I think a little clarification is needed. No. I don’t actually think everyone there is insane. I don’t care about the bans so stop trying to use that. HB enthusiasts coming here and trying to call me out achieves nothing besides proving my point
Edit: Feel free to keep trying to brigade me. It’s not going to scare me to take this down
Childish? Kinda. Insane? No.
There are three relevant things to say about hexbear.
1. It is not a serious instance. Or at least not completely serious; they’re mostly there for memes, funposting, “I know that feel” etc.
So they’re less like the meeting room of a communist party than like the bar where those communists hang out and drink beer, after the meeting is over.
I feel like this is often misinterpreted, as HB users say something that is mostly a taunt and others interpret as actual argumentation. And it also tends to attract younger users, who… well, behave like young people?
2. Even if not a serious instance, they’re serious about their views. Your typical HB user is communist, antifa, vegan, anti-cop, and interprets things in a very specific way. They’re rather transparent about it.
And, because of #1, they aren’t really willing to spend their time entertaining anyone’s counterpoints. It’ll be interpreted as sealioning or similar.
3. Hexbear was already its own thing before federation. As such it developed social norms that often conflict with the norms typically found in the rest of the Threadiverse (Lemmy, Mbin, Piefed etc.)
For example, even if Lemmy as a whole is prone to intrusive political discussions, HB users tend to do it far more. Because they’re used to an environment where this is typically taken as OK.
When it comes to dealing with HB users here, my advice is the exact same as dealing with other users:
This is the most reasonable response.
A lot of people here have long since made up their mind about hexbear based both on repeated meta posting on the topic and possibly a bad experience or two with them on a topic they assumed was uncontested but is a landmine topic for communists of a particular bent
I’ve personally never had a bad experience with hexbears, possibly because I’m more empathetic to their perspective, but more likely because I know when it’s time to disengage. There are users on lemmy who feel strongly about a certain topic that’s abrasive to hexbear users and dig in their heels when jeered at (or maybe feel a personal responsibility to stand them down) and are usually the users here who have the most complaints, because the standard reaction from hexbear users is irreverence (both the users and the mods).
Unlike a lot of liberals coming from reddit, communists often don’t have delusions about the neutrality of moderation and so they’ll ban you on a whim if they think you’re there to stir shit. They use the ban hammer judiciously even with users on their own instance. That’s often the biggest complaint both with hexbear and with lemmy.ml.
really well articulated. I feel bad for well meaning people, but so often they don’t realize it comes across as the exact same kind of bad faith trolling that communist online groups have to constantly deal with and so mods and users have little patience for it if it’s not explicitly a thread for that kind of conversation.
To be fair I’ve had a few bad experiences with Hexbears, but I think that most of them boil down to “unfunny guy interacting with unserious kids”. But since I’m often lurking there in my political account, I feel like my opinion about them is a bit less ungrounded than this whole “Hexbear bad! EDIT WOW THANKS FOR THE GOLD KIND STRANGER!” echo chamber.
(I also have a few bones to pick with .ml [the people in charge, not the whole instance], but they don’t apply to LG or HB, it’s a matter of transparency.)
Browsing their coms can be a pretty unique experience, especially if you go in with a preformed idea of what their communities are like. There’s a huge spread of interests and experiences, and sometimes you can be browsing a niche community and forget that these were the people posting BPB on lemmy.world threads a year ago.
Knowing the academic writings and history they’re referencing helps a lot with understanding where they are coming from, even if you may not agree with all of it.
Thank you for saying this in a more detailed way than I have been. This is exactly right. They built their own leftist haven and became a whole culture of their own, and then became federated. There is bound to be an initial clash, but honestly I think most of the people who hate on them never gave them a chance. All they saw were the shitposts and the in-jokes and you closed the door.
I see a lot of leftists (and leaning leftists), even on .world, who would be better off interacting with the users there (maybe blocking the shitposting comms). And outside of those most-seen comms (chapotraphouse and dunk_tank), there is genuine conversation and less shit talking and in-jokes. I believe, with more instances coming in that are federated with them (mine, .ml, and lem.ee? are a couple), some of the Hex-natives are understanding how to interact with curious left-leaning people with unintentionally wrong-headed ideas.
