After seeing a megathread praising Mao Zedong, an actual mass killer, and a post about a guy saying “99% of westerners are 100000000000% sure they know what happened in ‘Tiny Man Square’ […] the reasons for this are complex and involve propaganda […],” I am genuinely curious what leads people to this belief system. Even if propaganda is involved when it comes to Tiananmen Square, it doesn’t change the atrocities that were/are committed everywhere else in China.

I am all for letting people believe what they want but I am lost on why one would deliberately praise any authoritarian system this hard.

Can someone please help me understand why this is such a large and prominent community? How have these ideals garnered such a following outside of China?

EDIT: Thank you to everyone who has responded! This thread has been very insightful :)

  • TankieTanuki [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    301·
    3 days ago

    it’s plainly obvious that tankies fail specifically by not engaging in criticism

    Here are frequent criticisms of AES states from MLs off the top of my head:

    spoiler
    1. For the Soviet Union:
    • The criminalization of homosexuality
    • Stalin’s deportation of certain ethnic groups
    • Lysenkoism
    • Stalin’s brief denial that Operation Barbarossa had begun
    • The use of animals in the space program
    • Stalin’s refusal to supply a “nay” vote in the United Nations and prevent the US invasion of Korea
    • Excesses of the Great Purge
    • Khrushchev’s secret speech
    1. China:
    • The persecution of gay fanfic writers and general lagging of queer rights
    • Excesses of the Cultural Revolution, including the destruction of artifacts
    • Agricultural mistakes during the Great Leap Forward
    • Pig iron production during the Great Leap Forward
    • Lack of universal healthcare

    I keep hearing that MLs are “campists” who don’t engage in nuance, but the side I typically see lacking nuance is the “anti-authoritarians” who refuse to acknowledge any successes of AES and label anything short of universal condemnation as “apologetics”. That’s actual campism.

    You’ve probably heard of the expression “when someone is accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression”. There is a similar dynamic going on here: When someone is accustomed to black and white thinking, shades of gray look like whitewashing.

    • Socialism_Everyday@reddthat.com
      7·
      2 days ago

      Stalin’s brief denial that Operation Barbarossa had begun

      This is disproven as of 2025, though, to the best of my knowledge. This misinfo comes directly from Khruschyov’s secret speech, but with the opening of the Soviet Archives the official agenda of Stalin has been found, and he wasn’t enclosed getting drunk for days as Khruschyov said but actually had hours-long meetings the following day to the invasion. Or maybe you mean something else?

      • TankieTanuki [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        5·
        1 day ago

        Yeah, someone informed me here.

        I didn’t know much about it, but the story I remember reading was something like “the Nazis are invading” and Stalin’s attitude was “shut up that’s impossible; it’s too soon”.

        I’m honestly not too surprised that it’s false because it didn’t make much sense. Everyone knew it was inevitable.