I think the word "accelerationist" has the potential to become the next "tankie", or even a worse, more mainstream version of it. In the way a small number of liberals are currently using it, it is equally useless for understanding the world / equally useful for misunderstanding the world. It can be used to equate any leftist with a person who wants to start WW3. It can be used to draw a connection between the far right and the far left, without even having to use another concept like "authoritarianism" to mediate the comparison.

We are also quickly approaching the part of the American electoral cycle where liberals will start trying to suppress any non-abstract criticism of the Democrats. "Bernie bro" will start to seem outdated, so they are in need of a new rhetorical tool.

"Tankie" could also serve as this tool, but it has the downsides of its meaning being harder to intuit from the word itself, and its explanation including an actual historical event. "Accelerationist" is also directly rhetorically related to the current campaign of hate towards LGBT people, but does not necessarily reference it so it can still be used by cis people to insult trans leftists.

  • captcha [any]
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    2 years ago

    So how is the term "accelerationist" actually going to be abused? Before it basically meant a right wing troll pretending to left wing to make you support the right. Like how the boogaloo boys would say "death to america", but really want a race war.

    • ShimmeringKoi [comrade/them]
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      2 years ago

      "You want the US government to collapse? Why do you hate the poor and lgbt people, you accelerationist?!"

      • captcha [any]
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        2 years ago

        How do you want the US government to collapse? If it collapses into fascism thats not going to be good for US minorities or the rest of the world. You'll get the exact same outcome that Bin Laden got after 9/11.

        All this just sounds like people are gearing up to argue that US socialists should actively vote for Trump, as the "accelerationist" trolls were in 2016 and 2020.

    • Changeling [it/its]
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      2 years ago

      Fwiw accelerationism was originally a branch of left-wing academia. It tends to have right wing connotations currently because the whole “stochastic terror” strategy is quite literally right-wing accelerationism. Meanwhile, left-accelerationism, imo, is not a tradition that’s tied to materialist praxis. Or maybe I’m ignorant and just can’t be bothered to read enough Deleuze to understand it. I dunno. Apparently Mark Fisher belonged to an accelerationist collective at one point.

      • captcha [any]
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        2 years ago

        I'd be curious what actual left wing accelerationist praxis is but I suspect it all sort of dead ends or goes Blanquist. You can't make any sort of mass movement of out of people wanting to make their lives worse.

        • AcidSmiley [she/her]
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          2 years ago

          Also, the western left just isn't at a point were accelarationism makes any sense strategically. In about any imperial core country, better organization and mobilization means it's fascism that would be much more likely to benefit from a systemic collapse.