Downvote me all you want, I stand by Hexbear. o7
Answer me this: are they or are they not consistently in support of Russia/China? Because I’ve seen it a lot from them (and blocked the instance soon after joining Lemmy when I noticed the pattern).
Is it just some big joke that went over my head?
Support for PRC? Yes.
Support for the Russian Federation? Purely the anti-NATO role it takes, Hexbear hates Putin and the reactionary nature of the Russian Federation.
With China, mostly yes. With Russia, only in very specific contexts, otherwise they are VERY critical of it (as they are with most burgeois government, but particularly more due to the reactionary nature of the Russian government from what I’ve seen).
I’m curious about this, do you hold the same opinion about lemmygrad?
That is one of the few instances my instance is defederated from, so I haven’t had much interaction with them. I can speak about Hexbear because I see their posts and interact with them.
Lemmygrad.ml is a “serious” community of Marxist-Leninists, and are Dengists as well (or at least largely sympathetic towards Deng).
Hexbear is Left-Unity, and more of a community focused instance.
The views are largely similar, but the tone and goals of each instance are different.
well, views are pretty much the same. typically, grad users shitpost less and are less active as a whole but are more sectatarian because the rules of the instance allow for it, although there really isn’t that much sectarianism on there, the comm with the most sectatarinsm “shitultrassay” has only 20 posts in the last six months, whereas the equivalent comm for dunking on social and conservative liberals has over 100 posts in the last month alone
Yeah, the famous antifa-tankers. Every single person I’ve ever seen that identifies as antifa was a tanker. Other people run away from that label.
I really hate that I need to point this out, because I feel like it will derail the discussion from Hexbear to fascism:
“Antifa” boils down to “people who actively oppose fascism”, instead of either supporting it or sitting on their hands while doing jack shit.
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I highly recommend you give Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism and On Authority a read. At least On Authority, as it’s a very short piece, but the two combined should give you a basic understanding of the historical and theoretical basis of why marxists defend the use of authority. I can understand where you are coming from, I was more than a little skeptical of authoritarianism when I was younger and still identified as an anarchist, but I think if you take the time to honestly engage with our position then you will at least understand why our stance is what it is, and how we are diametrically opposed to fascism, even if you don’t agree with us.
Blackshirts and Reds was eye opening for me
Plenty HB users are authoritarian. I disagree with them in this; however I don’t think that both things cancel out, given the fascism is orders of magnitude worse than authoritarianism alone.
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Yeah, because saying “cat shit is not as huge as elephant shit” is the same as saying “cat shit is not shit”. /s
This guy knows nothing of the political spectrum.
This guy knows nothing of the political spectrum.
Wtf is loam?
Liberalism in the center? Gosh, this is the most American political coordinates there could be
It’s almost physically triggering how off-base that is
Why would you let a “chart” trigger you physically? What good will that do?
I’m sorry, I’m an American where liberals are actually centrists, but can you explain to me what else is off-base about this chart?
Edit: I would also like to see a chart that is more accurate in your view if you have one available.
Is there something in the name requiring people to support fascism if it wears the right color?
Do some people fighting fascism (aka antifa) go overboard? Yes, certainly; that’s bound to happen with any movement, group, or cohort.
For example, someone might miss the target due to witch hunting, or adopt an “ends always justify means” mindset, or even conflate “non-suporter = enemy”.
However. By implying that “antifa is fascism wearing a different colour”, like you are doing, you’re showing to not understand the obvious difference between
This conflation between both groups is not just immoral. It’s worse - it stinks stupidity and similar filth from a distance. As such I’m not wasting my time further with you, go chew some grass.
Maybe you can clear this up then:
Why does everyone there unequivocally, wholeheartedly, unquestionably support Russia?
