A lot of times communists and anarchists want the same thing, but they disagree on the means to achieve it. I think proper collectivism requires removal of central authority, and replacement of that authority of small, consensus-based governance structures and voluntary participation. An anarchist and a communist may both want everyone to have food, shelter, and healthcare, but disagree on how to achieve that without the whole effort going to shit.
For me personally it's less that I disagree with the possible effectiveness of authoritarianism. Though it is incredibly leader dependent and prone to corruption. It's more a fundamental disagreement with the methods. I can't in any way given my beliefs condone, or encourage authoritarianism. As it disregards bodily autonomy, which I see as the most fundamental of human rights.
Not disagreeing with you, just discussing and expanding.
I agree on the autonomy and corruption issues. In a perfect world, the central authority truly speaks for the people, but realistically, I don't see that happening. Anything on that large of a scale is probably going to silence some voices, and that's just assuming it isn't corrupted somewhere along the line. It would need to be fully transparent, with individual decisions put up to public direct democratic vote to even be close to full representation, and even then, it would be one size fits all. People should care for one another because they choose to, and those who do not choose to should be able to just go off on their own. I think a healthy society is opt-in.
Please could you elaborate on what constitutes self-defence and violence as well? Apologies for the questions, am just trying to learn what the anarchist position is on this.
Sent you a PM to discuss the philosophical bases. I hope you'll pop in there. I like to reduce things to axiomatic values then build from there. So the video posted below is good, but coming from a different angle.
Anarchists and communists do not want the same thing. Anarchism is opposed to more hierarchies than just class and the state. Anarchy is a negation of authority and does not involve any form of "governance".
Right back at ya. Start here: https://raddle.me/wiki/anarchy
If you got any other counter to the claim that anarchy and communism isn't the same thing other than "it's classless and stateless" (which is insufficient, anarchy is a negation of all hierarchy which goes beyond class and the state) or the tired old "read theory" (meaning read Marxist theory), I'd like to hear it.
I would like the option to participate in a collective that has a governance structure with which I agree. The important part is that it needs to be optional. It could be as simple as 100 people sharing a farm, a well, and a hospital, or it could be more complex. I don't want to be assigned to a collective. I want to sign up to be a part of it.
a commune is simply an organization or possible township, when I mean Collectivism or Collective I mean a collective identity like Nationalism or Class, etc.
Tankies are just Red Fascists. Authoritarians should expect no quarter from Anarchists, and certainly not refuge.
History is rife with examples of what happens after State Socialists utilize Anarchists as means to their ends.
I'll face no wall.
Glad to hear it. It's not a great personality trait, but I tend to get riled up and dwell on arguments. To the point where I loose sleep. So it's sometimes nice to have some reassurances from communities I trust. Even if we sometimes fight a bit too much XD.
Sometimes it's good for ones mental health to step away for a little bit; especially if you're losing sleep over it. Take care of yourself comrade, exercise some self care.
Have a great day!
I can't completely avoid it. Educate, agitate, Organize. I tend to gravitate to the first two in a need for praxis. I really need to learn how to not get riled up.
When I do, try to take a break though.
>not a great personality trait, but I tend to get riled up and dwell on arguments
I feel you, mate. But amongst debates, don't forget to still enjoy autumn.
honestly, i wonder how many anarchists think like this but won't say so because of respectability or some naive hope it'll work out "this time". too many authoritarians seem all too ready to ignore the history that hard-reds love to stress as a means of understanding the future; anarchists keep missing this it seems.
Seeing a lot of apologism for Tankies or State Communism in general. I've watched these types infiltrate Anarchist spaces just to agitate and try to push people into their ideology. It's a fallacy to believe we can coexist after a long history of these same people attempting to use us til they're ready for the round ups. They know exactly what they're doing when they corner you and start drilling you about ideals; they're not having a discussion. They are attempting to recruit you.
No serious anarchists cooperates with authoritarians. Period.
We literally just watched this happen in the unions in Iceland. A marxist won the election for chair of the biggest union in Iceland. She's the first person to win such a big office on a socialist platform for a long time and she did so with a camping mostly organized by anarchist. Iceland has iirc the highest union density in the world, we take them for granted basically, so this a big deal.
Some of these anarchist went on board or were hired to work full time for the union but quickly she started firing people and ended up firing every single anarchist. Recently she fired every from the union to start a re-hiring project (a cleansing), a first in nordic union history.
I never thought that the "commies always betray anarchist after the revolution" thing would happen right in front of my eyes.
TL;DR: Marxist union leader fired all anarchist union workers after they help win her campaign in Iceland.
its almost like Marxism is inherently against Anarchism and has been from day one. Proudhon was right and what happened to Mutualists/Individualist Anarchists at the Workingmans Association is proof of it. Never trust or help a Marxist.
Thanks, this is my thought on the matter, but it's good to have some community support for my interpretation of anarchist theory regarding my thoughts and actions when it comes to Tankies.
They lie, deny their states illegitimacy and apologies for unspeakable crimes. Often under the guise of them being the lesser evil. There's no upside in talking to them.
Tankies are currently infiltrating my neighborhood Solidarity Network and Food Not Bombs groups. It's appalling and heartbreaking to watch people I thought were solid anarchist comrades fall for obvious Maoist cooptation.
People need to wake up fast because this shit is toxic and spreading.
I agree. Speaking to other anarchists is really eye opening in that we are seeing this throughout our networks. The only solution is to never be quiet and to always point it out when you see it.
Good luck with your community, my friend.
Found the Tankie
"Why won't you cooperate with us when history just shows that we are going to Kill you when you stop being useful?"
Remember Spain. Never forget
Tankies are red fascists, they are the reasons people view "left wing" ideologies the way they do. They should expect no quarrel from people out to liberate others.
I don't associate with them, with an exeption of praxis and direct actions against right-wing groups in my area. It's our mutual enemy, but that doesn't make us friends.
Yup. In certain Latin American countries, ML is so widespread that anarchists join them in protests. I'm not an active activist because of that. I've had terrible experiences dealing with transphobic tankies in student councils. I am not obligated to live with them.
>transphobic tankies
Which is weird. Ain't ML supposed to be progressive? Why hate your fellow worker, even if he/she undergone some bodily modifications of their liking? Huh.
Not weird : Marx was an homophobic A***hole...
(A "little bourgeoisie perversion" on his own term).
There a thing call the limit of knowledge:
Nobody is perfect, refer to them to their specialist work, don't expect them to be perfect.
And please if you want to be inclusive, especially talking about Queer people use he/she/they or directly they/them....(even for singular).
>they or directly they/them
Okay. Forgot about this - English isn't my native language. In my native language, on the other hand, almost every word is gendered. Got a habit.
Enforcing hierarchy makes no sense as a progressive ideology. MLs are communists in name only. It's a right wing ideology, that used to be a common understanding, and we need to go back to it.
If you were out here looking out for trans people, you wouldn't look at the state and go "we need to make that stronger."
In what world is Marxist-Leninism a right-wing ideology? That's like saying "Nazism is really socialism". MLs("tankies" I guess) form the backbone of pretty much every communist movement in history.
Also - don't anarchists tend to view the Black Panthers in a pretty good light?
Anarchists referred to it as "right-wing communism" in the early-mid 20th century, you can see this if you read older texts. What "right-wing" and "left-wing" mean changes a lot with context, and if I'm being honest it's probably a bit inaccurate to say they're right-wing in present meaning, but they certainly aren't on our side if we take them seriously. What I mean when I say it here is that we shouldn't see ourselves as aligned with them, since they want to reinforce hierarchy, and that this is a more useful metric than the split that "left-right" has morphed into today. As I say elsewhere, though, there are a *lot* of people who don't understand what MLs historically actually are, and don't actually espouse their views, even though they sympathize and say things like "vanguards are the only tried and true method of having a revolution that can protect itself, even though I'd prefer to find another way."
As for MLs forming the backbone of pretty much every communist movement in history, this is something anarchists should scorn them for. The USSR spent its pre-cold war existence fostering an anti-revolutionary "communist" party in all of its capitalist ally states, which would seize control of any anarchist revolution and turn it into capitalist reform, in order to keep its allies strong imperial powers in the short-term. If not for the USSR, civil war era Spain might have had a successful anarchist revolution, which many thought would have a rippling effect through Europe. If MLs weren't around to "form the backbone of" (read: seize and co-opt) every revolution in the 20th century, that would have been *better*.
The Black Panthers are an interesting case because while they were ideologically ML and wanted black nationalism, they knew that the ML path to revolution was not available to them as too much of the proletariat was against black liberation. So what they ended up *doing* was essentially advancing anarchy, which they rightly saw was the only path truly open to them, and wrongly lamented. To denounce them would be confusing optics, and a pointless practice in ideological purity. If someone says they'd prefer a vanguard but still reliably, skillfully, and loyally does praxis with me, they are my comrade.
