It's a general-purpose instance that leans Libertarian.

Take a look at their community list. Besides the sorts of general-purpose communities that every instance has: Gaming, NonCredibleDefense (started as a shitposting spinoff of CredibleDefense, a subreddit about military discussion. Nowadays the community is basically a NATO circlejerk), AI shit, and "MeanwhileOnGrad", the community dedicated to posting our w's to get mad at.

(And after checking, it turns out the guy in the screenshot is the sole moderator of /c/MeanwhileOnGrad who makes basically all of their posts lol. Talk about living rent free)

The owner of sh.itjust.works is also a weird free-speech-absolutist Libertarian guy. He made a big stink about the community forcing him to defederate from exploding-heads, the Nazi instance, because he believed in "free speech". Users pointed out that sh.itjust.works had been defederated from Lemmygrad since it was created, and the admin confessed that that was because of "personal opinions" (that apparently did not apply to literal Nazis).

Average sh.itjust.works user

Lemmy is an internet protocol, like Email. Just like anyone can start their own email server, anyone can start their own Lemmy "Instance".

An "Instance" is a website. It is wholly controlled by the people who run (or rent) the servers. "Lemmygrad.ml" is an instance. So is "Lemmy.world" and "Lemmy.ml"

Instances have Communities, which are like subreddits. But Instances can also "Federate" with each other, so you can see and comment on posts from your home instance on federated instances. This is why, when you're browsing Lemmygrad's front page with browsing set to "All" (instead of "Local" or "Subscribed"), you'll see posts from "asklemmy@lemmy.ml" or "Fediverse@lemmy.world".

The developers of the Lemmy protocol are Marxists. They run their own instance, lemmy.ml, but it is not an explicitly ideological instance like lemmygrad.ml. There is a Nazi instance, exploding-heads. Most major instances do not federate with them, except the shitty "free speech" ones. There is no way to prevent Nazis from using Lemmy, because no-one owns Lemmy. It would be like trying to prevent Nazis from using Email.

Lemmygrad federates with most instances, except porn instances and fascist instances. Many instances choose not to federate with Lemmygrad due to "Tankie" hysteria.

As I've gotten older I find myself being more of a conservative in the true definition of the term: a preference for slow and steady change, caution towards new ideas, and some amount of reverence for tradition.

The issue is that the Republican party is not a Conservative Party. Joe Biden is a Conservative. The Republican party is a party for Reaction and Neoliberalism.

Agreed. There is too much false equivalence of "Tankies" and fascists.

Fascists want to enslave your sisters and daughters and stick your trans friends in psych wards until they "decide" to stop being trans. They're fine with Blacks wallowing in poverty as second-class citizens and having militarized police on every streetcorner.

"Tankies" (Marxist-Leninists) believe in all the same progressive things other (so-called) Socialists do but have different views on historical figures and foreign policy, something that does not matter a bit in the here and now.

Here is the difference between Fascists and "Tankies": if it was proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that China was trying to exterminate the Ughyr people through mass execution, 95% of the "Tankies" out there, myself included, would disown China and denounce the genocide (this will not happen, because it isn't a genocide except in the broadest and most meaningless of terms). If it was proven beyond a doubt that the Holocaust happened (which it more or less has), the majority of Neo-Nazis would still say it was good.

The Holocaust happened. The Armenian Genocide happened. Manifest Destiny happened.

The Ughyr detention centers, whatever you think of them, do not constitute a genocide. The Ukrainian Famine was a tragic loss of life, and perhaps the Bolsheviks could have done more to prevent it, but it was not an attempted extermination of the Ukrainian people. And don't even get me started on Rwanda.

And Liberals routinely deny genocide in Palestine and Kashmir because it is politically expedient.

A blanket reproachment of "Genocide Denial" ignores the fact that sometimes, a genocide is claimed where one does not exist. I'm sure you accept that "White Genocide", especially wrt South Africa, is a conspiracy theory with no legitimacy. Why do you not give the same benefit of the doubt to China, or the USSR?

I think the "billions on relief in poor countries while we can't afford helping Americans at home" bit is a false dichotomy. The money spent on other countries isn't to help their people, it's to curry favor with foreign governments and advance American empire.

Really, the people who are stealing our rightful wealth are not poor people in other countries (or "welfare queens" at home) but the rich and powerful who aren't paying their fair share.

Marxist-Leninist. I'm a believer in Socialist philosophy and the Marxist Material Dialectic, as explained by Marx, Engles, Lenin, Stalin, and Mao.

While I am not a believer in Dengism, I believe that the Communist Party of China is ideologically Marxist and has made great strides in building China's productive forces and improving the lives of the Chinese people.

China is a large country, with many Chinese.

I oppose Western Imperialism and offer critical support to non-Socialist countries that oppose it.

For what it's worth, I also believe in racial and gender equality and gay/trans rights, but these battles are secondary to the class war.

I have to say I agree with point 1.

"Read Theory" is "Google It" for Communists. It's annoying and a little arrogant. Of course reading theory is good. But they're here for the social aspect. If you were sitting down with a friend for lunch, or talking to a coworker at work, and they asked a question about socialism, you wouldn't tell them to go to the library and rent a book, would you?

While it's good to believe in Free Speech generally, a blanket approach is how Reddit alternatives end up like Voat. Even normal people were suggesting it as a popular Reddit alternative, but then it became clear that their slavish devotion to the idea of "free speech" included not kicking out fascists and bigots.

Most of the posters are Americans, but more "PSL" American Leftists than "DSA" American Leftists.

Also I see the name lemmygrad thrown around, what’s the story with them?

Lemmygrad.ml is an instance for Marxist-Leninists and other Socialists who are broadly pro-AES (Actually Existing Socialism, i.e. the USSR, PRC, Cuba, Vietnam, East Germany, etc.) and anti-West. Criticism of AES is fine; but the assumption is that you're there because you think AES is better than Actually Existing Capitalism. If you've ever heard of podcasts like TrueAnon or The Deprogram (or even Chapo Traphouse, to some extent, though they're more "ML-sympathetic" than "Outright Marxist-Leninists"), it'll give you a general idea of what sort of politics they're about.

Lemmygrad is where Leftist Redditors go when their favorite subs (/r/ChapoTrapHouse, /r/MoreTankieChapo, /r/FULLCOMMUNISM, /r/GenZedong) get banned or quarantined.

I'm not a big Lemmy-head, but I saw this post on lemmygrad so I assume that means your instance is federated with lemmygrad.