Russia has barely a trace of communism anymore and it is hard right oligarchy that fits almost every definition of fascism. Not to mention HEAVILY racist and anti-LGBTQ (I have multiple friends who were from Russia and they were the ones who originally told me that before I saw it for myself in Russia)
Yet the “antifa” hexbear will literally down vote you to hell and ban you if you say anything even slightly bad about Russia.
Also news@hexbear is 80% articles about the war with everyone citing Russian propaganda as absolute truth and every western media, every human rights group, etc… is completely lying about the war.
An interesting juxtaposition as they are in the same way pro Palestine and cite those human rights groups as telling the absolute truth in that case
I don’t know for sure. I’ll voice a strong belief in this regard, but take it with a grain of salt.
I think that Hexbear’s views on Russia is a specific case of a general tendency that you see all across social media (not just HB or Lemmy): to dichotomise complex matters into exactly one good side and exactly one bad side, while assuming that everyone belongs to those two bags. It should go like:
It gets messier when you add Ukraine into the equation, or consider people conflating governments and populations, but it should give you an idea - it starts with somewhat sane premises but quickly devolves into insane lack of logic.
It explains nicely why they’re supporting Palestine, even with the apparent contradiction: Israel is associated with USA and thus with NATO.
IMO their dichotomy in this topic is idiotic. However it is not just from their part, and blaming specifically Hexbear for this, like some people would do, would be unjust (and a self-demonstrating example). We, people using the internet in the 20s, are collectively doing it.
By the way, you see another example of the general phenomenon in this comment chain. Ctrl+F “elephant shit” and look at the comment I was replying to - “you either treat two types of bad as the same, or you’re defending one.”
[Now I probably drew the ire of all sides at the same time. Frankly? I don’t give a fuck; I’m too old and grumpy to play along.]
You may not like this, but the simple answer is they don’t.
Correct. Hexbear critically supports the role Russia plays as an anti-NATO country, and ally to the PRC, who Communists do support.
Communists in general see Western Hegemony as the international proletariat’s largest enemy, as the Global North hyper-exploits the Global South. Michael Parenti explains brilliantly in this short, 2 minute clip. Overall, Communists agree with Lenin’s analysis in Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, and agree that it remains the number 1 enemy of the international proletariat.
NATO is the military alliance of the largest Imperialist exploiters of the Global South, and therefore weakening NATO Hegemony is a good thing. The Nationalist, far-right Russian Bourgeoisie fights against this, because they were not allowed to join the club after the fall of the USSR like they had hoped!
Hope that helps.
Then what about when they constantly refer to the rhetoric as “truth” how Ukraine was full of Nazis that were genociding the Russian minority and how Russia invaded to save them and has committed exactly 0 war crimes?
I completely get that the US is not a good guy, most of western civilization was built on exploitation, imperialism, and subjugation of people. I even understand the great things China has done as far as huge quality of life upgrades for their people.
But Russia is only similar to china in that they propagate huge anti-US propaganda and technically support each other as an anti-US coalition.
Russia is also extremely imperialist, always has been, and literally has annexed (or tried to) multiple nations in the past decades, and is currently trying to do the same. Russia is everything that hexbear stands against, yet they unequivocally support them without any doubt.
Go say literally any critical things of Russia in hexbear. You will 100% be down voted to oblivion, if not banned. If you say anything against Putin being the greatest leader in recent history, you will be down voted to hell if not banned. I have yet to see any critical speech of Russia on hexbear that didn’t get removed or down voted so hard that the comment will never see the light of day.
I understand being Anti-US, but if Russia was in the US’s position, they would be just as bad if not worse for the treatment of people and propagating imperialism. Then to censor people about it… I can scream on other instances about how stupid the US is until I pass out and I wouldn’t get banned. That is TruthSocial/theDonald/Twitter territory.
I’m sorry, but again, this is a gross mischaracterization. Please actually read the links I sent, you don’t need to read the Imperialism text but at least go through the thread I linked and the Parenti speech.
I have been critical of the Russian Federation and Putin especially on Hexbear, and have been highly upvoted for it. Hexbear’s position on Russia is nuanced, ask them to explain it and you’ll get explanations.