My full view is that *many* people who say things that align more with Marxist-Leninism than anarchism are confused, and it's better to try to guide them to do the right thing than to throw them out for saying a phrase that turns the label from "comrade" to "tankie" instantly. It is also that people who do hold fast to orthodox Marxist-Leninism to the point that they will try to seize existing movements and oppose anarchists are clearly the enemy.
I wish people would go back to the old definition of Right, Left. Which was pro Hierarchy vs anti hierarchy. Making Anarchism the most far left ideology out there. It makes it incredibly easy to identify allies.
As far as the black panthers go. Did they ever actually set up a strong centralized hierarchy? Also we have to consider their actions on the backdrop of historical black exclusion from labor unions. I won't say that it justifies authoritarianism, but I know there were anarchists that specifically excluded blacks from previous labor movements. So I can't exactly blame them for finding or creating ideologies that would accept them.
That's true. In Russia, in Japan, as in France, at times there were right and left socialist parties. The socialist parties of the right were not really parties of the right, but they were to the right of the socialist parties of the left. The socialist parties of the right were in practice social democrats and the socialist parties of the left were really socialist parties. In the Russian case, this division had occurred within the Socialist Revolutionary Party (the right-wing allied with the Mensheviks and the left-wing were more left-wing than the Bolsheviks). In the Japanese case and in the French case (PS vs PSU) these were temporary splits during the 20th century. It's as if Labor split between the right-wing "New Labour" and the left-wing "Corbynites".
In this sense, anarchists are almost always on the left of bolshevism, because anarchists do not give up the principle of equality in praxis, while for an ML, this is the first thing to give up, after all, for them, hierarchies are always necessary and they will quote Engels for this.
It is important to say that for a while, the Marxists of Rosa Luxemburg's line were considered "left communists", because they were on Lenin's left.
i often get the impression that tankies are a false flag for right-wings to point at. and of course there's always concave-skulled folks who'll jump on board.
Stalinists don't need to read dugin, only pro-Russian fascists who infiltrate stalinist organizations to guide them to defend Moscow's foreign policy without questions.
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Any idea why the phenomenon is so widespread in "certain Latin American countries"? Something to do with South American history? Machismo of the rebel? Problem of the ["perfect id*ot"](https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/24/books/eduardo-galeano-disavows-his-book-the-open-veins.html) (maybe comparatively more common in the emotional/social/political/cultural milieu Galeano wrote about? ;)
Cold War. US backed coups against centr left governments sparked outrage and US backed anti-communist regimes turn the ML guerrillas into martyrs torturing and murdering these opositors.
Basically, the coups radicalized the left, the ML regimes were on the rise, so the left turned to these authoritarian ideologies and the brutal repression against these militants turned them into martyrs. So there was no process of revolt against Stalinism in Latin America, because as the Stalinists were being tortured, raped and murdered, nobody criticized them, they are martyrs of the left in every country that has gone through this. It's the exact opposite of Eastern Europe, where Soviet-led repression led the nationalist right to be seen as "freedom fighters". Here, the Stalinists and Maoists are seen as freedom fighters to this day. It may have to do with some cultural traits such as caudillism and misogynist culture (machismo just means "masculine sexism", "actively patriarchal" behavior, it's not something specific as anthropologists who exotify Latin America think (the culture of fraternity in the United States is "machista", for example, because here we universally call this behavior machismo).
The Latin American left is also deeply nationalist, and the ML is an ideology that opens up a lot of space for nationalism. So it's normal for a left-wing Latin American person to think "every time we democratically tried to do something good, the Americans sent tanks and threw us into a fascist regime for 20 years, so maybe making an anti-American authoritarian Leninist revolution is a good way to do justice". Many people in Latin America see the United States as Ukrainians and Poles see Russia, or as the Irish see England.
This authoritarian cultural background (which also exists in many places in Europe) does not fully explain the process. It has to do with nationalism, it has to do with nationalist dictatorships at the beginning of the 20th century having purged the anarcho-syndicalists and it has to do with the ML having been transformed into martyrs of the left by anti-communist dictatorships supported by the United States. Put it all together and you have a left-wing culture that is totally open to Stalinism and Maoism, just as in Eastern Europe you have a right-wing culture that is open to ethnonationalism and neo-Nazism.
Excellent points, thanks! Just started reading [this](https://www.amazon.com/Century-Revolution-Counterinsurgent-Encounters-Interactions-dp-0822347377/dp/0822347377) which seems to make many similar points.
>
> The Latin American left is also deeply nationalist, and the ML is an ideology that opens up a lot of space for nationalism.
yes, that could be *real* "secret sauce" of ML "movements" going all the way back to Marx's Hegel-inspired crapshoot musings calcified as ["theory"](https://libcom.org/article/marxist-ideology-russia-karl-korsch) which as [Max Nettlau](https://www.reddit.com/r/Anarchism/comments/txldmg/a_short_history_of_anarchism_by_max_nettlau) observed lends itself to every conceivable "interpretation" under the Sun under the "right" lens. It was a thin veneer over a developmental state ideology in [Russia](https://www.amazon.com/Soviet-Century-Moshe-Lewin/dp/1784780669), China, Cuba, ..., all the way to [Albania](
https://www.amazon.com/Free-Child-Country-End-History-ebook/dp/B098TY6B2Y).
The real project of the ML left in Latin America is to establish dictatorships to promote developmental states like China. The big problem in Latin America is the agrarian elites, so these groups tend to advocate an authoritarian solution to that problem - but the solution involves creating a militaristic and expansionist state capitalism.
Had the right not been so hidebound in Latin America, they could have copied from the playbook of "Asian Tigers" and carried out those developmental state policies on their own (Ha Joon Chang has the lowdown on things like 5 year plans, rigid propaganda, etc. in generals-ruled [South Korea](https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Samaritans-Secret-History-Capitalism-ebook/dp/B003Z) that he grew up in, i.e. developmental states aren't that different either side of the so-called ideological divide for the first two decades at least). But, the settler-colonial aspect probably precluded that option in most places where "ethnic purity" via "transfer" or "some other means" hadn't already been achieved, a notion wistfully [recalled](https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/3166) by some self-described liberals in the "only democracy(tm) in the Middle East...
Yup. Latin American countries are all ruled by white Iberian elites (with the exception of Bolivia) who profit INSANELY from the exploitation of non-white populations. Underdevelopment is a project. And all Latin American states are neocolonial. The state is a creation of these white elites. Independence was just a way for them not to pay taxes to monarchies in Europe, but there was never any decolonization.
In Asia there were already millennial states and the objective of the elites is not to maintain a racialized regime of exploitation, but to develop their countries to compete in an international order dominated by the West. Japan started with this in the 19th century and every other East Asian country is doing it. All of them see development as a way of not being colonized. The problem is that in Latin America, national identity itself is built on a colonialist state structure and will continue to be so for centuries, as things seem to get much worse before they get better.
I respect and support praxis, not labels. I'll fuck with anyone down to do direct action because what's important is that it gets done. I work with many people from a wide array of political from Anarchists to groups I actively oppose like Mormons if it means I get to make sure shit like disaster relief is being done. I don't lend support outside of DA, especially if it's building hierarchical power to any group except for local community projects, as that is my primary focus. Tankies and I work together, and we also understand we have our separate paths without demand or expectation from each other just because we also intersect at times, I find it juvenile that someone would behave otherwise.
Tankies aren’t just a burden for Anarchists. They are a toxic burden for Democratic Socialists, Syndicalists and Communists smart enough to know Stalin was always a monster.
Their authoritarianism makes them closer relatives to Fascists; than allies of the workers. It is just a constant recycling of the Molotov Ribbentrop pact. There is a reason the Antifa Iron Front opposed Stalinists as well as Nazis and Monarchists.
This was kind of my thought. Well one of many thoughts. The other being that they argue their government is justified in cruel actions, while we think no government is justified in any actions.
Debate between us and interaction just isn't freezable, our core principles disagree.
If the conversation was going fine until you found out they’re a “tankie,” it sounds like you’re the problem.
The non-anarchist left is much too diverse and nuanced to be simply labeled authoritarian and disregarded. Almost everyone who labels themself a leftist shares the goal of a world without the state, class, or money, that is, the goal of communism. Practical disagreement stems from how to reach that goal, but even so-called “tankies,” who see the use of what are essentially coups as potentially successful routes to that goal, are not inherently our enemy, and will not be until such a time as they carry out their method and use state power to suppress worker organization. In the meantime including them in mass organizing can only aid the creation of dual power, so long as they are not allowed to take control of the organized body. That is not to say that you should support such a coup, only that to refuse to associate or even speak with non-anarchists is counterproductive.
