I’ll admit my perspective may be skewed because I spend a good amount of time debating marxist-leninists, but I really don’t like arguing semantics unless it’s important to the discussion at large. For that reason I’ll often avoid using words in a way that will start semantics arguments that derail the discussion.
It’s also why I typically avoid calling people I’m currently debating tankies, because I think that makes them defensive and is bad for outreach. Maybe I’m wasting my time trying to change people’s minds, but if that’s the case then people who argue aggressively are definitely wasting their time.
Here’s me discovering socialism, new to the (actual) ideas but vibing with them pretty well.
Start talking about it online.
Anarchist: fuck you you stupid fucking tankie.
I had no idea what a tankie was, but I figured out real quick that anarchists are the angsty atheists of the political world.
If you’ve had bad experiences with anarchists before I’m sorry, but in my experience anarchists have been much kinder and more welcoming than marxist-leninists, especially in person. Characterizing anarchists as the angsty atheists of the political world is a bit hurtful, but I can see where you’re coming from. In the same way atheists sometimes lash out against religious folks, anarchists sometimes lash out against marxist-leninists because of bad experiences in the past. A lot of anarchists I know went through a similar political development where they started being curious about socialism and were met with pretty harsh responses to questions about the more authoritarian aspects of marxism-leninism.
