Communists shouldn't defend the Russian Federation. Yet for inexplicable reasons, many self-proclaimed communists online do so. Typically they're tankies with all sorts of other problematic opinions.
I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but it doesn't happen in the places I frequent - and I frequent a LOT of Leftist communities.
Edit: People are pointing to the Tankies Lemmy community. The place designed for tankies. I'm not arguing they don't exist. I'm aruing against the people saying they're all over the place and pervasive in other communities and that they're not a commonality and not the usual communist/socialist.
Pointing to the Tankies communities doesn't change anything I've said.
I'm an unabashed leftist who has been active in leftist spaces online since "leftist spaces online" meant particular groups on usenet and I see Russia apologists masquerading as socialists almost every day
This whole thread is basically just tankies frothing over military aid sent to Ukraine and me of course having the dumbest discussion of ny life. Just an example but they are simply insane or stupid, or just insanely stupid.
It's rampant in certain ML communities. A lot of people are so caught up in their reasonable opposition to the US, it's foreign policy and the military industrial complex that they start to see any US enemy in a positive light, despite many of those enemies being significantly worse.
I think the problem is that the meme chooses to use the term "communist" rather than "tankie." No principled communist would defend a plutocratic petrol state like current day Russia, unless they simply opposed the west more than they supported Marxism. It seems like this meme is targeted at centrist Americans and right wing liberals who think poorly of communism because they were alive during the Cold War, and think antifa hurts their cause more than they help. The peacenik one is pretty spot on, but the first two kind of suck.
No arguments there, the first two def could've done with better labels. I'm just shitposting from my 'best of' folders while the Fediverse finds its feet, not a content creator, so I do apologize for the problems caused by the share.