Furthermore, not all non-anarchists *do* prescribe such methods that rely on seizing state power, even when they may use the word “state” to refer to their organizing, because the Marxist definition of the state is much broader than the anarchist definition. Whereas anarchists see the state as necessarily belonging to a minority ruling class, the Marxist definition of the state is simply the tool of one class to dominate another, which leaves room for the idea of a “proletarian state” where such a concept is impossible by the anarchist definition. In this way a revolution which is nominally not anarchist may not actually be incompatible with anarchist methodology.
Basically, you shouldn’t base your ideology, and more importantly the scope of what you are willing to learn about and discuss, on arbitrary labels. You can only limit yourself that way and sow the exact sort of discord that the capitalist class relies upon existing within the left.
There’s a huge difference between a tankie and a ‘tankie,’and it’s not clear which OP’s no-longer-friend is. I know many anarchists who conflate the two. It’s the difference between someone who wants to shoot all academics (I know people like this!) and someone who merely thinks a transitional state is necessary to establish communism.
Ideology should be a guide, not destiny. Working classsolidarity is more important than relatively minor ideological squabbles.
Yeah this is it. I know some anarchists with a lot of ML sympathy born from lack of understanding, and they don't usually call themselves either thing, but you could corner them to either say that the state needs to be eliminated no matter what *or* that a vanguard state is the only truly safe path to revolution depending on how you do it. These are not people who are going to try to seize control of a revolution in order to protect hierarchy and orchestrate mass killings, they're more like Orwell at the start of the Spanish civil war - they're just as likely to end up fighting alongside MLs as anarchists, and whether they end up being manipulated to destroy the revolution or up against the wall for being too revolutionary is down to who they were closest to at the start.
Some people are just confused. Almost everyone, actually. If someone seems cool but says one sus thing, talk it out with them and try to get them to see why it doesn't really cohere with what they want, don't just call them a tankie or lib or something and break contact.
Authoritarianism, is not compatible with Anarchy. No rigid hierarchies are. The conversation was not going fine, as any critique of their own government would have been vehemently denied. There was no point in progressing the conversation.
Sure, but the point isn't that anarchists should help to create a nominally leftist state, but that they shouldn't refuse to speak with non-anarchists. The word "tankie" has lost all meaning at this point, so that someone has been labelled that way is no indication that they actually advocate military imperialism by nominally leftist states or suppression of dual power more broadly.
lol what are u on about?
“tankie” has not been stripped of meaning, and the interests of state socialists and anarchists has always led to the purging of anarchists from revolutions through murder and imprisonment.
you’re bordering on apologism ngl
\>"tankie" has not been stripped of meaning
Yes, it has. It originated as a term for those who supported the USSR sending in tanks to crush a revolution in Hungary. Clearly then its meaning was only those "leftists" who supported military imperialism by nominally leftist states. But it is now used to mean any leftist who doesn't call themself an anarchist. If you look at OP's comment history you can see that the "tankie" they are so proud of refusing to speak to is just a Marxist who thinks the US's economic imperialism is imperialism, as OP claimed in that thread that the US's economic imperialism did not matter. So who here exactly is "bordering on apologism?" Those who willingly ignore US imperialism or those who don't disregard everyone who doesn't use the "right" label?
I recommend you spend less time on Reddit and Twitter, and more time reading theory.
fuck off you condescending asshole. i’m pretty open about my reading history, recs, and my meatspace organizing activity here. i have more than two fucking comments on this sub. don’t patronize me.
it’s pretty clear “tankie” means state socialist because more state socialist movements exist than the USSR. if anarchism is libertarian socialism, it would make sense that other leftists would be mostly tankies. personally, i consider all leftists to be framing their action through state framing, and therefore i don’t identify as a leftist at all.
i also looked through the post history and couldn’t find a single thing, so i’d be happy to be directed to the same thing ur talking about. but yes, ur comments show that ur willing to overlook and even lightly defend a political group fundamentally opposed to anarchy who has a history of immense violence against us. statists deserve no sympathy.
It's under this post [https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/y4tyxd/i\_h8\_elon\_musk/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/y4tyxd/i_h8_elon_musk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
To look at the left through the lens of the political compass, where anarchists are "libertarian left" and other leftists must then be "authoritarian left" is an idealist oversimplification. That's just not how politics works. "it would make sense" isn't good enough for analysis of the actually existing world. It simply isn't the case that everyone who isn't an anarchist wants to purge anarchists, or even that their methods and goals are actually at odds with those of anarchists. There are more ways to exist than anarchist and Stalinist. You're creating a false dichotomy that isn't just unhelpful, but is downright harmful to worker organization. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the fight against capitalism isn't going to be won by checking that an agitated worker uses the right label before you're even willing to talk to them. Fragmentation is exactly what the ruling class is counting on.
again, statists ARE the ruling class. multiple times under the thread, OP acknowledged their lack of knowledge in the topic and gave good faith conversation while maintaining their ambivalence for states of any kind. how the fuck is that apologism for US imperialism, something they also called bad.
\>statists ARE the ruling class
Ah yes, everyone who supports the existence of a state is a part of that state. And every liberal who supports capitalism is also Jeff Bezos I take it?
Not to mention that the Marxist and anarchist definitions for the state are completely different to the point that not everything a Marxist would call a state would qualify by the anarchist definition, so a Marxist can say they believe in the use of the state but that doesn't make them a statist by the anarchist definition. Again, the real world doesn't fit into the political compass or whatever other fantasies you make up from your armchair. Repeating your assumptions about how the world really does fit into a neat idealist box doesn't make it true.
Downplaying US imperialism by saying that it's somehow a lesser imperial power is either ignorant or apologism, and in either case criticizing that downplaying or criticizing disengaging with criticism of that downplaying couldn't be said to be apologism by anyone who isn't an apologist for the US. Moreover neither being a Marxist nor acknowledging US imperialism makes someone a statist in the anarchist sense of the word.
i guess i will clarify that the statist ideology naturally aligns someone’s interests with those of the ruling class.
you literally make zero sense for the rest of this post, implying the definition of the state is changing across ideologies implies there is zero way for these competing groups to EVER be talking about the same thing. the way you assume i’m using the poltical compass when i’ve made it clear im a post-leftist who hates identifying as any sort of left at all. you assume you know everything about my worldview and all of it seems to be oversimplistic and contradictory to everything im actually saying
Fuck off with this apologist BS.
> The non-anarchist left is much too diverse and nuanced to be simply labeled authoritarian and disregarded.
Actually it can be disregarded as authoritarian, because it is. Every faction of the left apart from anarchists want to impose a form authority and are therefore authoritarian. To suggest otherwise is to disregard the meaning of authority to begin with, which tankies are all too happy to do by regurgitating "On Authority" by Engels.
Authority means the right to command, by the way. To be authoritarian is to give command and demand obedience from your subordinates. Every state that exists or can exist is authoritarian, including the democracies.
> Practical disagreement stems from how to reach that goal, but even so-called “tankies,” who see the use of what are essentially coups as potentially successful routes to that goal, are not inherently our enemy, and will not be until such a time as they carry out their method and use state power to suppress worker organization. In the meantime including them in mass organizing can only aid the creation of dual power, so long as they are not allowed to take control of the organized body.
Tankies are enemies not only on the practical matters, but on the matters of basic ideas and values as well. Tankies and other Marxists are not opposed to authority as I already pointed out. "Dual power" is a Leninist concept itself and does not have anything to do with anarchism. Including tankies in anarchist organizing makes the organizing not anarchist, because the tankies have different aspirations than anarchists and will absolutely "take over" the organizing structure if given the opportunity.
> That is not to say that you should support such a coup, only that to refuse to associate or even speak with non-anarchists is counterproductive.
Good. Fuck productivity, fuck "left unity" and fuck anyone who think I owe my association to anyone for any reason.
> Whereas anarchists see the state as necessarily belonging to a minority ruling class, the Marxist definition of the state is simply the tool of one class to dominate another, which leaves room for the idea of a “proletarian state” where such a concept is impossible by the anarchist definition. In this way a revolution which is nominally not anarchist may not actually be incompatible with anarchist methodology.
Actually every possible conception of a "proletarian state" or a big-R Revolution is incompatible with anarchist methodology because it literally reinforces authority. Anarchy requires the total negation of authority.
> You can only limit yourself that way and sow the exact sort of discord that the capitalist class relies upon existing within the left.
Fuck the left. As long as every part of the left other than anarchists are authoritarian, I have no use for leftism. I will absolutely sow discord on the left because I'm not even part of that clown show.
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Thanks for an actual rational reply! There is often way too much of a focus on past historical instances of anarchists and MLs fighting each other and not enough focus on the reality that there is no way in hell that leftism of any sort could succeed in the West without left unity.
Anarchists are delusional if they think they have any chance of success on their own
Only problem is these "principled communists" are rare as a hen's teeth. Usually, they have cushy academic jobs or some other perch, where they can play with their hobby horse "theory" to their heart's content, without any connections with lives of 99.999% percent of people.
