Update:
The comments from this post will not be removed as to preserve the discussion around the announcement. Any continued discussions outside of this thread that violate server rules will be removed. We feel that everyone that has an opinion, and wanted to vent, has been heard.

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Original post:
Yesterday, we received information about the planned federation by Hexbear. The announcement thread can be found here: https://www.hexbear.net/post/280770. After reviewing the thread and the comments, it became evident that allowing Hexbear to federate would violate our rules.

Our code of conduct and server rules can be found here.

The announcement included several concerning statements, as highlighted below:

  • “Please try to keep the dirtbag lib-dunking to hexbear itself. Do not follow the Chapo Rules of Posting, instead try to engage utilizing informed rhetoric with sources to dismantle western propaganda. Posting the western atrocity propaganda and pig poop balls is hilarious but will pretty quickly get you banned and if enough of us do it defederated.”
  • “The West’s role in the world, through organizations such as NATO, the IMF, and the World Bank - among many others - are deeply harmful to the billions of people living both inside and outside of their imperial core.”
  • “These organizations constitute the modern imperial order, with the United States at its heart - we are not fooled by the term “rules-based international order.” It is in the Left’s interest for these organizations to be demolished. When and how this will occur, and what precisely comes after, is the cause of great debate and discussion on this site, but it is necessary for a better world.”

The rhetoric and goal of Hexbar are clear based on their announcement: to “dismantle western propaganda” and "demolish organizations such as NATO” shows that Hexbar has no intention of "respecting the rules of the community instance in which they are posting/commenting.” It’s to push their beliefs and ideology.

In addition, several comments from a Hexbear admin, demonstrate that instance rules will not be respected.

Here are some examples:

“I can assure you there will be no lemmygrad brigades, that energy would be better funneled into the current war against liberalism on the wider fediverse.”

“All loyal, honest, active and upright Communists must unite to oppose the liberal tendencies shown by certain people among us, and set them on the right path. This is one of the tasks on our ideological front.”

Overall community comments:

To clarify, for those who have inquired about why Hexbear versus Lemmygrad, it should be noted that we are currently exploring the possibility of defederating from Lemmygrad as well based on similar comments Hexbear has made.

Defederation should only be considered as a last resort. However, based on their comments and behavior, no positive outcomes can be expected.

We made the decision to preemptively defederate from Hexbear for these reasons. While we understand that not everyone may agree with our decision, we believe it is important to prioritize the best interests of our community.

  • GoodEye8@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Have you read the rules of Lemmygrad? Literally the first rule of the instance.

    No capitalist apologia / anti-communism.

    Having a different viewpoint is literally against the rules of Lemmygrad. You’re allowed to suck the toes of Putin and say “DEATH TO NATO” but the moment you say anything remotely bad about USSR are you’re already on the watchlist of getting banned. How about you be critical about the very instance you’re from before you go crying about others considering defederating from you.

    Really. Think about how fucking vague that rule is. I guarantee people (probably you included considering the community you moderate) in Lemmygrad believe NATO to be a apparatus created by the capitalist US to spread their “capitalist” imperialism which means talking about anything in favor of NATO is capitalist apologia. But when we turn it around and have capitalist Russia spread “capitalist” imperialism, not only is that NOT capitalist apologia but people in Lemmygrad actually support the imperialism of capitalist Russia, like it doesn’t contradict their beliefs AT ALL. Literally the only difference, from the anti-capitalist anti-imperialist point of view, between Russia and the US is that the US does their imperialism under the NATO umbrella while Russia doesn’t even try to hide their imperialism. Yet defending one is probably a bannable offense while defending the other is not just fine but actively promoted.

    • ImOnADiet🇵🇸 (He/Him)@lemmygrad.ml
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      1 year ago

      in Lemmygrad believe NATO to be a apparatus created by the capitalist US to spread their “capitalist” imperialism which means talking about anything in favor of NATO is capitalist apologia

      stalin chad yes balloon

      Begging you to read Lenin so you know what we mean when we say imperialism, it’s not “when mean country does mean thing”

      • GoodEye8@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Ah yes, the fabled “You just don’t understand imperialism” argument. How informative. Well enlighten me how or why Russia and their actions towards Ukraine do not fall under the concept of imperialism Lenin described in “Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism”.

