I agree that the mod is taking their anti-authoritarian stance maybe a bit too far, but I also can see why your perspective doesn't always work depending on the level of authoritarian we're talking about. "Just be their friends" is difficult to swallow, when the person you're suggesting their befriend is someone who might, say, gleefully support Putin's invasion, Israel's Genocide, or Assad's brutality, or worse. There's limits with whom one can be a "community". It seems that mod has drawn those limits perhaps a bit too strictly, but I can still understand them.

I wish there weren't two posts from this same exchange.

To answer your question "What do you all think, should I have even made my original comment if I already knew it to be fruitless?" The answer is unequivocally "no."

You were in an instance that doesn't allow for authoritarianism, an instance that bans people based on their comment history even outside of that instance. You show up with the authoritarianism in your profile and try telling someone complaining about their friend not disliking authoritarianism with "just be friends." This is all completely expected for the rules of that instance.

When people get a ban for doing a thing in a place where the rules say to not do that thing... it's YDI.

For anyone wondering why we have such strict rules regarding tankies in our community, it's because they have a tendency to try to worm their way into leftist spaces. Tankies constantly try to convince everyone that they are leftists and that being opposed to working with them is "leftist infighting", yet they will defend nation states which oppress unions, commit genocides, or do straight up imperialism. All the same things that capitalist nations do. They either embrace these things or deny they happened, or explain that they were somehow necessary. Some are earnest in how they try to convince others, and some know their stances are not popular and try to be subtle.

Tankies are not leftists, and disagreeing with them is not arbitrary. Based on this we have decided to not platform them on 196. This is mentioned in the sidebar and anyone who does not like this is free to go elsewhere. Additionally, we usually give a warning if the infringing comments are not too bad. Both instances posted about here were instances where they were warned yet continued with their behavior.

Edit: We also don't mind tankies being active on 196, we only mind them defending tankies or proselytizing.

Hello! I am the mod in question.

Here is the post in question.

This is the post text copy pasted for anyone not wanting to click in and read the post:

I know someone that thinks tankies are allies against American imperialism, and they say that any movement to the left is better than capitalism, even if it’s Russia or CCP branded leftism. They say that nothing that Russia or CCP has done is worse than what American imperialism. This all came up after I mentioned the tankie triad, and they said they were subscribed to multiple communities on there and didn’t disagree with what they were seeing on there. Let me know if there’s a better place to ask or if there’s any other threads or resources I should refer them to. I will be forwarding this thread to them, so your help would be greatly appreciated.

Your original comment was in reply to this post. The 196 community has a no tolerance policy for authoritarians (it's in the sidebar), so whether or not I am power tripping then depends on whether or not it was reasonable of me to read you as a tankie or your comment as apologia.

The original comment I made was stating that alienation of someone by frustrating their political beliefs is not a way to convince them of anything.

This is true. I make the same point in another comment. I read your comment as making the same point. My issues with your comment relates to the original post making it clear that their friends supports russia and ccp and their actions, both authoritarian nations which have and are currently committing various atrocities. Please keep in mind that russia is my neighbour, and that I constantly see refugees from Ukraine and I know people who have been killed in the war. I would also like to state that I do not condone similar actions by capitalist nations. I am a socialist myself.

By planting the idea that the post might be bait, and by framing tankies as simply being a different flavor of leftist, you make light of this oppression as simply a "difference of opinion". In response to this I would say that I also have differences of opinion with fascists, among many other flavors of authoritarians.

This is my reading, and how I still read it. I removed your comment as we don't like platforming tankie rhetoric, and I sent you the following DM:

You did not respond to this DM, but instead reply in the thread for which you were warned, resulting in your ban. Your reply contained much of the same rhetoric, and specifically mentioned that you want leftists to cooperate with many kinds of marxists, which I read as including leninists and maoists, since that is the context of the post. Why did you not reply to my DM instead? You make it clear here that you specifically wanted to explain your position to me. I read this action as not wanting to speak with me, but instead spread your rhetoric.

Restoring your comments is something I am against, but I am not necessarily against unbanning you.

YDI. I'm really tired of people going into blahaj communities and telling the users there how to act towards people not in the community. The communities aren't for the purpose of courting "allies", etc., and I think going into minority communities and insisting the communities must have a purpose like that or users and mods should treat outsiders with kid gloves is alone enough to deserve a ban.

Punching left is a mandatory requirement for being on 196. If you don't want to infight and purity test, you won't be welcome there. They're basically full on McCarthyists, peak Anarcho-Natoism rivaled only by NCD.