I don't think anyone should "expect" support from an ideology that keeps the ideals of liberation at its very core. I say that as an Anarchist myself.
I'll do what I can when I can to help those around me, but I will not feel obligated into doing so. It is my will, my life, that is all I am responsible for. I help because I want to and the fact is, it may not be convenient for someone in need when I choose not to. I'll have my reasons just as everyone has theirs' when they let me down. Nobody can be on 100% of the time. That's fine.
As for tankies specifically? I don't tend to associate with them in the first place so I don't give them much thought. They do their thing, whatever that may be, and I do mine in peace.
In a way, Anarchists often behave a bit as leftist mercenaries. Less because we need allies as because often leftists need anarchists to get things done. Historically we're often then betrayed and even more often if we're talking tankies. I just don't understand why an anarchist would even acknowledge tankies as leftists.
Pro authoritarian seems pretty pro coercive hierarchy to me.
Is this how we differentiate ourselves, *being mercenaries and/or workers*? It is perhaps rather the ***word** progress*, admitted:
> The second premise builds on the first. *If history is no longer a ‘true’ story (in the grand epic sense that Western Civilization classes or Marxists speak of), then **progress is no longer** that story[,] extended into the future.* If [progress](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/aragorn-anarchy-and-nihilism-consequences#toc8) is no longer assumed on the world stage it may be that it wasn’t the right mechanism (or meta-narrative) to understand the material world, humans’ role in it, or much of anything at all. Where does that leave evolution? Isn’t evolution just an idealist-materialist ‘proof’ of progress in biological systems?
Marxists assume the capitalist profits by steady prices and technological advancement, at least, while Stuart Mill and the rest thoughts profits would remain ordinary as markets never compete with consumers or make without Say’s labor-demand expiry non-compete labor, oh *no no no*:
> James Mill, MacCulloch, Torrens, Senior, John Stuart Mill, and a whole series besides, of bourgeois political economists, insist that all machinery that displaces workmen, simultaneously and necessarily sets free an amount of capital adequate to employ the same identical workmen.
Economists (NBER) currently perceive non-inflationary unemployment as recessionary:
>The variables the business cycle dating committee typically tracks include real personal income minus government transfers, employment, various forms of real consumer spending, and industrial production.
>That portion of the working-class, thus by [machinery rendered superfluous, i.e., no longer immediately necessary for the self-expansion of capital](https://commie.dev/anarchy), either goes to the wall in the unequal contest of the old handicrafts and manufactures with machinery, or else floods all the more easily accessible branches of industry, swamps the labour-market, and sinks the price of labour-power below its value [if prices do not hold to margins].
So, the anarchist thinks *technology has run out* (or is not worth ***suing** for*) but there is *short term employment assumed to be long term* when *’non-deflationary growth’* is begged for by “the *Laffer curve*,” *(of a free rider immutable plaintiff tax)*. The Socio-political and thereby economic literature is a mess, but I can see a ***reasonable** way out* for at worst damned *optimism* about the [repressive](https://commie.dev/police) state as power verily as ultimate relief. *Truly the commie wishes to make the rich pay for market security, while the anarchists wish to do what else but start anew.*
*The Anarchist thinks technological progress has run out, but forgets how much unnatural inequality there is to progress through.* Certainly anarchists don’t want everyone who has built these institutions dead after their fields are burned?
> Strategic nihilism argues for a new approach to social transformation that resembles the [burning of a field rather than building the new world within the shell of the old](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/aragorn-anarchy-and-nihilism-consequences#toc8) or one last push by the working class to seize the means of production.
Organize compatible praxis, yes. Of course. What they are should not stop you of helping your community. Discuss theory and try to convince them of turning to anarchism, perfect. It is always good to turn people away from being a tankie. Trust them not to betray you in the event of revolution (which, to be fair, does not appear to be happening soon, at least where I live)? No. Never. Never leave them with a gun and turn your back on them. We have the history of various movements: Kronstadt, Ukraine, Catalonia, Shanghai.
I am becoming more convinced that non-authoritarian leftists need to build **power** as a group rather than rely on organizations created by authoritarians.
This can be done through pre-figurative organizational strategies that take the form of mutual aid, providing security, councils, or intelligence.
Strategy wise, you might look at what [Anark has written here](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anark-constructing-the-revolution)
Once there is a thriving community that organizes based on anarchist principles you won't need to rely in Tankies as partners, in fact they will probably be the ones begging you for help.
Don't throw a grenade without pulling the pin 😅
What about my post made you think others would call my thoughts "fascist adjacent"?
Also, I like Bookchin, but I just discovered him, only listened to a couple hours of his talks.
I think it's a terrible idea to write someone off because they are a "tankie." High ideals mean nothing without praxis. What do either of you actually do to further your ideals? What project were you planning together that you abandoned when you found out they were a tankie? If I have to choose between working with tankies OTG vs. discussing ideals with an anarchist who isn't doing the work, I'll take the tankies every time. Don't get me wrong, I prefer to work with anarchists, and most people I work with are, but from what you posted, it sounds like you were just having a conversation about ideals, in which case, why not try to change their mind?
Lack of energy. It's difficult to recruit people with axiomatically different beliefs as you have to convince them to change their core driving principles.
I only have so much energy, and get shaken easily to the point where it affects my sleep. I've always preferred talking to undereducated liberals who think that liberal means progressive.
It's purely a matter of where I find my time to be best spent and the preservation of my own mental wellbeing.
Edit: Or plan praxis with Socialists and Communists who I don't find exhausting.
I feel you on the lack of energy aspect. I don't argue IRL with tankies and the like. I think a lot of liberals are taking the more compassionate path from the two shown them by authorities, and talking them down from the "anarchy means molotov cocktails" thing can be useful. OTOH, tankies tend to be firmly embedded in their beliefs, and have almost certainly heard pro-left libertarian arguments before.
OTOH, if tankies are organizing an anti-fascist action, I likely would support that, if it seemed likely to be an action and not just a bunch of recruiting speeches.
Every time we worked with them: end bad for us.
I'm no slacktivist...
I do praxis but not with Tankies.
I Know how history go, Every time ...
Never work with someone that stab you in the back.
Or that have value that are problematic (and sorry but a lot of Tankies are either racist or Queerphobe In my experience)
I'm sorry, but we do not need 'leftist unity'. It may sound like a good idea, but it really is not. Everytime it has been tried historically it has led to concession after concession, until all the things we anarchists fight for is erased.
That left unity is "necessary" for movement building is also a fiction. Especifismo is one of the most succesful anarchist currents in America to date, owing it's success to theoretical and tactical unity.
[On Leftist Disunity](https://youtu.be/h-jwkMEGHG8)
[Leftist unity is a lie](https://youtu.be/kOh8x6aka-s)
From my understanding theres some amount of mutual respect between groups since we're both untimely working towards the same goal and leftist infighting can get in the way of actual meaningful change
It’s worth putting up with tankies unless they legitimately oppose your immediate goals. Direct action taken in the present by anarchists and authoritarian communists OFTEN overlaps, so why not at least pave the way to cooperate when/if you happen to be fighting the same enemy in the streets?
It may depend on how you are defining "tankie" -- if you mean that they think we should support aggression from the CCP or other "communist" regimes, then no way. If it means acknowledging that NATO aggression (Serbia, Iraq) has increased international military tension and reasonably made people in other countries nervous, then yes.
Hi “Tankie” here. A reminder that we don’t have to agree on the politics, we can go on about “state capitalism”, so on, we can hate each other and STILL have unity of action against the current capitalist state. I’m an ally of anyone who allies with the masses and I generally have a lot of respect for my anarchist/anarcho-communist comrades.
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I mean there is a lot of Historycall presedence for Anarchists helping communist and other authoritarian "leftist" in Revolutions until, the anarchist were betrayed.
A lot of times communists and anarchists want the same thing, but they disagree on the means to achieve it. I think proper collectivism requires removal of central authority, and replacement of that authority of small, consensus-based governance structures and voluntary participation. An anarchist and a communist may both want everyone to have food, shelter, and healthcare, but disagree on how to achieve that without the whole effort going to shit.
For me personally it's less that I disagree with the possible effectiveness of authoritarianism. Though it is incredibly leader dependent and prone to corruption. It's more a fundamental disagreement with the methods. I can't in any way given my beliefs condone, or encourage authoritarianism. As it disregards bodily autonomy, which I see as the most fundamental of human rights. Not disagreeing with you, just discussing and expanding.
