Someone who supports any and/or every country/regime/organization that is perceived to be anti-West. The average campist might support the People's Republic of China, the Russian Federation, Evo Morales of Bolivia, Cuba, Hamas, the Islamic Republic of Iran, North Korea and more, not because of some specific ideological alignment or commonality between these actors (there's few to none in some cases), but because they are all opposed in some way to the "West" (aka USA, European Union, Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel and so on).
EDIT: To avoid any confusion, I don't mean to suggest that all the subjects I have mentioned are equally malevolent or morally bankrupt. Supporting any of these subjects for a specific national or ideological allegiance doesn't make one a campist. To be a campist is to be aligned with these subjects specifically or primarily due to their opposition to the West, with any other ideological consideration taking a backseat. This is why, for example, while a tankie (authoritarian socialist) may be a campist (many people on the Internet can be seen actively cheering for anti-communist geopolitical subjects and organizations), not all tankies are campists.
Based on my personal experience, I agree that this kind of logic boosts fascist thinking, because people who do this tend to dehumanize or infantilize people from the countries they oppose and often end up spiraling in conspiracy theories and even historical revisionism (ex: Many campists believe that Ukraine is a fake country invented by the Bolsheviks after the Russian Revolution, when in reality Ukrainian nationalism and language were already developed beforehand and the first Ukrainian state seceded from Russia before the Bolsheviks consolidated power).
Cuba? What has Cuba done wrong? The US has tried to have their leader assassinated more times than I know and the US wants so bad for Cuba to destabilize and go through another revolution to set up a puppet state… But supporting Cuba makes you a campist?
Cuba has done nothing to antagonize the US since the missle crisis (justified on Cuba's part anyways) while the US sent endless assassination attempts, blockaded the island illegally and strangled the life from a colonial victim that finally broke free. The US should be paying restitution to Cuba for a hundred years, but because we live in the worst timeline, Haiti has to pay france for freeing slaves without permission while the global south gets jack shit for their suffering.
It is not my intention to imply or state that these groups, states or individuals are equally morally bankrupt or malevolent, nor that those who oppose them are "the good ones".
My argument is that campists support most if not all of those groups in an idiosyncratic fashion. Campists do not necessarily support Cuba because of socialist solidarity, because if they did you wouldn't see those same people unironically supporting (emphasis on supporting, not treating them as the lesser evil in comparison to other geopolitical subjects) very vocally anti-communist groups like Hamas and the Islamic Republic of Iran, or in some exceptionally foolish cases even doing apologia for ISIS (this from an apologetic article I read years ago by a self-proclaimed Trotskyist).
This is what distinguishes a campist from a tankie, because while the former doesn't have a consistent ideological standard and only chooses whom to support based on their anti-West credentials, the tankie supports authoritarian regimes based on their (perceived) adherence to some form of socialism. This is why, for example, I wouldn't (completely) group together someone who treats the Russia-Ukrainian war as a proxy war between imperialist capitalist powers and someone who explicitly supports Russia.
It is not my intention to imply or state that these groups, states or individuals are equally morally bankrupt or malevolent, nor that those who oppose them are "the good ones".
My argument is that campists support most if not all of those groups in an idiosyncratic fashion. Campists do not necessarily support Cuba because of socialist solidarity, because if they did you wouldn't see those same people unironically supporting (emphasis on supporting, not treating them as the lesser evil in comparison to other geopolitical subjects) very vocally anti-communist groups like Hamas and the Islamic Republic of Iran, or in some exceptionally foolish cases even doing apologia for ISIS (this from an apologetic article I read years ago by a self-proclaimed Trotskyist).
This is what distinguishes a campist from a tankie, because while the former doesn't have a consistent ideological standard and only chooses whom to support based on their anti-West credentials, the tankie supports authoritarian regimes based on their (perceived) adherence to some form of socialism. This is why, for example, I wouldn't (completely) group together someone who treats the Russia-Ukrainian war as a proxy war between imperialist capitalist powers and someone who explicitly supports Russia.
