this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2026
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Lefty Memes

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An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of "ML" (read: Dengist) influence. 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, discussion and agitprop/stuff that's better fit for a poster than a meme 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

Version without spoilers

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. Please post agitprop here)


0.5 [Provisional Rule] Use alt text or image descriptions to allow greater accessibility


(Please take a look at our wiki page for the guidelines on how to actually write alternative text!)

We require alternative text (from now referred to as "alt text") to be added to all posts/comments containing media, such as images, animated GIFs, videos, audio files, and custom emojis.
EDIT: For files you share in the comments, a simple summary should be enough if they’re too complex.

We are committed to social equity and to reducing barriers of entry, including (digital) communication and culture. It takes each of us only a few moments to make a whole world of content (more) accessible to a bunch of folks.

When alt text is absent, a reminder will be issued. If you don't add the missing alt text within 48 hours, the post will be removed. No hard feelings.


0.5.1 Style tip about abbreviations and short forms


When writing stuff like "lol" and "iirc", it's a good idea to try and replace those with their all caps counterpart

  • ofc => OFC
  • af = AF
  • ok => OK
  • lol => LOL
  • bc => BC
  • bs => BS
  • iirc => IIRC
  • cia => CIA
  • nato => Nato (you don't spell it when talking, right?)
  • usa => USA
  • prc => PRC
  • etc.

Why? Because otherwise (AFAIK), screen readers will try to read them out as actually words instead of spelling them


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" (read: Dengists) (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 irrationally 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.



  1. Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:

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[yellow, angry]
I don't like communism because every time we tried it, power corrupted people

[yellow, smiling and shrugging]
This is why I prefer capitalism, in which power corrupts people

[yellow, t-posing and drooling]
I am very smart and understand ideologies very well than you for coming to my TED talk

https://thebad.website/comic/elite_reasoning

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[–] NaibofTabr -1 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Er, wait, do you think Mao was a capitalist?

[–] rockerface@lemmy.cafe 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The modern China definitely is

[–] NaibofTabr 0 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Sure, but in the context of:

Really it's capitalist doing whatever to protect the statue quo

What Mao did to China had nothing to do with capitalism. Socialism and communism also struggle with the strong-man populist authoritarianism problem, and blaming capitalists for that makes no sense at all.

[–] Bluescluestoothpaste@sh.itjust.works 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Nobody said anything about Mao, so that's why we're confused.

[–] NaibofTabr -4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Cattail's comment implies that the historical failures of socialist and communist societies is due to capitalists working to prevent them from reaching their true Utopian goals.

My point is that socialism and communism fail entirely on their own. Mao is obviously an extreme example, but far from the only such example.

For proponents of communist or socialist systems to blame capitalists as the reason they can't have their perfect societies is pure deflection, a refusal to address their own internal problems in an honest way. It is hypocrisy and self-delusion.

No it doesn't imply that you just misread it.

[–] Cattail@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago

No? I don't care if mao was capitalist or not