Edit for clarity: I’m not asking why the Tankie/Anarchist grudge exist. I’m curious about what information sources - mentors, friends, books, TV, cultural osmosis, conveys that information to people. Where do individuals encounter this information and how does it become important to them. It’s an anthropology question about a contemporary culture rather than a question about the history of leftism.
I’ve been thinking about this a bit lately. Newly minted Anarchists have to learn to hate Lenin and Stalin and whoever else they have a grudge against. They have to encounter some materials or teacher who teaches them “Yeah these guys, you have to hate these guys and it has to be super-personal like they kicked your dog. You have to be extremely angry about it and treat anyone who doesn’t disavow them as though they’re literally going to kill you.”
Like there’s some process of enculturation there, of being brought in to the culture of anarchism, and there’s a process where anarchists learn this thing that all (most?) anarchists know and agree on.
Idk, just anthropology brain anthropologying. Cause like if someone or something didn’t teach you this why would you care so much?
I think AssortedBiscuits answered your question in the first couple sentences of their comment:
It’s really not any deeper than that. There’s no need or reason to single out anarchists from any other average westerner when analyzing the source of animosity for the USSR because the answer is going to be the same whether you’re talking about chuds, liberals, or anarchists. Even the non-western anarchists who hold a grudge against the USSR, the answer is probably still the same just because of the prevalence of western cultural hegemony all over the world. In your edit, you specify:
But the answer to that is the same information sources you yourself were probably exposed to early on. It’s all the same shit we’re steeped in, the ubiquity of anti-communism throughout western culture. Animal Farm and 1984 were required reading for me in junior high and high school respectively. The class discussions around these books were centered around teaching us that the USSR was corrupt, oppressive, and that these communist ideals that may sound like good ideas will always and invariably lead to “authoritarianism” and “totalitarian dictatorships” like the Soviet Union. Everyone absorbs that shit young, even the people who might later go on to question the truth of what they were taught, like anarchists.
You say
But no they don’t. Not as newly-minted anarchists anyway. That brainworm software was already installed long ago before they became anarchists. A major part of becoming a leftist is going through a process of uninstalling all that brainworm malware. Anarchists who still hate the Soviet Union are people who have been successful at uninstalling much of the brainworm malware, it’s just that they haven’t completed the process by uninstalling the anti-Soviet or anti-“tankie” worms… yet. And I say all this as someone who long considered themself an anarchist.
great analogy, usually im “eh” when people compare brains to computers but in this case it works because western cultural hegemony really is like a despicable adware program that is very difficult to uninstall.
I was a little reluctant to even use the software analogy because I tend to have the same reaction to it. But I think the problem there for me anyway is that the bazingabrain (lol at your username in this context) dipshits who loved using it so much not only made it cliche but failed to understand it was an analogy and took it as literally true, which is fucking absurd. In this case, I figured it was fitting enough that I could get away with using it.
Agreed. As a rough and ready analogy it works really well. But take it any further than thay and it’s just silly and useless.
From an anarchist perspective, the state is the problem. From an anarchist perspective, every state ends in some type of abuse towards citizens. The Soviet Union was a collection of states. I don’t disagree with you, but I think there’s also a theory reason. Keep up the good fight
This is an important point and the most genuine argument topic between anarchists and communists imo.
The thing to understand here is that a worker state was never really included in the Marxist definition of communism. Marx, Engels, Lenin, all very clearly oppose the existence of the state and believe that the final liberation of humanity will require its long term dissolution. Socialism, as the premature stage of communism, requires a state as a means of establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat against the bourgeoisie.
Being against the state is not incompatible with being a communist, on the contrary it is necessary for socialism to progress and evolve. But it is purely utopian to believe that you can have socialism without a worker state, when classes are still an existing thing. Just look at the past century to see the relentless effort of the bourgeoisie to regain control. Do you really think you have a chance against that without a means of their oppression?
That, I believe, is the major ideological difference we have with anarchists, the rest is purely a result of anticommunist propaganda.
Word. I’m an anti-state ml or whatever. I don’t consider it a contradiction because a state is a tool, a technology, and a weapon. It’s also a horrific form of violence and often a source of enormously harmful oppression. But, to date, the only weapon that can reliably fight and kill states is another state. For lack of an available alternative state-killing weapon, a state is needed. And I just hope that when we’ve killed all the capitalist states we can engage in what is very literally a disarmament process to disassemble the state as weapon and consign it to the dustbin of history with nukes and other superweapons.
The equivalent tvtropes would be Godzilla Threshold - how bad do things need to get before summoning Godzilla to fight the other Kaiju leads to less overall destruction that not summoning godzilla.
Well said. The real difference is Marxists want the transitional state while anarchists see that transitional state as problematic as well. My clumsy analogy is socdems vs socialists
You’re right, there is definitely theory reasons too, but I think that’s more general to states as a concept and doesn’t do much to explain the specific grudge against the USSR or why there seems to be hatred for it that goes beyond states in general. There’s historical reasons for that specific hate of course, which other comments covered better than I could, but I answered the way I did because of Frank’s (OP’s) edit about sources of information.
I think there’s still another aspect for the specific anti-Soviet sentiment that has to do with many anarchists wanting to differentiate themselves from MLs or “tankies.” Since we all agree we’re on the left, there’s a desire for a lot of anarchists to draw a clear distinction between themselves and those they perceive as adversaries or enemies, and strong disapproval with the USSR is a pretty obvious way to do that. I suspect part of that may in some cases come from a kind of “I’m one of the good ones” or “pick me” attitude, since they can say to liberals “yes, I am a radical leftist, but I’m not like those bad authoritarian tankies that we all know are the bad guys!” But the need to do even that I think has a lot to do with the general anti-communist milieu, that “malware” we’re all indoctrinated with by default.
I largely agree with you. My sticking point is the ‘anarchists want to be liked by liberals’. The anarchists I know acknowledge that working with the commies is how to move forward. At least commies acknowledge the importance of mutual aid and community. Liberals don’t. No one likes a liberal
Literally everyone
literally everyone else
Fuck liberals all my homies hate liberals
For sure. And I don’t mean to paint all anarchists with the same brush, since there are genuine anarchists as well as people who use the label anarchist and who even believe themselves to be anarchists, but who I think we would all here would agree are just radlibs at best. But even drawing on my own experience as my leftism developed (which it still is), it wasn’t like a conscious “I want to impress liberals” thought process, but more like wanting people to know that I was aware of the “evils of authoritarianism” and that being a leftist and anticapitalist didn’t require a submission to “authoritarian” doctrine. I imagine I’m not the only one who felt that way, and even though I know better now, I can still see it sometimes in other people who call themselves anarchists, people who correctly recognize liberals as the common enemy of all leftists, but who still are careful to avoid being associated with “tankies.”
That’s my thinking as well. Western leftists identify as anarchists far more than they identify as Marxists whereas in the global south the reverse is true. This gives the impression anarchism is fundamentally opposed to Marxism to the point of taking the side of the US over AES, but that’s actually just the same background level of racist, liberal brainrot that westerners share in general.
I think one does have to, to a degree, because you may have to conform with anarchists who believe this in order to work with them. Like how I have to keep my respect for Stalin close to my chest if I’m organizing with Trots. And if there’s no one to organize with other than anarchists, Trots, and a spectrum of socdems, then… that’s just what it’s like here, lol (hyperbolic)