It’s about 6 months old, but I thought this essay by William Gillis was pretty good. Also particularly relevant to a lot of the discourse that happens in the lemmyverse.
I actually found the weeks around the Russians invasion in 2022 quite enlightening here on Lemmy. I must admit I previously felt like “Tankie” was a tired trope and despite some previous evidence to the contrary in regards to support of Assad, I thought they could be reasoned with.
But seeing them here on Lemmy in real-time turn from confused and maybe slightly scared right after the invasion (which they loudly proclaimed would never happen right before it did happen), towards renewed support of Putin’s regime clearly showed to me that they are so good at lying to themselves that they can never be trusted.
There are many such people deeply wedded to the old “one big coalition to destroy the one big enemy” way of thinking, and the Ukraine war has shaken them out. They cannot believe that many of us could resist NATO in the streets of Chicago and then come home and fight against the “national-anarchists” and tankies in our local scenes who likewise oppose NATO. This is, to them, not consistency in anti-authoritarian principles but inconsistency in alliances.
Very insightful
I’ve not read the article yet, but just this makes me think of “left unity” and who it is who is always pushing for it, and at whose expense.
Prioritising (and demanding others also prioritise) alliances above morals is an act of authority preserving itself.
