What are tankies? What does sea-lioning mean? - eviltoast

I’ve run across these terms several times, but without enough context to figure out what they mean. Could someone help me out, please?

ETA All of you are amazing! A huge thank you to everyone who responded, and an extra thank you to those who have provided links or explanations to further and/or related information. I am learning so much by reading all of these comments!

  • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.world
    710·
    1 year ago

    Tankies are leftists that defend or deny the atrocities committed by authoritarian communist regimes like the Soviet Union or the CCP. It was first used to describe communists in Great Britain that defended the Soviet Union for using tanks to crush anti-communist revolutions.

    Ironically history has proven that decision to have been the correct one and even the soft-left here in Britain today acknowledges that the people who were called “tankies” originally when that happened were all completely correct.