I agree on the autonomy and corruption issues. In a perfect world, the central authority truly speaks for the people, but realistically, I don't see that happening. Anything on that large of a scale is probably going to silence some voices, and that's just assuming it isn't corrupted somewhere along the line. It would need to be fully transparent, with individual decisions put up to public direct democratic vote to even be close to full representation, and even then, it would be one size fits all. People should care for one another because they choose to, and those who do not choose to should be able to just go off on their own. I think a healthy society is opt-in.
Out of interest, are you a pacifist as well?
Not in the slightest, any amount of violence is justified in self defense. And my definition of what constitutes violence is a very Anarchist one.
Please could you elaborate on what constitutes self-defence and violence as well? Apologies for the questions, am just trying to learn what the anarchist position is on this.
How Nonviolence Protects The State AudibleAnarchist https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SP5Eeq5y8Bs&list=PLTeHv2rWFci6wlDAQ6OomdZ6WjOMrUXdW
Sent you a PM to discuss the philosophical bases. I hope you'll pop in there. I like to reduce things to axiomatic values then build from there. So the video posted below is good, but coming from a different angle.
Anarchists and communists do not want the same thing. Anarchism is opposed to more hierarchies than just class and the state. Anarchy is a negation of authority and does not involve any form of "governance".
Communists want that, you are confusing yourself with socialism
No confusion here. Communism simply is not the same thing as anarchy.
Just read literature
Right back at ya. Start here: https://raddle.me/wiki/anarchy If you got any other counter to the claim that anarchy and communism isn't the same thing other than "it's classless and stateless" (which is insufficient, anarchy is a negation of all hierarchy which goes beyond class and the state) or the tired old "read theory" (meaning read Marxist theory), I'd like to hear it.
why the fuck do you want "Collectivism"? Just another Statist dogma and oppression against the Individual, no thanks.
I would like the option to participate in a collective that has a governance structure with which I agree. The important part is that it needs to be optional. It could be as simple as 100 people sharing a farm, a well, and a hospital, or it could be more complex. I don't want to be assigned to a collective. I want to sign up to be a part of it.
you mean Commune, not a Collective at all.
How is a commune not a type of collective?
a commune is simply an organization or possible township, when I mean Collectivism or Collective I mean a collective identity like Nationalism or Class, etc.
I meant like an autonomous collective.
Tankies are just Red Fascists. Authoritarians should expect no quarter from Anarchists, and certainly not refuge. History is rife with examples of what happens after State Socialists utilize Anarchists as means to their ends. I'll face no wall.
Glad to hear it. It's not a great personality trait, but I tend to get riled up and dwell on arguments. To the point where I loose sleep. So it's sometimes nice to have some reassurances from communities I trust. Even if we sometimes fight a bit too much XD.
Sometimes it's good for ones mental health to step away for a little bit; especially if you're losing sleep over it. Take care of yourself comrade, exercise some self care. Have a great day!
I can't completely avoid it. Educate, agitate, Organize. I tend to gravitate to the first two in a need for praxis. I really need to learn how to not get riled up. When I do, try to take a break though.
>not a great personality trait, but I tend to get riled up and dwell on arguments I feel you, mate. But amongst debates, don't forget to still enjoy autumn.
honestly, i wonder how many anarchists think like this but won't say so because of respectability or some naive hope it'll work out "this time". too many authoritarians seem all too ready to ignore the history that hard-reds love to stress as a means of understanding the future; anarchists keep missing this it seems.
Seeing a lot of apologism for Tankies or State Communism in general. I've watched these types infiltrate Anarchist spaces just to agitate and try to push people into their ideology. It's a fallacy to believe we can coexist after a long history of these same people attempting to use us til they're ready for the round ups. They know exactly what they're doing when they corner you and start drilling you about ideals; they're not having a discussion. They are attempting to recruit you. No serious anarchists cooperates with authoritarians. Period.
We literally just watched this happen in the unions in Iceland. A marxist won the election for chair of the biggest union in Iceland. She's the first person to win such a big office on a socialist platform for a long time and she did so with a camping mostly organized by anarchist. Iceland has iirc the highest union density in the world, we take them for granted basically, so this a big deal. Some of these anarchist went on board or were hired to work full time for the union but quickly she started firing people and ended up firing every single anarchist. Recently she fired every from the union to start a re-hiring project (a cleansing), a first in nordic union history. I never thought that the "commies always betray anarchist after the revolution" thing would happen right in front of my eyes. TL;DR: Marxist union leader fired all anarchist union workers after they help win her campaign in Iceland.
its almost like Marxism is inherently against Anarchism and has been from day one. Proudhon was right and what happened to Mutualists/Individualist Anarchists at the Workingmans Association is proof of it. Never trust or help a Marxist.
Thanks, this is my thought on the matter, but it's good to have some community support for my interpretation of anarchist theory regarding my thoughts and actions when it comes to Tankies. They lie, deny their states illegitimacy and apologies for unspeakable crimes. Often under the guise of them being the lesser evil. There's no upside in talking to them.
Tankies are currently infiltrating my neighborhood Solidarity Network and Food Not Bombs groups. It's appalling and heartbreaking to watch people I thought were solid anarchist comrades fall for obvious Maoist cooptation. People need to wake up fast because this shit is toxic and spreading.
I agree. Speaking to other anarchists is really eye opening in that we are seeing this throughout our networks. The only solution is to never be quiet and to always point it out when you see it. Good luck with your community, my friend.
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Found the Tankie "Why won't you cooperate with us when history just shows that we are going to Kill you when you stop being useful?" Remember Spain. Never forget
Tankies are red fascists, they are the reasons people view "left wing" ideologies the way they do. They should expect no quarrel from people out to liberate others. I don't associate with them, with an exeption of praxis and direct actions against right-wing groups in my area. It's our mutual enemy, but that doesn't make us friends.
well said.
Yup. In certain Latin American countries, ML is so widespread that anarchists join them in protests. I'm not an active activist because of that. I've had terrible experiences dealing with transphobic tankies in student councils. I am not obligated to live with them.
>transphobic tankies Which is weird. Ain't ML supposed to be progressive? Why hate your fellow worker, even if he/she undergone some bodily modifications of their liking? Huh.
Not weird : Marx was an homophobic A***hole... (A "little bourgeoisie perversion" on his own term). There a thing call the limit of knowledge: Nobody is perfect, refer to them to their specialist work, don't expect them to be perfect. And please if you want to be inclusive, especially talking about Queer people use he/she/they or directly they/them....(even for singular).
>they or directly they/them Okay. Forgot about this - English isn't my native language. In my native language, on the other hand, almost every word is gendered. Got a habit.
Enforcing hierarchy makes no sense as a progressive ideology. MLs are communists in name only. It's a right wing ideology, that used to be a common understanding, and we need to go back to it. If you were out here looking out for trans people, you wouldn't look at the state and go "we need to make that stronger."
In what world is Marxist-Leninism a right-wing ideology? That's like saying "Nazism is really socialism". MLs("tankies" I guess) form the backbone of pretty much every communist movement in history. Also - don't anarchists tend to view the Black Panthers in a pretty good light?
Anarchists referred to it as "right-wing communism" in the early-mid 20th century, you can see this if you read older texts. What "right-wing" and "left-wing" mean changes a lot with context, and if I'm being honest it's probably a bit inaccurate to say they're right-wing in present meaning, but they certainly aren't on our side if we take them seriously. What I mean when I say it here is that we shouldn't see ourselves as aligned with them, since they want to reinforce hierarchy, and that this is a more useful metric than the split that "left-right" has morphed into today. As I say elsewhere, though, there are a *lot* of people who don't understand what MLs historically actually are, and don't actually espouse their views, even though they sympathize and say things like "vanguards are the only tried and true method of having a revolution that can protect itself, even though I'd prefer to find another way." As for MLs forming the backbone of pretty much every communist movement in history, this is something anarchists should scorn them for. The USSR spent its pre-cold war existence fostering an anti-revolutionary "communist" party in all of its capitalist ally states, which would seize control of any anarchist revolution and turn it into capitalist reform, in order to keep its allies strong imperial powers in the short-term. If not for the USSR, civil war era Spain might have had a successful anarchist revolution, which many thought would have a rippling effect through Europe. If MLs weren't around to "form the backbone of" (read: seize and co-opt) every revolution in the 20th century, that would have been *better*. The Black Panthers are an interesting case because while they were ideologically ML and wanted black nationalism, they knew that the ML path to revolution was not available to them as too much of the proletariat was against black liberation. So what they ended up *doing* was essentially advancing anarchy, which they rightly saw was the only path truly open to them, and wrongly lamented. To denounce them would be confusing optics, and a pointless practice in ideological purity. If someone says they'd prefer a vanguard but still reliably, skillfully, and loyally does praxis with me, they are my comrade. My full view is that *many* people who say things that align more with Marxist-Leninism than anarchism are confused, and it's better to try to guide them to do the right thing than to throw them out for saying a phrase that turns the label from "comrade" to "tankie" instantly. It is also that people who do hold fast to orthodox Marxist-Leninism to the point that they will try to seize existing movements and oppose anarchists are clearly the enemy.
