I’m gonna try and give an actual brief history. The word “Tankie” originated from a split in the Communist party of Great Britain in the 1950s, over the Soviet invasion of Hungary. Those who supported the invasion were called “Tankies” by those who opposed it.
That would’ve been it, and it would have faded into history as an obscure piece of British leftist slang, if it weren’t for the word’s rediscovery decades later, where more modern leftists used the term in a half joking way among each other.
At some point over… Really just the past couple of years or so, tankie breached containment, and has been worming its way into non-leftist people’s vocabularies, where it’s lost any and all connection to its original meaning.
So when, say, OP of this thread uses it, it’s unclear what they mean. Do they mean communists in general? Leftists in general? Supporters of China? What does it mean for a white, Western, leftist to ‘support’ China anyway? Is it just a general term for someone they deem Authoritarian? Or do they mean a specific kind of “Patriotic Socialist” who LARPs as a communist but actually holds deeply reactionary ideas?
It’s all very unclear. So I wouldn’t take “Tankie discourse” too seriously tbh. It’s just a thought terminating cliche at this point. If you want to talk about any of those groups mentioned above… Just be specific and dunk on who you want to dunk on. There’s legitimate, good faith, critiques to be made of all of them. Just make them, and be thoughtful about it.
But running around and calling anyone you don’t like a Tankie doesn’t foster good discussion. Especially when I have to sit down and decipher which one of 6 different possible definitions of “Tankie” someone might be referring to.
The USA has explicit foreign policy doctrine stating that using strongmen dictators is important for anticommunism. The USA supports over 70% of the world’s dictators.
The USA also has the worlds largest prison population and uses them for slave labour.
The USA has been involved in many genocides over the years.
No cause the US would have to even pretend to give a shit about its own populace and pretend be a social serving government, for anyone that supports the US in it’s current form to not just be an authoritarian pro-capitalist dick sucker.
No tankies like all that stuff but with the words “for the greater good” slapped on their ass while gargling authoritarian balls.
No, I am a tankie but I don’t support any authoritarian regime. I don’t support America or the EU for example. I like Cuba. They have laws mandating queer rights, women’s right, health care, strong democratic participation.
Around here it is pretty common. Easily. Most of the people who actually ever worked to improve society have been labeled tankies so it is a badge of honor.
Theoriticaly yes.
I mean ignoring the russian thing completely.
China still has some serious large scale privacy and human rights violations.
Alghtough arguably as with ‘woke’ in reality tankie is a meaningless term used to divide pepole between us and them instead of actually just discussing the actual issues.
And what are you doing with privacy? We have none here in the US and our lives are not really any worse for it is there? If anything the only time we see any privacy rights is when some one wants to hide how they are hurting us. Corrupt politicians and the like.
There is definietly more privacy than in china( Not that the issue doesnt exist in Us ,Europe or the rest of the world,but its not as bad ,you can get vpns or messaging apps that will tell the goverment to f* off or simply beacuse they dont collect any relevant data like signal ).
Also you still left out massive human rights violations, arguably much more important thing .
What rights? To my knowledge all of those claims are made up by our state department to cover our genocide in the middle east and our funding and training far right extremeists.
Yes there’s no privacy in the US, and the US has numerous human rights violations, but China is obvioudly worse cus no freedom, inscrutable asiatics, tank man. Checkmate tankie
I asked this question a little while ago because I’ve heard the term but it’s not always clear what it is referring to. I think that similarly to ‘woke’ it is used in the context of ideological or political battles, so the definition is variable depending on the context. Opponents will likely have the widest definition since that way they can insult the largest group of people whose beliefs they disagree with, eg. “If you support Ukraine you’re a tankie”.
Words like ‘progressive’, ‘socialist’, ‘authoritarian’ are more appropriately descriptive if that’s what you’re going for. If you want to have an argument then ‘woke’, ‘tankie’, ‘SJW’, ‘karen/keith’, ‘snowflake’, ‘bootlicker’, ‘edgelord’, ‘redditor’ are good choices.
The term originated in a British socialist political party, I can’t remember which, as a term for other socialists that supported the Soviet Union’s invasion of I think Hungary. The tank parts originates from the fact tanks were used. Like you say though, the term has become very watered down now and people kind of just throw it around without much discernment.
What is tankie?
It’s the liberal equivalent of “woke”
A welder who works on metal storage vessels, sometimes called tanks.
I’m gonna try and give an actual brief history. The word “Tankie” originated from a split in the Communist party of Great Britain in the 1950s, over the Soviet invasion of Hungary. Those who supported the invasion were called “Tankies” by those who opposed it.
That would’ve been it, and it would have faded into history as an obscure piece of British leftist slang, if it weren’t for the word’s rediscovery decades later, where more modern leftists used the term in a half joking way among each other.
At some point over… Really just the past couple of years or so, tankie breached containment, and has been worming its way into non-leftist people’s vocabularies, where it’s lost any and all connection to its original meaning.
