I really appreciate your comment - it elevates the post, and I hope is the first step to developing a culture of media criticism and respectful debate in !vietnam. You put a lot of effort in to your analysis, I respect that.

I'm really grateful @cnx created this community on Slrpnk, as it has encouraged me to research and learn more about Vietnam and the Vietnamese people. I share things here that I find interesting and educating, in the hopes that other people also find them valuable. One of the things that interests me is how Vietnamese people feel about themselves, their country, and their place in the world. My ability to learn is impaired by my language limitations, as I don't speak Vietnamese.

I find some of Luna Oi's work worth sharing because I think she gives an English voice to the sentiments of a significant portion of the Vietnamese people. She is very critical about how Vietnam is misrepresented in western media, and is actively creating propaganda that represents the Vietnam she would like the rest of the world to see. I hope !vietnam can become a place where Vietnamese people feel welcome to build community, and I think demonstrating a willingness to engage with media they feel represents authentic Vietnamese perspectives is a good way to achieve that goal.

The original plan for this community when it was created by @cnx and @poVoq was to primarily emphasize the solarpunk aspects of Vietnamese culture, but my engagement is for a broader purpose. I don't think an anarchist or solarpunk future is possible without the participation of people who have survived colonialism, from which the Vietnamese experience is particularly valuable.

While most of my posts are based on what I find interesting in the moment, I do make some effort to balance stories I share that are critical of the Vietnamese government and society with posts that encourage an engagement with the typical Vietnamese experience.

While I try and privilege anarchist media and voices when selecting sources, I share news and stories from a spectrum of political ideologies. Limiting my posting to sources I explicitly endorse would significantly limit my post volume, and hamstring my goal of fostering a community of diverse political perspectives. While I don't endorse Luna Oi, not sharing content of hers I find interesting while holding a different standard for other content I share would be hypocritical. Worse, I've found that working too hard to differentiate oneself from the authoritarian left can be interpreted by Nazis as an endorsement of their views and politics. My cooperation with party socialists is conditional on shared goals and means. I'm happy to exclude Hexbear and Lemmygrad from the platform, but I don't have a problem with authoritarian leftists themselves who can engage with Slrpnk communities without disrespecting community norms and trolling. I reject "left unity" but I welcome cooperation from any political ideology when fighting against racism, homophobia, and fascism.

Ultimately, I think anarchist ideas are resilient enough to survive exposure to authoritarian ones. While the responsibility for directing the growth of a community is in the hands of its moderators, I think there's a lot of potential for a community of diverse Vietnamese and foreign perspectives sharing ideas in an online solarpunk context. @cnx has been extremely tolerant of my less than flattering posts about Vietnam, I suspect your contributions have a place here as well. I hope you continue your engagement in this community and the Fediverse project.