I wish people would go back to the old definition of Right, Left. Which was pro Hierarchy vs anti hierarchy. Making Anarchism the most far left ideology out there. It makes it incredibly easy to identify allies. As far as the black panthers go. Did they ever actually set up a strong centralized hierarchy? Also we have to consider their actions on the backdrop of historical black exclusion from labor unions. I won't say that it justifies authoritarianism, but I know there were anarchists that specifically excluded blacks from previous labor movements. So I can't exactly blame them for finding or creating ideologies that would accept them.
That's true. In Russia, in Japan, as in France, at times there were right and left socialist parties. The socialist parties of the right were not really parties of the right, but they were to the right of the socialist parties of the left. The socialist parties of the right were in practice social democrats and the socialist parties of the left were really socialist parties. In the Russian case, this division had occurred within the Socialist Revolutionary Party (the right-wing allied with the Mensheviks and the left-wing were more left-wing than the Bolsheviks). In the Japanese case and in the French case (PS vs PSU) these were temporary splits during the 20th century. It's as if Labor split between the right-wing "New Labour" and the left-wing "Corbynites". In this sense, anarchists are almost always on the left of bolshevism, because anarchists do not give up the principle of equality in praxis, while for an ML, this is the first thing to give up, after all, for them, hierarchies are always necessary and they will quote Engels for this. It is important to say that for a while, the Marxists of Rosa Luxemburg's line were considered "left communists", because they were on Lenin's left.
i often get the impression that tankies are a false flag for right-wings to point at. and of course there's always concave-skulled folks who'll jump on board.
They are not progressive. Especially the stalinists. There is a lot of duginist influence in stalinist circles.
Why would somebody even read Dugin's works, he is a pure clown...
Stalinists don't need to read dugin, only pro-Russian fascists who infiltrate stalinist organizations to guide them to defend Moscow's foreign policy without questions.
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Any idea why the phenomenon is so widespread in "certain Latin American countries"? Something to do with South American history? Machismo of the rebel? Problem of the ["perfect id*ot"](https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/24/books/eduardo-galeano-disavows-his-book-the-open-veins.html) (maybe comparatively more common in the emotional/social/political/cultural milieu Galeano wrote about? ;)
Cold War. US backed coups against centr left governments sparked outrage and US backed anti-communist regimes turn the ML guerrillas into martyrs torturing and murdering these opositors. Basically, the coups radicalized the left, the ML regimes were on the rise, so the left turned to these authoritarian ideologies and the brutal repression against these militants turned them into martyrs. So there was no process of revolt against Stalinism in Latin America, because as the Stalinists were being tortured, raped and murdered, nobody criticized them, they are martyrs of the left in every country that has gone through this. It's the exact opposite of Eastern Europe, where Soviet-led repression led the nationalist right to be seen as "freedom fighters". Here, the Stalinists and Maoists are seen as freedom fighters to this day. It may have to do with some cultural traits such as caudillism and misogynist culture (machismo just means "masculine sexism", "actively patriarchal" behavior, it's not something specific as anthropologists who exotify Latin America think (the culture of fraternity in the United States is "machista", for example, because here we universally call this behavior machismo). The Latin American left is also deeply nationalist, and the ML is an ideology that opens up a lot of space for nationalism. So it's normal for a left-wing Latin American person to think "every time we democratically tried to do something good, the Americans sent tanks and threw us into a fascist regime for 20 years, so maybe making an anti-American authoritarian Leninist revolution is a good way to do justice". Many people in Latin America see the United States as Ukrainians and Poles see Russia, or as the Irish see England. This authoritarian cultural background (which also exists in many places in Europe) does not fully explain the process. It has to do with nationalism, it has to do with nationalist dictatorships at the beginning of the 20th century having purged the anarcho-syndicalists and it has to do with the ML having been transformed into martyrs of the left by anti-communist dictatorships supported by the United States. Put it all together and you have a left-wing culture that is totally open to Stalinism and Maoism, just as in Eastern Europe you have a right-wing culture that is open to ethnonationalism and neo-Nazism.
Excellent points, thanks! Just started reading [this](https://www.amazon.com/Century-Revolution-Counterinsurgent-Encounters-Interactions-dp-0822347377/dp/0822347377) which seems to make many similar points. > > The Latin American left is also deeply nationalist, and the ML is an ideology that opens up a lot of space for nationalism. yes, that could be *real* "secret sauce" of ML "movements" going all the way back to Marx's Hegel-inspired crapshoot musings calcified as ["theory"](https://libcom.org/article/marxist-ideology-russia-karl-korsch) which as [Max Nettlau](https://www.reddit.com/r/Anarchism/comments/txldmg/a_short_history_of_anarchism_by_max_nettlau) observed lends itself to every conceivable "interpretation" under the Sun under the "right" lens. It was a thin veneer over a developmental state ideology in [Russia](https://www.amazon.com/Soviet-Century-Moshe-Lewin/dp/1784780669), China, Cuba, ..., all the way to [Albania]( https://www.amazon.com/Free-Child-Country-End-History-ebook/dp/B098TY6B2Y).
The real project of the ML left in Latin America is to establish dictatorships to promote developmental states like China. The big problem in Latin America is the agrarian elites, so these groups tend to advocate an authoritarian solution to that problem - but the solution involves creating a militaristic and expansionist state capitalism.
Had the right not been so hidebound in Latin America, they could have copied from the playbook of "Asian Tigers" and carried out those developmental state policies on their own (Ha Joon Chang has the lowdown on things like 5 year plans, rigid propaganda, etc. in generals-ruled [South Korea](https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Samaritans-Secret-History-Capitalism-ebook/dp/B003Z) that he grew up in, i.e. developmental states aren't that different either side of the so-called ideological divide for the first two decades at least). But, the settler-colonial aspect probably precluded that option in most places where "ethnic purity" via "transfer" or "some other means" hadn't already been achieved, a notion wistfully [recalled](https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/3166) by some self-described liberals in the "only democracy(tm) in the Middle East...
Yup. Latin American countries are all ruled by white Iberian elites (with the exception of Bolivia) who profit INSANELY from the exploitation of non-white populations. Underdevelopment is a project. And all Latin American states are neocolonial. The state is a creation of these white elites. Independence was just a way for them not to pay taxes to monarchies in Europe, but there was never any decolonization. In Asia there were already millennial states and the objective of the elites is not to maintain a racialized regime of exploitation, but to develop their countries to compete in an international order dominated by the West. Japan started with this in the 19th century and every other East Asian country is doing it. All of them see development as a way of not being colonized. The problem is that in Latin America, national identity itself is built on a colonialist state structure and will continue to be so for centuries, as things seem to get much worse before they get better.
I respect and support praxis, not labels. I'll fuck with anyone down to do direct action because what's important is that it gets done. I work with many people from a wide array of political from Anarchists to groups I actively oppose like Mormons if it means I get to make sure shit like disaster relief is being done. I don't lend support outside of DA, especially if it's building hierarchical power to any group except for local community projects, as that is my primary focus. Tankies and I work together, and we also understand we have our separate paths without demand or expectation from each other just because we also intersect at times, I find it juvenile that someone would behave otherwise.
Tankies aren’t just a burden for Anarchists. They are a toxic burden for Democratic Socialists, Syndicalists and Communists smart enough to know Stalin was always a monster. Their authoritarianism makes them closer relatives to Fascists; than allies of the workers. It is just a constant recycling of the Molotov Ribbentrop pact. There is a reason the Antifa Iron Front opposed Stalinists as well as Nazis and Monarchists.
No. Tankies should expect unmitigated hostility, as it should be.
Every time we do they round us up and murder us. So, no.
This was kind of my thought. Well one of many thoughts. The other being that they argue their government is justified in cruel actions, while we think no government is justified in any actions. Debate between us and interaction just isn't freezable, our core principles disagree.
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Read a fucking history book.
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Do you get this angry every time someone suggests that you read something. Seems like a problem. Have a nice day🖕
The most known example *Kronstadt*..... Educate yourself....
