Lefty Memes
An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of the "ML" influence of instances like lemmy.ml and lemmygrad. This is a place for undogmatic shitposting and memes from a progressive, anti-capitalist and truly anti-imperialist perspective, regardless of specific ideology.
Serious posts, news, and discussion go in c/Socialism.
If you are new to socialism, you can ask questions and find resources over on c/Socialism101.
Please don't forget to help keep this community clean by reporting rule violations, updooting good contributions and downdooting those of low-quality!
Rules
0. Only post socialist memes
That refers to funny image macros and means that generally videos and screenshots are not allowed. Exceptions include explicitly humorous and short videos, as well as (social media) screenshots depicting a funny situation, joke, or joke picture relating to socialist movements, theory, societal issues, or political opponents. Examples would be the classic case of humorous Tumblr or Twitter posts/threads. (and no, agitprop text does not count as a meme)
1. Socialist Unity in the form of mutual respect and good faith interactions is enforced here
Try to keep an open mind, other schools of thought may offer points of view and analyses you haven't considered yet. Also: This is not a place for the Idealism vs. Materialism or rather Anarchism vs. Marxism debate(s), for that please visit c/AnarchismVsMarxism.
2. Anti-Imperialism means recognizing capitalist states like Russia and China as such
That means condemning (their) imperialism, even if it is of the "anti-USA" flavor.
3. No liberalism, (right-wing) revisionism or reactionaries.
That includes so called: Social Democracy, Democratic Socialism, Dengism, Market Socialism, Patriotic Socialism, National Bolshevism, Anarcho-Capitalism etc. . Anti-Socialist people and content have no place here, as well as the variety of "Marxist"-"Leninists" seen on lemmygrad and more specifically GenZedong (actual ML's are welcome as long as they agree to the rules and don't just copy paste/larp about stuff from a hundred years ago).
4. No Bigotry.
The only dangerous minority is the rich.
5. Don't demonize previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.
We must constructively learn from their mistakes, while acknowledging their achievements and recognizing when they have strayed away from socialist principles.
(if you are reading the rules to apply for modding this community, mention "Mantic Minotaur" when answering question 2)
6. Don't idolize/glorify previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.
Notable achievements in all spheres of society were made by various socialist/people's/democratic republics around the world. Mistakes, however, were made as well: bureaucratic castes of parasitic elites - as well as reactionary cults of personality - were established, many things were mismanaged and prejudice and bigotry sometimes replaced internationalism and progressiveness.
- Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:
- Racism
- Sexism
- Queerphobia
- Ableism
- Classism
- Rape or assault
- Genocide/ethnic cleansing or (mass) deportations
- Fascism
- (National) chauvinism
- Orientalism
- Colonialism or Imperialism (and their neo- counterparts)
- Zionism
- Religious fundamentalism of any kind
view the rest of the comments
America is falling apart, but not because some people's pet issue is miscasting prison convict work as "slavery". Fasten your seat belts.
Yep, we know those workers have a choice of employers and get at least minimum wage, regular increases for merit, regular holidays and personal days, the right to organize, and an assortment of benefits. Their pay is commensurate with anyone doing similar jobs, right? There’s no way that’s space labor
Correct, prison labor is a form of involuntary servitude the 13th Amendment explicitly doesn't apply to. Bear in mind, all this time I haven't even argued in favor of prison labor. I'm saying calling it slavery is inappropriate, no matter how passionate you are about it.
It can be called slavery while still being permissible under the constitution. It's not illegal slavery, just like pre-civil war slavery in the south wasn't illegal... But it's still slavery.
Slaves have owners, but call it flapjacks or pudding or whatever makes you feel like a keyboard justice warrior.
If "has an owner" is what everything hinges on, and the Department of Corrections or whoever has full custody and control doesn't count, fine. I guess that's technically in the first definition that came up. But Jesus Christ, when the vast majority of conditions match up, you sure spent a hell of a lot more time puffing your chest and acting high and mighty instead of, you know, explaining why it isn't. You had to go through a few responses before any explanation at all!
"It's not slavery, its involuntary servitude."
This guys is either trolling or dumb as a bag of dumb cunts
Name-calling - a time-honored way to win any argument. Respect!
Semantics isn't an argument, it's a waste of time.