• JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl
      60·
      11 months ago

      I mean, China fucking sucks and is a shit authoritarian statist government but let’s not pretend America hasn’t done similar things.

      Ever heard the stories of how America won the right to unions?

      • Columbine Mine Massacre

      • Ludlow Massacre

      • Thibodaux Massacre

      • Battle of Blair Mountain

      • Herrin Massacre

      Hundreds of people killed in total because they were protesting.

      The difference in outcome is that back then the technology was more of a level playing field.

      • shadowspirit@lemmy.world
        50·
        11 months ago

        Can always rely on there being at least one person … “but the USA did XYZ.” Doesn’t change what happened in 1989.

        • JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl
          17·
          11 months ago

          No it doesn’t. But the same people who whine and cry about people using whataboutism in favor of China do the EXACT same thing in favor of the US.

          They are both shit. Everyone is tired of each side pretending that only one side is shit.

          • Syrc@lemmy.world
            16·
            11 months ago

            Except they’re nowhere nearly comparable. The US is pretty bad but China is an authoritarian state with internet censorship and state-controlled companies.

            The “America also bad” argument feels like a mass murderer saying “well you stabbed a guy 10 years ago, you’re no different!”.

            • diffaldo@lemm.ee
              4·
              11 months ago

              Do u know banana republics, thats a rad story. i think u should look up what usa have done to south american contries.

          • PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee
            2·
            11 months ago

            Go look up to see what China did during the great leap forward and cultural revolution. They killed about 30 million of their own people. I would like you to post a source proving that the United States murdered 30 million of its own people within the past 150 years, as well as persecuting tens of millions of people and sending millions of children from cities to be reeducated with forced labor on camps after being separated from their parents. Hundreds of thousands of intellectuals were murdered for being… Intellectuals.

            The only thing that comes close was slavery and the Japanese internment during world War II. However, slavery was abolished over 150 years ago, and during the Japanese internment families were generally kept together and they were not forcibly reeducated.

            • JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl
              1·
              11 months ago

              “Please tell me a time when.this country did terrible things b-b-but only in this certain half of the country’s existence!! Otherwise it’s cheating!!1!”

              Conveniently chose a time right where you can ignore the Slavery and the Trail of Tears (% population wise that was just as bad). Not to mention the mass Native American “reeducation” and ripping them away from their families to get a “proper white education”

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_of_Tears

              https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_boarding_schools

              Every government has done terrible things. The US, China, and Russia are among the worst. We can argue about what is “worse.” But that is completely subjective. China literally just did much of what the US did, but on a larger scale 150 years later and with different technology.

              Arguably Russia was the worst of them all, but literally all 3 are bad. America pulled itself out of that era and into corporate indetured servitude era of corporations committing genocides and coups in other countries. Personally I think that China is worse than the US and Russia dwarfs both of them, but just because one is maybe marginally worse doesn’t mean the other wasn’t/isn’t bad.

        • atx_aquarian@lemmy.world
          4·
          11 months ago

          The one they replied to may have been criticizing “whataboutism”, but it could also be (mis)interpreted as implying the USA has not had similar problems.

          But who hasn’t killed their citizens in a simple misunderstanding? Or, if that doesn’t work, America Also Bad! \s

    • RiikkaTheIcePrincess@kbin.social
      58·
      11 months ago

      America Also Bad!

      Seems like they usually leave out the “also” because apparently two things can’t be bad at the same time. Wouldn’t it be great to live in a world where only one thing is bad? I expect it’d be simpler, at least.

    • Thief_of_Crows@sh.itjust.works
      1·
      5 months ago

      Well, the citizens they killed were literally firing on them and killed around 150 soldiers. Meanwhile the military for the most part did not have guns. Not saying it is justified even then to use military force on striking workers, but a hell of a lot more justified than western media claims. Oh yeah, and literally no college students died that day, as well as nobody within a mile of Tianenmen Square.

  • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
    85·
    11 months ago

    Ah yes the one demonstration to push a government to the left and organize labor that tankies don’t like acknowledging

    • Noughmad@programming.dev
      49·
      11 months ago

      No, there was another one, interestingly at the exact same time, in Poland. They don’t like that one either.

        • Noughmad@programming.dev
          33·
          11 months ago

          The Solidarity movement, started in 1980 as a series of labor strikes, formed into a large trade union and then a political movement demanding workers’ rights, actual worker control over means of production, and similar socialist policies. It finally forced and won a public election in 1989 (on the very same day of the Tiananmen square crackdown) which in turn led to the end of communist (and Russian) rule in Poland.

            • DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe
              10·
              11 months ago

              Tankies when the people being told heirarchy is bad and steals the value of your labor when people actually believe it and try to abolish it:

            • Touching_Grass@lemmy.world
              2·
              11 months ago

              When oliver Anthony sings that he’s an old world man struggling to live in a new world, all I think about is how strong the old world fought to unionize the work force. I didn’t even know about it until this year. The 1900s labour movement was intense and interesing. Especially reading about it from the future which helps put a lot of current politics into perspective.

          • DrYazman@lemmy.world
            4·
            11 months ago

            a political movement demanding workers’ rights, actual worker control over means of production, and similar socialist policies.

            They demanded this, won, and then ignored all of it and introduced neoliberal capitalism pretty much straight away?

      • Hubi@feddit.de
        63·
        11 months ago

        I don’t see any reason to care about that as long as they aren’t forcing their opinions on anyone tbh.

        • persolb@lemmy.ml
          30·
          11 months ago

          This. Unless your use/purchase directly supports something you disagree with, people shouldn’t be worried so much. Companies and organizations are huge. They are all going to contain shitty people.

          If you are on the internet, you have no choice but to indirectly supporting shitty people.

          If you are worried about that do actual politics, not this ‘you eat ChikFilA you monster’ type shit.0

          • AlexWIWA@lemmy.mlEnglish
            3·
            11 months ago

            Yup. And they literally gave us the tools to take our toys and go home to make our own fun if we don’t like the way they run Lemmy.ml.

      • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        32·
        11 months ago

        Oh I know all about that. It’s one of the reasons I enjoy clowning on tankies on lemmy.ml so hard.

        Fun fact: the .ml TLD is officially designated as belonging to Mali; the lemmy devs chose it as an acronym for “Marxist-Leninist”. This caused problems very recently when Mali suddenly re-exerted control of their TLD, where previously they did not take an active hand in its management.

        I’ll copy the top comment there, because it’s actually kind of important if you’re at all into web infra or self-hosting:

        Using ccTLDs when you have no relationship with the country is just asking for trouble. Comes across as naive and unprofessional, although I’ve seen many serious infrastructure built upon .co and .io names.

      • ImFresh3x@sh.itjust.works
        21·
        11 months ago

        I don’t see why I should care, as long as their not assholes, not breaking their own rules, and not abusing their powers as devs.

      • a1_15@lemmy.world
        3·
        11 months ago

        hexbear alt spotted!! this is the most popular comment that those fascits/bigots/neo-terrorists post in any thread that makes them salty!

      • Psythik@lemm.ee
        7·
        11 months ago

        You’re not a real Marxist; you’re a Fascist cosplaying as one. Anyone who spends 5 minutes on Hexbear can figure it out. You’re not fooling anyone.

        Edit: Lots of people replying to me who are in denial, I see.

        • Catradora-Stalinism☭@lemmygrad.ml
          6·
          11 months ago

          fooling

          You really think that, don’t you?

          Maybe I’m just tired of hearing of these lies, I know china didn’t do it, and I know the story is a myth concocted from bits of reality and western media embellishing and skewing details. I’m really just trying to get a rise out of ya’ll.

          But how are we fascists? You think we are lying at all hours even when you aren’t looking? It would be easier to just be a fascist if that was the truth. Those movements already exist: Nazbols, MAGA communists, and the like. Why aren’t we them? Why do we always separate ourselves and constantly denounce them? Why do we go through what would be a ridiculous amount of effort to pretend to be communists? Pretend to be leftists? This is a ridiculous assertion in every way!

          I dare you to spend 5 minutes on hexbear, minutes not trying to hate us, and just look around. I may be scum yes, but I don’t think they are, far from it in fact. Maybe you’ll see that, or you’ll just keep being the way you are:

          Blind and hateful, lashing out at whatever you don’t understand.

        • abbotsbury@lemmy.world
          2·
          11 months ago

          I’ve seen every post of theirs in this thread and nothing seems fascist to me, perhaps you merely disagree with them.

  • ⚡⚡⚡@feddit.de
    52·
    11 months ago

    tanks brually killed students fighting for democracy.

    Or in Chinese: ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ students ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ for ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛

    • DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe
      20·
      11 months ago

      According to my aunt, whose parents fled the Cultural Revolution when she was a teenager:

      It’s like if Chinese people kept trying to give you shit about the Kent State massacre and not Vietnam itself.

    • zanzo@lemmy.world
      17·
      11 months ago

      From my conversations with mainland Chinese, they often tout the line that the US was somehow involved, so it was partly an excusable defense of the homeland against dangerously co-opted students. That said, most acknowledge that it was pretty bad. But these are also well-educated Chinese working abroad, so I assume the majority of Chinese don’t know much.

