this post was submitted on 17 Nov 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.
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Rules
Version without spoilers
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
That means 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).
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The only dangerous minority is the rich.
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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.
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Your comment reads like you're shooting down this agitprop because it doesn't have an explicitly revolutionary spin, which seems extremely counterproductive. If we only stick with revolutionary rhetoric, we will never attract those shy of revolution, who only understand it as a violent upheaval.
Forming communities and spreading agitprop which promotes more community formation is fundamental to any path forward. Communities are the best tool to saving anyone from the currently fucked situation, even if toppling never happens. It's also the only means to build the trust needed for legitimate organizing. Agitprop only promoting community formation should not only be tolerated or accepted, it should be strongly encouraged.
The problem is that revolution is necessary, and simply hoping things get better isn't acceptable. Agitprop needs a practical message as well.
Again, whether necessary or not, you are immediately alienating anyone who isn't ready for revolution by always putting it in the message. If we expect to ever compete with centrist and fascist propaganda, we must implement their same tactics in our agitprop, which means pipelining.
At the same time, what revolution means also varies. Some think hacktivism, asking for Jane, and other counter-establishment movements - for others it's waging a guerilla war against the US government and the upper class. I just want to get the ball rolling, regardless of where it starts rolling.
I agree with pipelining, but messages can't conflict or leave out the further conclusions. I do a lot of pipelining on Lemmy myself.
That seems like a pretty arbitrary rule which no other political groups doing pipelining adhere to. Outside messages often contradict as you go deeper with white supremacy, cults, and neoliberal rhetoric. They also constantly leave out the more extreme messaging on the outside and slowly ramp up the other stuff.
I don't doubt you've moved leftists further left, but actually shifting centrists, conservatives, or anyone else does not seem likely with your approach.
Plenty of conservative libertarian farmer types who voted for trump would agree about the importance of community, but they will immediately check out if you even hint at toppling the government, or even mentioning socialized infrastructure. We need to adjust our agitprop so it can at least start reaching out that far, and by doing so we'll be more likely to capture centrists for pipelining. We need a large portion of most countries if we want a global revolution, and we need agitprop that can gain that.
You adjust ajitprop based on audience, and want to serve as a slide without preventing further movement. If you give a leftist message that takes an anti-revolutionary stance, that makes further pipelining more difficult.
On "lefty memes," the people are largely liberals and progressives that can be converted into actual leftists with proper messaging, I wouldn't worry about appealing to libertarian conservatives here.
The above agitprop post is not anti-revolutionary, it is just not explicitly revolutionary. It does not make pipelining harder, as it transitions smoothly into agitprop promoting militant protection of communities and community activism which can mesh cleanly with revolution.
Liberals and progressives are both still solidly in the "work within the system" camp but are receptive to community building and counter-establishment action. I've seen them receptive to as far as underground distribution of abortion meds, and even activist vandalism. Most are still shy of the idea of taking up arms, and any mention of 'revolution'. I expect you will end up getting better capture by just omitting talking about revolution and instead just talking about the actual practices and infrastructure that lead to it.
Gonna have to agree to disagree here, the overt pacifism and lack of even a unionization message ultimately means it delays revolutionary messaging.
That's the beauty of decentralized activism. You do it your way, I do it mine, and whichever works grows by success. Parallelized trial and error.