this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2024
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Lefty Memes

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An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of the "ML" influence of instances like lemmy.ml and lemmygrad. This is a place for undogmatic shitposting and memes from a progressive, anti-capitalist and truly anti-imperialist perspective, regardless of specific ideology.

Serious posts, news, and discussion go in c/Socialism.

If you are new to socialism, you can ask questions and find resources over on c/Socialism101.

Please don't forget to help keep this community clean by reporting rule violations, updooting good contributions and downdooting those of low-quality!

Rules

0. Only post socialist memes

That refers to funny image macros and means that generally videos and screenshots are not allowed. Exceptions include explicitly humorous and short videos, as well as (social media) screenshots depicting a funny situation, joke, or joke picture relating to socialist movements, theory, societal issues, or political opponents. Examples would be the classic case of humorous Tumblr or Twitter posts/threads. (and no, agitprop text does not count as a meme)

1. Socialist Unity in the form of mutual respect and good faith interactions is enforced here

Try to keep an open mind, other schools of thought may offer points of view and analyses you haven't considered yet. Also: This is not a place for the Idealism vs. Materialism or rather Anarchism vs. Marxism debate(s), for that please visit c/AnarchismVsMarxism.

2. Anti-Imperialism means recognizing capitalist states like Russia and China as such,

as well as condemning (their) imperialism, even if it is of the "anti-USA" flavor.

3. No liberalism, (right-wing) revisionism or reactionaries.

That includes so called: Social Democracy, Democratic Socialism, Dengism, Market Socialism, Patriotic Socialism, National Bolshevism, Anarcho-Capitalism etc. . Anti-Socialist people and content have no place here, as well as the variety of "Marxist"-"Leninists" seen on lemmygrad and more specifically GenZedong (actual ML's are welcome as long as they agree to the rules and don't just copy paste/larp about stuff from a hundred years ago).

4. No Bigotry.

The only dangerous minority is the rich.

5. Don't demonize previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.

We must constructively learn from their mistakes, while acknowledging their achievements and recognizing when they have strayed away from socialist principles.

(if you are reading the rules to apply for modding this community, mention "Mantic Minotaur" when answering question 2)

6. Don't idolize/glorify previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.

Notable achievements in all spheres of society were made by various socialist/people's/democratic republics around the world. Mistakes, however, were made as well: bureaucratic castes of parasitic elites - as well as reactionary cults of personality - were established, many things were mismanaged and prejudice and bigotry sometimes replaced internationalism and progressiveness.

7. Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:

(This is not a definitive list, the spirit of the other rules still counts! Eventual duplicates with other rules are for emphasis.)

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 6 days ago (35 children)

The Israelites conquered Canaan from the Canaanites who were already living there.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 6 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (27 children)

Americans conquered America from the aboriginals who were living there

Edit: Btw, if it wasn't clear, I'm disagreeing with you, because by your logic we would also have to condemn:

Egypt who conquered Nubia, parts of the Levant, and various neighboring regions multiple times.

Babylon and Assyria dominated who Sumerian lands, various Mesopotamian city-states, and parts of the Levant.

The Persian Empire conquered most of the Middle East, Egypt, and parts of India, and later Central Asia.

Islamic Caliphates (Umayyad and Abbasid) who conquered parts of North Africa, Spain, the Levant, Persia, and more.

The Ottoman Empire that controlled large parts of Eastern Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East.

The Roman Empire that conquered Britain, France (Gaul), parts of the Middle East, North Africa, and much of Europe.

The Macedonian Empire (Alexander the Great) who conquered Persia, Egypt, parts of India, and Greece.

The Viking Conquests that involved colonization of parts of England, France (Normandy), Iceland, Greenland, and even North America. Napoleonic France conquered parts of Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, and attempted to hold Egypt.

The British Empire colonized the Americas, Australia, India, parts of Africa, and various islands worldwide.

The Aztecs conquered neighboring Mesoamerican tribes before the Spanish conquest.

Incas who subjugated various tribes across the Andes, forming an extensive empire.

The Spanish Empire who conquered most of Central and South America, the Caribbean, and parts of North America.

The United States acquired Native American lands across the continent through treaties, purchases, and conquests (e.g., Mexican-American War for the Southwest).

Portuguese colonizers who took land from indigenous Brazilian tribes.

The Mongol Empire who conquered China, Persia, the Middle East, and parts of Europe.

The Chinese Dynasties (Han, Tang, Qing, etc.) that expanded China’s borders through conquests, including Tibet, Xinjiang, and Manchuria.

The Japanese Empire that colonized Korea, parts of China, Taiwan, and occupied Southeast Asia during World War II.

The Russian Empire/Soviet Union that expanded into Central Asia, Siberia, parts of Eastern Europe, and Alaska (later sold to the USA).

The Zulu Kingdom who expanded in Southern Africa, subjugating neighboring tribes.

The Ethiopian Empire that conquered various kingdoms within what is now Ethiopia.

The Colonial Powers (Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, Portugal) partitioned and ruled over nearly all of Africa.

Maori Tribes in New Zealand conquered and displaced other Polynesian tribes.

Polynesian Expansion colonized the Pacific islands, often displacing or assimilating previous inhabitants.

European Colonization of Australia: British settlers took land from Indigenous Australians.

Surely, it is impractical that we demand that current nations and peoples return land to those who lived there centuries or millennia ago. Modern borders are often built upon layers of historical migrations and conquests, making a clear-cut solution impractical. We can't use moral rubrics of today to judge past (and that's talking centuries an millenia ago) actions.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 days ago (6 children)

Depends on what you mean by condemn. All of those things were bad when they happened. But we can’t forever condemn the descendants of warlike people as tainted colonizers.

On the other hand, in the case of some of the more recent events, we still have people today who are marginalized, impoverished, and lack access to land as a result of those past atrocities. Most notably for the west, this includes native Americans and Palestinians, among others. This situation calls out for a just solution. The redistribution of land, extra services, reparations, etc. should all be on the table for the descendants of the colonized. But notably, the expulsion of the descendants of the colonizers should not be—this will just perpetuate a similar injustice into the future.

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