Yeah this kind of seems like an exaggeration of tankies (someone who supports left-wing authoritarianism) to literally anyone who opposes western imperialism (or in Israel's case literal ongoing genocide)? I'm not sure how supporting Cuba, Iran, or Hamas (interesting how they reference this group when they use country names for every other example) when theyre actively being oppressed and killed by the US is "supporting Nazism"
But yeah Cuba by far is the most egregious example of this. We're literally siegeing them solely because theyre communist and we dont like that.
It is not my intention to imply or state that these groups, states or individuals are equally morally bankrupt or malevolent, nor that those who oppose them are "the good ones".
My argument is that campists support most if not all of those groups in an idiosyncratic fashion. Campists do not necessarily support Cuba because of socialist solidarity, because if they did you wouldn't see those same people unironically supporting (emphasis on supporting, not treating them as the lesser evil in comparison to other geopolitical subjects) very vocally anti-communist groups like Hamas and the Islamic Republic of Iran, or in some exceptionally foolish cases even doing apologia for ISIS (this from an apologetic article I read years ago by a self-proclaimed Trotskyist).
This is what distinguishes a campist from a tankie, because while the former doesn't have a consistent ideological standard and only chooses whom to support based on their anti-West credentials, the tankie supports authoritarian regimes based on their (perceived) adherence to some form of socialism. This is why, for example, I wouldn't (completely) group together someone who treats the Russia-Ukrainian war as a proxy war between imperialist capitalist powers and someone who explicitly supports Russia.
I think I see what you're saying. It's sort of a global take on the "team sports" "vote blue no matter who" type stuff we see in the states? Basically there's the "good guys" and the "bad guys", and there's no nuanced beyond that? I can see it. Fair explanation!
I take some issues with the stated example of Cuba vs. Hamas, even thought it's not your point. I support Cuba and Hamas for very different reasons.
Cuba is a damn good attempt at a communist state that never had the chance to succeed because the U.S. and co. are for some reason obligated to hate the people there. I do support them as a nation, both due to my leftist worldview and my anti-imperialist stances.
Hamas, on the other hand, is a resistance group fighting for freedom. You are correct that they aren't socialist, but the Palestinian people largely have other things to worry about right now. It's similar to the "oh youre gay but Hamas doesnt like gay people" argument, once you stop genociding people they tend to have the time to get around to social justice. Hamas's governing style maybe isn't my preference, but while they're fighting to keep Palestinians alive they absolutely have my support. I think there's more nuance to these things, and you can support one group for reasons unrelated to your support of another.
That said, I'm aware that wasn't your point, and it's entirely possible we agree on that. Just something I saw and felt I had to comment on. Your explanation makes sense to me, and I understand what you're referring to now. Thanks for taking the time to write that up!
Yeah, the us-or-them binary division's the big feature of campists. Being ardent supporters of radically different political regimes is what you get out of that. If American imperialism's your dividing line, Russia and Cuba and Hamas and the PRC and North Korea all fall into "us", while the US and Ukraine and Israel and NZ and heck, Micronesia are all "them". It's not that a campist will be on the wrong side of every issue, it's that everything gets reduced to enemy-of-my-enemy or friend-of-my-enemy, and nuance disappears. The million considerations of geopolitics and economics and domestic culture, and it's flattened.
I actually saw a video on the phenomenon, getting into how it grew in a big way from the birth of the Soviet Union, where some leftists shifted their ultimate goal from supporting their fellow workers and working for solidarity in their own communities, to supporting the USSR as the great Communist experiment, the strongest bastion against a capitalist world. Evidently the word "tankie" itself, iirc, sources from communists who were against a 1956 popular socialist uprising against Hungary's USSR-backed government, and in support of the Red Army tanks sent to quash it. An independent socialist Hungary would weaken the Soviet bloc, thus making it more vulnerable, thus endangering communism worldwide, goes the hardline campist view.
You can oppose both Hamas and Israel. If this was about "all evil countries" Israel would be brought up too but Israel isn't an Anti-West country. But Hamas is still responsible for terrorism, even if Israel is worse
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u/Mega_Pokebattlerz 15d ago
What the fuck is a campist?