this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2025
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MeanwhileOnGrad
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That's their secret. They're also right-wingers.
So far left, they're right. Bizzaro Centrists.
I think it's more that a genuinely leftist movement in Russia was captured and subjugated by authoritarians and they spent 70 years muddying the waters about what leftism means with their powerful propaganda.
Strong evidence for the horseshoe theory.
To be fair, this is largely why I discredit the left-right paradigm of politics. The graph adding authoritarian vs libertarian helps a bit, but it's just too complex of a set of ideals to break into simple binaries.
The .ml crew are genuinely leftists. They believe in the value of socialized systems and collective empowerment as opposed to individual merit. The problem is that they're also authoritarian nutjobs who actively cover up and/or support the wholesale murder of out groups.
Yes, there's a decent argument that this isn't true leftism, or a true belief in collective empowerment and the like, but that's kind my point. Politics are too complicated for simplistic binaries. They carry a number of beliefs that are decidedly left, while simultaneously sharing far more beliefs than they're willing to admit with the batshit insane nationalists that they claim to detest. They defend authoritarianism at every turn, while simultaneously speaking down to those they perceive as fascist. And not all of it - emphasis on "all", as a good portion of it is - is as hypocritical as we'd like to believe. Our simplified political binaries just do a bad job of discussing complex ideologies.
They're just nonexhaustive ways of describing ideologies according to considerations that don't necessarily matter to you. The left–right spectrum originated from seating arrangements of the revolutionary French national assembly where the right favored conserving the traditional rule of church & feudal hierarchy and the left favored radical liberation from traditional hierarchies toward egalitarian rule, hence conservative right & liberal left. Alignment between social hierarchy & equality is not necessarily as relevant today or our top consideration.
Each of us can choose more relevant considerations to evaluate ideologies. I personally consider unrestricted authority incredibly dangerous, so above all other considerations I prioritize the restriction of authority to protect fundamental liberties. While the pursuit of equality is good, any ideology that does so without limiting authority to protect fundamental liberties is entirely illegitimate & immoral to me. The ends do not justify the means.
I'd argue that's the main problem with tankies: immoral contempt for fundamental liberties.
I completely agree. Here in Brazil there's a great example of how badly these binaries fail with Getúlio Vargas.
He got into power with the help of the fascists against the communists. But he was an ultranationalist and those were foreign ideologies, so he persecuted both.
He instituted many workers' rights and was called big father of the poor, but was also a cruel dictator who committed genocide against the natives, and also persecuted white Europeans who did not had Brazilian culture.
After being deposed he got reelected and committed suicide in a way that saved Brazilian democracy from a military coup.
Fascinating. I'm embarrassingly uneducated on South American politics, though I've taught a few EAL learners from there. I appreciate the quick history lesson, genuinely.
Well, they're conservatives. Their chosen ingroup just happens to be leftists. Same behavior, different markings.
By contrast there are right-wingers who aren't tribalists blindly performing loyalty. You can spot them as they get booted from their party for insisting on yesterday's bullshit over today's bullshit. They're the schmucks who actually bought their side's propaganda, never realizing it was only a disposable cudgel.