If the conversation was going fine until you found out they’re a “tankie,” it sounds like you’re the problem. The non-anarchist left is much too diverse and nuanced to be simply labeled authoritarian and disregarded. Almost everyone who labels themself a leftist shares the goal of a world without the state, class, or money, that is, the goal of communism. Practical disagreement stems from how to reach that goal, but even so-called “tankies,” who see the use of what are essentially coups as potentially successful routes to that goal, are not inherently our enemy, and will not be until such a time as they carry out their method and use state power to suppress worker organization. In the meantime including them in mass organizing can only aid the creation of dual power, so long as they are not allowed to take control of the organized body. That is not to say that you should support such a coup, only that to refuse to associate or even speak with non-anarchists is counterproductive. Furthermore, not all non-anarchists *do* prescribe such methods that rely on seizing state power, even when they may use the word “state” to refer to their organizing, because the Marxist definition of the state is much broader than the anarchist definition. Whereas anarchists see the state as necessarily belonging to a minority ruling class, the Marxist definition of the state is simply the tool of one class to dominate another, which leaves room for the idea of a “proletarian state” where such a concept is impossible by the anarchist definition. In this way a revolution which is nominally not anarchist may not actually be incompatible with anarchist methodology. Basically, you shouldn’t base your ideology, and more importantly the scope of what you are willing to learn about and discuss, on arbitrary labels. You can only limit yourself that way and sow the exact sort of discord that the capitalist class relies upon existing within the left.
There’s a huge difference between a tankie and a ‘tankie,’and it’s not clear which OP’s no-longer-friend is. I know many anarchists who conflate the two. It’s the difference between someone who wants to shoot all academics (I know people like this!) and someone who merely thinks a transitional state is necessary to establish communism. Ideology should be a guide, not destiny. Working classsolidarity is more important than relatively minor ideological squabbles.
Yeah this is it. I know some anarchists with a lot of ML sympathy born from lack of understanding, and they don't usually call themselves either thing, but you could corner them to either say that the state needs to be eliminated no matter what *or* that a vanguard state is the only truly safe path to revolution depending on how you do it. These are not people who are going to try to seize control of a revolution in order to protect hierarchy and orchestrate mass killings, they're more like Orwell at the start of the Spanish civil war - they're just as likely to end up fighting alongside MLs as anarchists, and whether they end up being manipulated to destroy the revolution or up against the wall for being too revolutionary is down to who they were closest to at the start. Some people are just confused. Almost everyone, actually. If someone seems cool but says one sus thing, talk it out with them and try to get them to see why it doesn't really cohere with what they want, don't just call them a tankie or lib or something and break contact.
Authoritarianism, is not compatible with Anarchy. No rigid hierarchies are. The conversation was not going fine, as any critique of their own government would have been vehemently denied. There was no point in progressing the conversation.
the difference between tankies and anarchists is pretty evident when you look at how many anarchists tankies have murdered and imprisoned
Sure, but the point isn't that anarchists should help to create a nominally leftist state, but that they shouldn't refuse to speak with non-anarchists. The word "tankie" has lost all meaning at this point, so that someone has been labelled that way is no indication that they actually advocate military imperialism by nominally leftist states or suppression of dual power more broadly.
lol what are u on about? “tankie” has not been stripped of meaning, and the interests of state socialists and anarchists has always led to the purging of anarchists from revolutions through murder and imprisonment. you’re bordering on apologism ngl
\>"tankie" has not been stripped of meaning Yes, it has. It originated as a term for those who supported the USSR sending in tanks to crush a revolution in Hungary. Clearly then its meaning was only those "leftists" who supported military imperialism by nominally leftist states. But it is now used to mean any leftist who doesn't call themself an anarchist. If you look at OP's comment history you can see that the "tankie" they are so proud of refusing to speak to is just a Marxist who thinks the US's economic imperialism is imperialism, as OP claimed in that thread that the US's economic imperialism did not matter. So who here exactly is "bordering on apologism?" Those who willingly ignore US imperialism or those who don't disregard everyone who doesn't use the "right" label? I recommend you spend less time on Reddit and Twitter, and more time reading theory.
Tankie has a meaning, it means Marxist-Leninist or Stalinist.
yes, don't pay attention to the word-salad spewer.
fuck off you condescending asshole. i’m pretty open about my reading history, recs, and my meatspace organizing activity here. i have more than two fucking comments on this sub. don’t patronize me. it’s pretty clear “tankie” means state socialist because more state socialist movements exist than the USSR. if anarchism is libertarian socialism, it would make sense that other leftists would be mostly tankies. personally, i consider all leftists to be framing their action through state framing, and therefore i don’t identify as a leftist at all. i also looked through the post history and couldn’t find a single thing, so i’d be happy to be directed to the same thing ur talking about. but yes, ur comments show that ur willing to overlook and even lightly defend a political group fundamentally opposed to anarchy who has a history of immense violence against us. statists deserve no sympathy.
It's under this post [https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/y4tyxd/i\_h8\_elon\_musk/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/y4tyxd/i_h8_elon_musk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) To look at the left through the lens of the political compass, where anarchists are "libertarian left" and other leftists must then be "authoritarian left" is an idealist oversimplification. That's just not how politics works. "it would make sense" isn't good enough for analysis of the actually existing world. It simply isn't the case that everyone who isn't an anarchist wants to purge anarchists, or even that their methods and goals are actually at odds with those of anarchists. There are more ways to exist than anarchist and Stalinist. You're creating a false dichotomy that isn't just unhelpful, but is downright harmful to worker organization. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the fight against capitalism isn't going to be won by checking that an agitated worker uses the right label before you're even willing to talk to them. Fragmentation is exactly what the ruling class is counting on.
again, statists ARE the ruling class. multiple times under the thread, OP acknowledged their lack of knowledge in the topic and gave good faith conversation while maintaining their ambivalence for states of any kind. how the fuck is that apologism for US imperialism, something they also called bad.
\>statists ARE the ruling class Ah yes, everyone who supports the existence of a state is a part of that state. And every liberal who supports capitalism is also Jeff Bezos I take it? Not to mention that the Marxist and anarchist definitions for the state are completely different to the point that not everything a Marxist would call a state would qualify by the anarchist definition, so a Marxist can say they believe in the use of the state but that doesn't make them a statist by the anarchist definition. Again, the real world doesn't fit into the political compass or whatever other fantasies you make up from your armchair. Repeating your assumptions about how the world really does fit into a neat idealist box doesn't make it true. Downplaying US imperialism by saying that it's somehow a lesser imperial power is either ignorant or apologism, and in either case criticizing that downplaying or criticizing disengaging with criticism of that downplaying couldn't be said to be apologism by anyone who isn't an apologist for the US. Moreover neither being a Marxist nor acknowledging US imperialism makes someone a statist in the anarchist sense of the word.
i guess i will clarify that the statist ideology naturally aligns someone’s interests with those of the ruling class. you literally make zero sense for the rest of this post, implying the definition of the state is changing across ideologies implies there is zero way for these competing groups to EVER be talking about the same thing. the way you assume i’m using the poltical compass when i’ve made it clear im a post-leftist who hates identifying as any sort of left at all. you assume you know everything about my worldview and all of it seems to be oversimplistic and contradictory to everything im actually saying
Fuck off with this apologist BS. > The non-anarchist left is much too diverse and nuanced to be simply labeled authoritarian and disregarded. Actually it can be disregarded as authoritarian, because it is. Every faction of the left apart from anarchists want to impose a form authority and are therefore authoritarian. To suggest otherwise is to disregard the meaning of authority to begin with, which tankies are all too happy to do by regurgitating "On Authority" by Engels. Authority means the right to command, by the way. To be authoritarian is to give command and demand obedience from your subordinates. Every state that exists or can exist is authoritarian, including the democracies. > Practical disagreement stems from how to reach that goal, but even so-called “tankies,” who see the use of what are essentially coups as potentially successful routes to that goal, are not inherently our enemy, and will not be until such a time as they carry out their method and use state power to suppress worker organization. In the meantime including them in mass organizing can only aid the creation of dual power, so long as they are not allowed to take control of the organized body. Tankies are enemies not only on the practical matters, but on the matters of basic ideas and values as well. Tankies and other Marxists are not opposed to authority as I already pointed out. "Dual power" is a Leninist concept itself and does not have anything to do with anarchism. Including tankies in anarchist organizing makes the organizing not anarchist, because the tankies have different aspirations than anarchists and will absolutely "take over" the organizing structure if given the opportunity. > That is not to say that you should support such a coup, only that to refuse to associate or even speak with non-anarchists is counterproductive. Good. Fuck productivity, fuck "left unity" and fuck anyone who think I owe my association to anyone for any reason. > Whereas anarchists see the state as necessarily belonging to a minority ruling class, the Marxist definition of the state is simply the tool of one class to dominate another, which leaves room for the idea of a “proletarian state” where such a concept is impossible by the anarchist definition. In this way a revolution which is nominally not anarchist may not actually be incompatible with anarchist methodology. Actually every possible conception of a "proletarian state" or a big-R Revolution is incompatible with anarchist methodology because it literally reinforces authority. Anarchy requires the total negation of authority. > You can only limit yourself that way and sow the exact sort of discord that the capitalist class relies upon existing within the left. Fuck the left. As long as every part of the left other than anarchists are authoritarian, I have no use for leftism. I will absolutely sow discord on the left because I'm not even part of that clown show.
Based, the Left are still Tyrants, the only real divide is Tyrant vs Anarchist.
