this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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Blåhaj Lemmy is a Lemmy instance attached to blahaj.zone. This is a group for questions or discussions relevant to either instance.

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This is an admin post, intended for blahaj lemmy users. Top level posts from members of other instances will be removed.

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Edit - Hexbear announced plans to deferedate from us.

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~~After recent events, it feels to me that sentiment has shifted and more people are asking for defederation of hexbear than previously~~

~~I've been doing my best to try and mend bridges and keep us connected, as it's my hope that we can maintain trans solidarity and work with them, despite the friction, however, ultimately, I feel that this is an issue for the blahaj lemmy community to decide, not the admins alone~~

~~So here's what we're going to do~~

~~We're going to leave things as they are for a week. That will give time for things to calm down whilst we see if we can work together. After a week, I'll put up a vote and get a feel for where the community is at in regards to our continued federation with hexbear. That poll will run for a week. If there is a strong will to defederate (a clear majority), then that's what we will do~~

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[–] Erika2rsis@lemmy.blahaj.zone 32 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

When they say "liberals" I personally understand it as referring to liberalism in the textbook economic sense, i.e. support for private property, market economies, Age of Enlightenment ideals of personal liberty, and what could be called "bourgeois" democracy. You may be somewhat familiar with the economic definition of "liberal" from the term "neoliberal", which refers to the types of market liberalization associated with Reagan and Thatcher.

So basically the confusion comes because in the popular discourse of the United States, political terms are often used with completely different meanings from their more international/proper definitions. This is made worse by the fact that leftists use a number of words, such as "anarchy" and "dictatorship", in completely different ways than most of the rest of the world.

The issue of contradictory definitions is particularly problematic for me as a Norwegian-American leftist, because I might say "I'm a republican. I'd never vote for Liberals or Democrats in my life. I strongly oppose liberal ideology." one moment, and then the next I might say, "Oh, no, I'm absolutely a liberal! I hate Republicans like nothing else and only vote Democrat.", with these statements not being contradictory in the slightest because these words are all autoantonyms with meanings depending on who exactly you're speaking to. And don't even get me started on the American versus Norwegian Overton windows!

Edit: I guess you could say these are examples of what the What Is Politics? podcast refers to as political "worbs". Great podcast IMO.

[–] GarbageShoot@hexbear.net 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You are completely correct and explained things well.

As a note for those wondering, anarchy refers to the absence of "unjust" hierarchy (take that as you will, different anarchists take different views on it) and dictatorship is the "rule without restriction" that a class has over society, e.g. a capitalist society is the "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie" not because there is a single person who is a dictator but because political power is overwhelmingly placed in the practical control of the bourgeoisie through many different means (corporate media, lobbying, speaking fees, etc.)