This is 100% correct, the thing is, nobody but the US is in the US’s position. Russia is acting in the manner they are because they aren’t.
https://hexbear.net/post/3025711
https://hexbear.net/post/3379624
https://hexbear.net/comment/5253718 top comment, massively upvoted
https://hexbear.net/post/3232536 - more “all Ukrainians are Nazi rhetoric”
https://hexbear.net/comment/4594619 - more “the war is just a local conflict with everyone on Russia’s side” propaganda that is heavily upvoted. Objectively false. There is way way more nuance than that.
https://hexbear.net/post/3394475 - Russia never does anything wrong. It is just Americans who of course blame it on Russia
https://hexbear.net/comment/5113469 - Russia never does anything wrong. It is actually a conspiracy that Americans did it
https://hexbear.net/comment/5084604 - Russia can do no wrong. Russia is destined to win and take the lands they want to annex
https://hexbear.net/comment/5084494 - yet more Ukraine genocide rhetoric, straight from Russian propaganda
https://lemmygrad.ml/post/4112194 - literally regurgitating unsubstantiated Russian propaganda. Literally one person saying “if you just blindly believed Russian propaganda 100% of the time, you would be right 70% of the time”
https://hexbear.net/post/2763869 - “Russia is extremely generous with these terms”, they only have to give up their land to glorious leader of Russia
imperialism /ĭm-pîr′ē-ə-lĭz″əm/ noun
The extension of a nation’s authority by territorial acquisition or by the establishment of economic and political dominance over other nations.
A political doctrine or system promoting such extension of authority.
The power or character of an emperor; imperial authority; the spirit of empire.
Literally exactly the definition of Putin’s post-socialism authoritarian Russia…
Like “the enemy of my enemy” can only take you so far. Like when Putin blatantly poisoned a political opponent and everyone on hexbear was cheering them and saying “I’m surprised it took them this long”… Supporting a murderous regime because they happen to be against an exploitative corrupt regime doesn’t even seem like a valid solution to me.
Again, you are not reading the links, nor are you interested in engaging in good faith. As an example:
The comment was mocking the “no Ukranians are Nazis” rhetoric on a video of Ukranian soldiers with Nazi symbols on their helmets harassing an elderly Russian man. You aren’t interested in truth, but debate-broing.
As for your definition of Imperialism, I quite specifically linked Lenin’s work on Imperialism as a stage of Capitalism, not merely invasion, yet you obscure that and push the dictionary definiton, again as a measure of bad-faith. Marxists specifically refer to international Monopoly Capitalism as Imperialism, something the Parenti video I linked you touches on well enough to give you a sufficient taste of Lenin’s Imperialism so you don’t have to read the book for this conversation, yet you twist words and pretend Hexbear is operating on a double standard by using the dictionary definition against a forum of Marxists using Lenin’s definition!
It’s peak dishonesty, your other links are similarly dishonest readings out of context, hoping people won’t actually click the link and see what they really said.
If you aren’t going to engage honestly, you need to logout and touch grass.
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Most antifa groups are anarchist collectives. So I’m not sure where you’re seeing this, unless it’s solely from people that are terminally online.
Organized anti-fascist groups often have a mix of left ideological backgrounds, but are mostly anarchists and communists. We work together when it comes to physical defense, barricades, etc.
e.g. many people in black bloc are Maoists even though outsiders tend to assume they are all anarchists.
Interestingly those points all applied to The_Donald as well.
Ah yes, famously communist, antifa, vegan, anti-cop the_donald.
I think that this is a red herring.
Even if the first two points apply (do they? I don’t think so, but I’m not going to dispute it*), the problem with T_D was neither, it was users there actively promoting hate against marginalised groups.
And, while you can complain a thousand things about Hexbear, they are not promoting hate against marginalised groups. On the contrary - if they even smell that you might be potentially promoting it, they’ll ban you under a “better safe than sorry” approach.
*reason: I don’t care about USA internal politics.