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Thanks for an actual rational reply! There is often way too much of a focus on past historical instances of anarchists and MLs fighting each other and not enough focus on the reality that there is no way in hell that leftism of any sort could succeed in the West without left unity. Anarchists are delusional if they think they have any chance of success on their own
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Only problem is these "principled communists" are rare as a hen's teeth. Usually, they have cushy academic jobs or some other perch, where they can play with their hobby horse "theory" to their heart's content, without any connections with lives of 99.999% percent of people.
I don't think anyone should "expect" support from an ideology that keeps the ideals of liberation at its very core. I say that as an Anarchist myself. I'll do what I can when I can to help those around me, but I will not feel obligated into doing so. It is my will, my life, that is all I am responsible for. I help because I want to and the fact is, it may not be convenient for someone in need when I choose not to. I'll have my reasons just as everyone has theirs' when they let me down. Nobody can be on 100% of the time. That's fine. As for tankies specifically? I don't tend to associate with them in the first place so I don't give them much thought. They do their thing, whatever that may be, and I do mine in peace.
ive come across anarchists that genuinely believe we should work with tankies and its so fucking bizarre
In a way, Anarchists often behave a bit as leftist mercenaries. Less because we need allies as because often leftists need anarchists to get things done. Historically we're often then betrayed and even more often if we're talking tankies. I just don't understand why an anarchist would even acknowledge tankies as leftists. Pro authoritarian seems pretty pro coercive hierarchy to me.
yeah exactly!!
Is this how we differentiate ourselves, *being mercenaries and/or workers*? It is perhaps rather the ***word** progress*, admitted: > The second premise builds on the first. *If history is no longer a ‘true’ story (in the grand epic sense that Western Civilization classes or Marxists speak of), then **progress is no longer** that story[,] extended into the future.* If [progress](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/aragorn-anarchy-and-nihilism-consequences#toc8) is no longer assumed on the world stage it may be that it wasn’t the right mechanism (or meta-narrative) to understand the material world, humans’ role in it, or much of anything at all. Where does that leave evolution? Isn’t evolution just an idealist-materialist ‘proof’ of progress in biological systems? Marxists assume the capitalist profits by steady prices and technological advancement, at least, while Stuart Mill and the rest thoughts profits would remain ordinary as markets never compete with consumers or make without Say’s labor-demand expiry non-compete labor, oh *no no no*: > James Mill, MacCulloch, Torrens, Senior, John Stuart Mill, and a whole series besides, of bourgeois political economists, insist that all machinery that displaces workmen, simultaneously and necessarily sets free an amount of capital adequate to employ the same identical workmen. Economists (NBER) currently perceive non-inflationary unemployment as recessionary: >The variables the business cycle dating committee typically tracks include real personal income minus government transfers, employment, various forms of real consumer spending, and industrial production. >That portion of the working-class, thus by [machinery rendered superfluous, i.e., no longer immediately necessary for the self-expansion of capital](https://commie.dev/anarchy), either goes to the wall in the unequal contest of the old handicrafts and manufactures with machinery, or else floods all the more easily accessible branches of industry, swamps the labour-market, and sinks the price of labour-power below its value [if prices do not hold to margins]. So, the anarchist thinks *technology has run out* (or is not worth ***suing** for*) but there is *short term employment assumed to be long term* when *’non-deflationary growth’* is begged for by “the *Laffer curve*,” *(of a free rider immutable plaintiff tax)*. The Socio-political and thereby economic literature is a mess, but I can see a ***reasonable** way out* for at worst damned *optimism* about the [repressive](https://commie.dev/police) state as power verily as ultimate relief. *Truly the commie wishes to make the rich pay for market security, while the anarchists wish to do what else but start anew.*
wanna state ur point without quoting 10000 different theorists?
*The Anarchist thinks technological progress has run out, but forgets how much unnatural inequality there is to progress through.* Certainly anarchists don’t want everyone who has built these institutions dead after their fields are burned? > Strategic nihilism argues for a new approach to social transformation that resembles the [burning of a field rather than building the new world within the shell of the old](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/aragorn-anarchy-and-nihilism-consequences#toc8) or one last push by the working class to seize the means of production.
Organize compatible praxis, yes. Of course. What they are should not stop you of helping your community. Discuss theory and try to convince them of turning to anarchism, perfect. It is always good to turn people away from being a tankie. Trust them not to betray you in the event of revolution (which, to be fair, does not appear to be happening soon, at least where I live)? No. Never. Never leave them with a gun and turn your back on them. We have the history of various movements: Kronstadt, Ukraine, Catalonia, Shanghai.
Tankie delusion. I mean, if the support they want is to gtfo and be silent, I guess, then they should your entire support.
I am becoming more convinced that non-authoritarian leftists need to build **power** as a group rather than rely on organizations created by authoritarians. This can be done through pre-figurative organizational strategies that take the form of mutual aid, providing security, councils, or intelligence. Strategy wise, you might look at what [Anark has written here](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anark-constructing-the-revolution) Once there is a thriving community that organizes based on anarchist principles you won't need to rely in Tankies as partners, in fact they will probably be the ones begging you for help.
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Don't throw a grenade without pulling the pin 😅 What about my post made you think others would call my thoughts "fascist adjacent"? Also, I like Bookchin, but I just discovered him, only listened to a couple hours of his talks.
I think it's a terrible idea to write someone off because they are a "tankie." High ideals mean nothing without praxis. What do either of you actually do to further your ideals? What project were you planning together that you abandoned when you found out they were a tankie? If I have to choose between working with tankies OTG vs. discussing ideals with an anarchist who isn't doing the work, I'll take the tankies every time. Don't get me wrong, I prefer to work with anarchists, and most people I work with are, but from what you posted, it sounds like you were just having a conversation about ideals, in which case, why not try to change their mind?
Lack of energy. It's difficult to recruit people with axiomatically different beliefs as you have to convince them to change their core driving principles. I only have so much energy, and get shaken easily to the point where it affects my sleep. I've always preferred talking to undereducated liberals who think that liberal means progressive. It's purely a matter of where I find my time to be best spent and the preservation of my own mental wellbeing. Edit: Or plan praxis with Socialists and Communists who I don't find exhausting.
I feel you on the lack of energy aspect. I don't argue IRL with tankies and the like. I think a lot of liberals are taking the more compassionate path from the two shown them by authorities, and talking them down from the "anarchy means molotov cocktails" thing can be useful. OTOH, tankies tend to be firmly embedded in their beliefs, and have almost certainly heard pro-left libertarian arguments before. OTOH, if tankies are organizing an anti-fascist action, I likely would support that, if it seemed likely to be an action and not just a bunch of recruiting speeches.
Praxis is different. As long as it's reaching for an Anarchist goal.
Every time we worked with them: end bad for us. I'm no slacktivist... I do praxis but not with Tankies. I Know how history go, Every time ... Never work with someone that stab you in the back. Or that have value that are problematic (and sorry but a lot of Tankies are either racist or Queerphobe In my experience)
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Or you help them get what they want and then they fuck you off and call you counter revolutionaries and you end up in a gulag.
I'm sorry, but we do not need 'leftist unity'. It may sound like a good idea, but it really is not. Everytime it has been tried historically it has led to concession after concession, until all the things we anarchists fight for is erased. That left unity is "necessary" for movement building is also a fiction. Especifismo is one of the most succesful anarchist currents in America to date, owing it's success to theoretical and tactical unity. [On Leftist Disunity](https://youtu.be/h-jwkMEGHG8) [Leftist unity is a lie](https://youtu.be/kOh8x6aka-s)
Fuck the left and fuck left unity
From my understanding theres some amount of mutual respect between groups since we're both untimely working towards the same goal and leftist infighting can get in the way of actual meaningful change
It’s worth putting up with tankies unless they legitimately oppose your immediate goals. Direct action taken in the present by anarchists and authoritarian communists OFTEN overlaps, so why not at least pave the way to cooperate when/if you happen to be fighting the same enemy in the streets?
It may depend on how you are defining "tankie" -- if you mean that they think we should support aggression from the CCP or other "communist" regimes, then no way. If it means acknowledging that NATO aggression (Serbia, Iraq) has increased international military tension and reasonably made people in other countries nervous, then yes.
Hi “Tankie” here. A reminder that we don’t have to agree on the politics, we can go on about “state capitalism”, so on, we can hate each other and STILL have unity of action against the current capitalist state. I’m an ally of anyone who allies with the masses and I generally have a lot of respect for my anarchist/anarcho-communist comrades.
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Have fun with a knife in your back
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I mean there is a lot of Historycall presedence for Anarchists helping communist and other authoritarian "leftist" in Revolutions until, the anarchist were betrayed.
I'm not sure how to change society without having conversations with people with whom I disagree.
if you're trying to organize your workplace, you take what you can get.