this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2025
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"Tankie" does not come from Tiananmen Square, that is a common misconception. The term "tankie" is 33 years older than the Tiananmen Square massacre.
It originated to describe people who supported the 1956 Soviet Union military intervention in Hungary. Stalin sent in a bunch of T-35 tanks to crush the Hungarian Revolution. He was successful, and thousands of people died in the process.
Ever since then, "tankie" has been used as a derogatory term against Stalinists, Marxist-Leninists, communists, and leftists in general.
To be fair, tanks seem to be a favored tool of these oppressive regimes. I'm personally not against communism, they have some good ideas like universal child care, guaranteed jobs, and housing (even though the latter may be considered sub-par by some). The problem comes when these fucking authoritarian cheerleaders come out and say communist governments were never oppressive.
Tankies never seem to get that that part is not being critized, but the subversive of the movement by authoritarians.
Extremists like to use "alternative facts" or whatever other tactics achieve their goals. The means does not matter to them, only the ends, which they feel self-righteously justifies anything to achieve.
And then separately from that, gullible people also exist too. It is a bias that we all could fall prey to, though some of us seem more on guard against it than others.
(Tbf, many of those claiming those alternative facts are quite aware of just how nonfactual they actually are - they simply do not care as power, rather than correctness, is all that there is to them.)
Except you'd not get that healthcare and the rest if you didn't pay people off.
In theory it might seem fine, but in reality it was just a dictatorship, and quite a brutal one too.
eh docs and nurses are pretty fucking cool but don't work for free. of course you're going to pay people off, they need wages ffs
Communism = no currency. There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of knowledge regarding communism in here. A bit of an echo chamber. It's funny how so many can hate something so much without actually knowing what it is they're hating. Ha.
...I'd prefer a single payer system where no one went without. Broke my nose while living in the UK and was impressed with their no bullshit system.
you can have democratic socialism of many flavors without going full on communism, and you'll never get to communism from here, abjectly shittified capitalism. I'd prefer denmark over...well, where has communism worked?
Like, I respect the medical professionals Cuba produces but would never want to live there.
You're advocating for the "lesser evil" option without having a basic understanding of leftist ideology. It's still capitalism, it's still a terrible right winger framework.
you didn't answer the question at all. call it whatever you want, I'd rather have something that I can see working - than something that I've never seen work. Unfettered capitalism is cancer, sure. But that's not exclusive to capitalism - government without restraints usually is miserable - see the USSR.
if you can show me communism working I'm down to learn new things; but you can't point at liberal social democracies and say "that's still in the terrible right winger framework" when it's functioning far better than the US or the communist countries I've seen.
Another data point would be great, but from my POV all I can see is left---(social democracies)---center-----right (capitalist fascism)
note there's no (communist society) on that spectrum.
Communism has never been implemented. You're unaware of what communism is, so how would you know anyways? Social Democracy Isn't on the left side of the spectrum. There's no such thing as a leftist that supports capitalism. Capitalism does not work without exploitation.
China is working towards communism, and the USSR made huge progress, all while at war with the west the entire time.
I'm busy reading and can't be bothered to continue this conversation. Later.
You libs sure are angry birds.
Thats a really interesting bit of history, thank you for the additional context
Their name references a genocide, I doubt in good faith
Krono? Or are you referring to someone else in this thread?
Ohhh. I think you may have gotten confused about where you're replying to. I hadn't even seen them, as they weren't in the direct chain of comments I was replying in. I was thanking Krono for explaining that tankie came from violence carried out in the Soviet Union long before the tianamen square massacre, and so the name predated that particular act of violence
Anyway, I hope you have a lovely day :)
I don't think it is a common misconception, I think it's pretty common knowledge (at least among the terminally online) that it started with the Hungarian Revolution.
It seems more common knowledge for people actually in Europe. Many people in the USA seem to have never really heard the word. Especially the younger generations (which since this is a memes community... does seem slightly relevant to your statement, as I would expect a broader populace here as opposed to a community dedicated to discussions of world-wide import).
The term mostly had been invoked by anti-authoritarian leftists derisively toward anyone who still supported the Soviet Union. In time, the usage generalized to apply broadly to authoritarian leftists, such as Marxist-Lenininsts (or Stalinists).
Now is it largely misused by liberals to designate anyone strongly critical of Western imperialism, which includes everyone from anarchists to campists.
Thank you.