this post was submitted on 20 Mar 2024
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First of all I AM NOT DEFENDING ZIONISTS.
However, the Soviet Famine killed between 5.7 and 8.7 million people and the population of Gaza and the west bank is only ~5 million, so the famine might have been worse, but no one wins when you play the suffering Olympics.
Its more power mapping than suffering Olympics. Tankies can only argue to justify things, there are no tankies in control of countries or influencing countries budgets and agendas. There are Zionists that control countries with massive militaries though. There are zionists in media influencing millions daily. You can be mad at tankies for defending things but they had no hand in perpetuating them, you cannot say the same of Zionists. Why spend time being mad at groups that don't influence anything?
They influence discourse on here, and if "The kulaks deserved it and the deportation of the Crimean Tatars was holsum" becomes normalized, I sure as shit ain't sticking around any more than I would stick around someplace where Nazis are normalized.
Spreading fascist talking points in an effort to discourage voters in the West from sending aid to Ukraine also has a very real effect.
The people actually effecting Ukraine aide are the conservatives who lean fascist. You're giving tankies way too much credit, they don't exist outside of niche internet spaces, and they certainly dont influence US foreign policy.
Oh, the lion's share of the blame belongs to them, absolutely.
They influence voters, who influence US foreign policy. The increasing hostility on the left (or what passes for it in the US) is very much fueled by online left spaces where such fascist talking points are tolerated or celebrated. Communism isn't as unpopular as it was for my parents' and grandparents' generation, and with that broader shift comes the possibility (and reality) of radicalism and sheer edgy fucking stupidity getting ahold of a minority of those shifting. Approximately 30% of Gen Z (and 27% of my gen, Millennials) has a positive view of Marxism (which is great!). If we assume only 10% of them are dumb enough to buy into tankie talking points, that's still some 6 million people.
You ever see Tankies outside of Lemmy or old CTH on reddit? Because Ive been organizing since my 20s and met just one in real life. I would be flabbergasted if there were more than 1% of the figures you pointed out were tankies, let alone 10%. Also tankies don't believe in voting and are still dwarfed by other sources of misinformation. The tankies make themselves nice and loud, they're very easy to ignore. Unlike the types of propaganda that get injected into Meta platforms and Twitter. I still think you're swinging at ghosts because its easy to do.
Lets say tomorrow there are no more tankies, they magically never existed in the english speaking world, what actually changes for the US?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2018/04/04/only-two-thirds-of-american-millennials-believe-the-earth-is-round/?sh=e7dd4067ec66
Theres more flat earther Millennials than tankies by either estimation we use too. Can't wait for them to influence foreign policy.