      One story I heard retold by an English teacher working in Nanjing that I used to know was about the experience of one of the people involved in the protests…or at least they were an academic in Beijing at the time of the massacre. They were really depressed 20 years later and felt that nobody around them, particularly their students, knew anything.

    • socsa@lemmy.ml
      16·
      11 months ago

      The people I have spoken to in China understand something happened, and most of them know that it was the suppression of a student protest movement. From there the knowledge diverges as to what kind of protest movement and how violent was the suppression and whether it was justified. My family will kind of halfheartedly repeat some version of the party line but acknowledge it was a fucked up situation, and they also understand that the censorship surrounding it is awkward and unnecessary.

      Generally the Chinese I have spoken to are mostly aware of and opposed to the CCP’s censorship, but they also don’t really like to talk about it for obvious reasons.

  • bouh@lemmy.world
    17·
    11 months ago

    So the west is still hunting communists to this day? Easier than fixing climate or providing healthcare I guess.

      • ⚡⚡⚡@feddit.de
        15·
        11 months ago

        He/she does not understand you. You need to write it like this:

        when criticizing a ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ committed by the ⬛⬛⬛

    • Syrc@lemmy.world
      22·
      11 months ago

      Care to explain what was communist in the event except the name of the party that enacted the massacre and maybe some of the people who died?

      • bouh@lemmy.world
        4·
        11 months ago

        I wonder why an event that happened almost before I was born is so important to some people here. Why aren’t we showcasing how monstrous Hitler was burning people for racism then? That’s far more fitting to the situation of most western countries that are all leaning on fascism and racism. Some western countries like France are not far from crushing protestors with tanks btw.

        But I guess the cold war world of 40 years ago is more comfortable. There was this nice black and white taint where capitalists were the good guys against evil communists. And we must now bring back all the sins of China and USSR to never forget what they did, so can be blind to what’s happening now I guess.

        People throwing “tankies” everywhere are worth no more than any Russian troll honestly.

        • Syrc@lemmy.world
          20·
          11 months ago

          You didn’t answer my question.

          To answer yours, maybe it’s because Germany has literal museums dedicated to education about the horrors of its past while China tries to hide them and has that same party in power. That’s slightly different.

          Also don’t fool yourself. The Cold War was capitalists against capitalists that called themselves communists. Real communism never existed for more than a week in any country in the world.

          • bouh@lemmy.world
            1·
            11 months ago

            He. If you want to criticise China you should talk about ouïghours or Hong Kong. Tiananmen is irrelevant. It’s as relevant as slavery in the US. Aren’t you busy killing black people these days btw?

            • Syrc@lemmy.world
              2·
              11 months ago

              Definitely not as relevant since you can talk about slavery and it’s widely condemned (by the ruling party, at least).

              I’m also not American, but nice try.

              • bouh@lemmy.world
                1·
                11 months ago

                I don’t care where you live. You’re not Chinese yet you care about tiananmen apparently. But you don’t care about slavery in the US apparently. Nor about fascism eventhough it’s making a comeback in all western countries.

                Which proves my point: tiananmen is not about China. It’s a symbol of communist oppression. And a Godwin point to end any discussion about communism. And a liberal fuck you to all leftists and communists of lemmy. There’s a reason I’ve never read “tankie” before I read lemmy.

                • Syrc@lemmy.world
                  2·
                  11 months ago

                  I care about slavery and I care about fascism. Am I not allowed to care about those things and at the same time about the fact that the second-most populated country in the world is a literal dictatorship?

                  Again, there was nothing communist about Tiananmen, nor there is anything communist about the current CCP. It’s just fascism under a different name. Invent a time machine and bring back Marx to see this shit, he definitely wouldn’t be happy about it.

        • khalic@lemmy.world
          11·
          11 months ago

          I think you’re underestimating the simple anti-authoritarian spirit in many. Why are Tiananmen Massacre posts so popular? Because they’re forbidden, and freedom of expression is a big deal for many, many people. Not just Americans

          • bouh@lemmy.world
            1·
            11 months ago

            Forbidden? Hahaha that’s so funny!

            That’s pure anti-china propaganda. Anti-left propaganda even. It’s a Godwin point.

            There’s a saying in French : it’s easier to see the straw on the neighbor nose than the beam you have in the eye.

            If you want to criticised China you should talk about the current, these days genocide they’re doing. Or about Hong Kong. Tiananmen is a Godwin point, in my generation you’d only know about it if you’re exposed to liberal propaganda. Because as a historical event it is irrelevant.

        • Wanderer@lemm.ee
          4·
          11 months ago

          If Hitler or his party was still around and denying the Holocaust that that would be a comparable analogy. But it’s not, so it isn’t.