          • GoodEye8@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            Have you read Lenins works? Because if you have I don’t understand how you could take that article seriously. The article tries to take the 5 points and break down why Russia doesn’t fit them.

            Starting with

            1)the concentration of production and capital has developed to such a high stage that it has created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life. and I guess 4) the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves

            Lenin goes into great detail in chapter 1 about what constitutes a monopoly, how they become cartels and how cartels turn into the foundation of economic life which then turns capitalism into imperialism. The examples of monopolies and cartels are universally on a national or local level, never on a global level (probably because he simply couldn’t fathom the world we live in today).

            The writer doesn’t actually even address point 1). I’m just going assume he lumps it together with point 4) and pulls out a global dick measuring competition to say:“look, Russia has a small peepee, therefor Russia can’t be monopolistic”. It doesn’t matter where Russian enterprises land on the global scale because a backyard monopoly is still a monopoly. If the global monopolistic cartel is so much bigger than whatever Russia has, why hasn’t the international monopoly taken over Russia and exploit it for profits? Because Russian oligarchs together with the Russian government have created their own national cartel. Companies from countries can only play by their rules which is literally what Lenin is talking about:

            Cartels come to an agreement on the terms of sale, dates of payment, etc. They divide the markets among themselves. They fix the quantity of goods to be produced. They fix prices. They divide the profits among the various enterprises, etc.

            Hence, as per point 1 Russia fits the imperialistic definition. As for point 4, CIS exists as an extension of Russian sphere of influence. Considering other imperialists can’t really divide that region implies the existence of an imperialistic force within that region, Russia.

            1. the merging of bank capital with industrial capital, and the creation, on the basis of this “finance capital,” of a financial oligarchy.

            The author of the article goes back to the same “small peepee” argument, which I already disputed in point 1. A backyard monopoly is still a monopoly.

            But I’ll give the author some benefit of the doubt, they couldn’t have assumed the control the Russian cartel has over their own banking. That is now apparent with all the sanctions the west as thrown at Russia, which would absolutely destroy the banking sector of any normal country. But Russia for the most parts seems unfazed by those sanctions. This can happen only if there’s a cartel running the entire thing, as they have enough power over the market that the influence of external actors can be negated.

            No I’m not convinced that point 2 does not apply to Russia.

            1. the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities acquires exceptional importance

            This is the only point of contention. The article writer approaches this from 2 angles. First is that idea that an imperialistic country would export high technology goods as opposed to raw materials, and the countries that export raw material fit the pattern of “semi-developed third world state”. And if you don’t look too deep that seems to be true, most third world countries do export raw materials and import the high technology goods created from those materials. However there’s a very clear exception that the writer brings out but refuses to acknowledge, energy (which includes gas and oil). Imperial powers absolutely would (and do) export energy, even in its raw form, because not only is it the perfect commodity (because it’s always in demand) it’s also extremely profitable if you can control its pricing. I would say the complete opposite to the writer, Russia is an imperialistic power because they have gas and oil to export.

            The other aspect of this point is the export of financial capital. The writer once again goes for the “small peepee” argument and claims that because other imperialistic countries can export financial capital more than Russia then it means Russia can’t be imperialistic. But then the writer also acknowledges that Russia does in fact export financial capital. And here’s the contentious point, does the amount of financial capital exported from Russia gain exceptional importance or not? I would say it does but if you want to claim it doesn’t then I’m not going to argue over one point. Whether they do or not does change the outcome because the other 4 points still indicate imperialism.

            1. the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed

            If Russia is not an imperialistic power then how do you explain the war in Ukraine? If you subscribe to the idea of imperialistic capitalistic powers then Ukraine is a territorial dispute between two imperialistic powers. You’ve established that one side is “the west”, what is the other side? By the power of deduction it can only be Russia.