative for those who defend socialist states. The "authoritarian" part doesn't really make any sense, considering the Marxist analysis of authority is that what matters most is which class has the authority of the state.

Either way, the ethnic cleansing of the Donbass region was widely reported even by western organizations until 2022, then this was all wiped away and minimized.

[–] nitroemdash@lemmy.wtf 0 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Tankie is a pejorative for those who defend socialist states.

Never heard it used against democratic socialists who acknowledged mistakes of the past.

The "authoritarian" part doesn't really make any sense, considering the Marxist analysis of authority is that what matters most is which class has the authority of the state.

So you believe there were no authoritarian socialist states in history? Ones that silenced critics, shot protesters, censored press and didn't have competitive elections? Lol.

Either way, the ethnic cleansing of the Donbass region was widely reported even by western organizations until 2022, then this was all wiped away and minimized.

This war killed almost half a million people already on all sides combined (if we believe Russian MoD, this number way exceeds a million). Do you think the “ethnic cleansing” would kill this much in a thousand years? According to DPR-operated media, only 17 people died in last years before 2022 on Donbas, most from uncleaned minefields.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 weeks ago

As I said, tankie is a pejorative used against people that defend socialist states. Self-described "democratic socialists" are not socialists that have "learned from history," they are those who have removed themselves from it. Socialism, both in theory and historically, is fundamentally democratic. Demsocs are, in practice, those who claim to support socialism while accepting bourgeois historiography, whining and weeping for the oppressed fascists, landlords, and capitalists that wind up at the short end of existing socialism.

As for the idea of there being no authoritarian socialist states, I mean quite the opposite. There has never been a "non-authoritarian state" in general, as the state itself is a monopoly on violence in the hands of a given class. All slave, feudal, capitalist, and socialist states have been authoritarian, but each serves wildly different classes, the socialist state representing working class authority. That's why the question isn't "is this state authoritarian or not" and instead is "which class controls this state?"

As for the bit on the Donbass, 14,000 people were killed by Kiev, many civilians. Do these civilians not have a right to their own self-determination, to secede from a neofascist state?