So when, say, OP of this thread uses it, it’s unclear what they mean. Do they mean communists in general? Leftists in general? Supporters of China? What does it mean for a white, Western, leftist to ‘support’ China anyway? Is it just a general term for someone they deem Authoritarian? Or do they mean a specific kind of “Patriotic Socialist” who LARPs as a communist but actually holds deeply reactionary ideas?
It’s all very unclear. So I wouldn’t take “Tankie discourse” too seriously tbh. It’s just a thought terminating cliche at this point. If you want to talk about any of those groups mentioned above… Just be specific and dunk on who you want to dunk on. There’s legitimate, good faith, critiques to be made of all of them. Just make them, and be thoughtful about it.
But running around and calling anyone you don’t like a Tankie doesn’t foster good discussion. Especially when I have to sit down and decipher which one of 6 different possible definitions of “Tankie” someone might be referring to.
:dracula: Just anyone that is to the left of you on foreign policy.
What is a Tankie?
:abbie-cocktail:
A miserable little pile of secrets.
But enough talk …
Have at you!
:xi-reactionary-spotted:
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Those who support authoritative regime. I think it’s the new commies. Tend to be used on those who are sympathetic to Russia and China.
Russia is as not a communist state. No one on the left is supporting Puttin lead Russia.
Ambivalent KPRF noises
The USA has explicit foreign policy doctrine stating that using strongmen dictators is important for anticommunism. The USA supports over 70% of the world’s dictators.
The USA also has the worlds largest prison population and uses them for slave labour.
The USA has been involved in many genocides over the years.
Are people who support the USA tankies?
No cause the US would have to even pretend to give a shit about its own populace and pretend be a social serving government, for anyone that supports the US in it’s current form to not just be an authoritarian pro-capitalist dick sucker.
No tankies like all that stuff but with the words “for the greater good” slapped on their ass while gargling authoritarian balls.
No, I am a tankie but I don’t support any authoritarian regime. I don’t support America or the EU for example. I like Cuba. They have laws mandating queer rights, women’s right, health care, strong democratic participation.
How do you identify as a tankie?
I only see the word used on other people, but never see some one use it on themselves
Around here it is pretty common. Easily. Most of the people who actually ever worked to improve society have been labeled tankies so it is a badge of honor.
What if I am fully sympathetic towards China out of those two?
I am sympathetic towards Russian fear of nato expansion but believe Vlad bungled so fucking bad he made things worse then ever at breakneck speeds.
Am I a tankie.
Theoriticaly yes. I mean ignoring the russian thing completely. China still has some serious large scale privacy and human rights violations. Alghtough arguably as with ‘woke’ in reality tankie is a meaningless term used to divide pepole between us and them instead of actually just discussing the actual issues.
And what are you doing with privacy? We have none here in the US and our lives are not really any worse for it is there? If anything the only time we see any privacy rights is when some one wants to hide how they are hurting us. Corrupt politicians and the like.
There is definietly more privacy than in china( Not that the issue doesnt exist in Us ,Europe or the rest of the world,but its not as bad ,you can get vpns or messaging apps that will tell the goverment to f* off or simply beacuse they dont collect any relevant data like signal ). Also you still left out massive human rights violations, arguably much more important thing .
Something like half of Chinese people use a VPN and the state censoring western sites Facebook and Twitter is a good thing
What rights? To my knowledge all of those claims are made up by our state department to cover our genocide in the middle east and our funding and training far right extremeists.
Yes there’s no privacy in the US, and the US has numerous human rights violations, but China is obvioudly worse cus no freedom, inscrutable asiatics, tank man. Checkmate tankie
So people who support Ukraine are tankies?
I’d argue they’re not commies - they don’t give a shit about worker enfranchisement. They’re just red-coded fascists.
True that.
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Basically communists who defend Mao and Stalin. (And sometimes, oddly enough, the current governments of Russia and China.)
Relevant Wikipedia.
a far-left nazi
I asked this question a little while ago because I’ve heard the term but it’s not always clear what it is referring to. I think that similarly to ‘woke’ it is used in the context of ideological or political battles, so the definition is variable depending on the context. Opponents will likely have the widest definition since that way they can insult the largest group of people whose beliefs they disagree with, eg. “If you support Ukraine you’re a tankie”.
Words like ‘progressive’, ‘socialist’, ‘authoritarian’ are more appropriately descriptive if that’s what you’re going for. If you want to have an argument then ‘woke’, ‘tankie’, ‘SJW’, ‘karen/keith’, ‘snowflake’, ‘bootlicker’, ‘edgelord’, ‘redditor’ are good choices.
The term originated in a British socialist political party, I can’t remember which, as a term for other socialists that supported the Soviet Union’s invasion of I think Hungary. The tank parts originates from the fact tanks were used. Like you say though, the term has become very watered down now and people kind of just throw it around without much discernment.