I don't know for sure. I'll voice a strong belief in this regard, but take it with a grain of salt.

I think that Hexbear's views on Russia is a specific case of a general tendency that you see all across social media (not just HB or Lemmy): to dichotomise complex matters into exactly one good side and exactly one bad side, while assuming that everyone belongs to those two bags. It should go like:

1. NATO bad.
2. NATO fights Russia.
3. Criticism against Russia assumed to be NATO support.
4. Since NATO bad, NATO supporter bad.
5. Anyone who would otherwise criticise both NATO and Russia gets screeched at, and eventually shuts up.
6. "Russia good" becomes part of a local consensus.

It gets messier when you add Ukraine into the equation, or consider people conflating governments and populations, but it should give you an idea - it starts with somewhat sane premises but quickly devolves into insane lack of logic.

It explains nicely why they're supporting Palestine, even with the apparent contradiction: Israel is associated with USA and thus with NATO.

IMO their dichotomy in this topic is idiotic. However it is not just from their part, and blaming specifically Hexbear for this, like some people would do, would be unjust (and a self-demonstrating example). We, people using the internet in the 20s, are collectively doing it.

By the way, you see another example of the general phenomenon in this comment chain. Ctrl+F "elephant shit" and look at the comment I was replying to - "you either treat two types of bad as the same, or you're defending one."

[Now I probably drew the ire of all sides at the same time. Frankly? I don't give a fuck; I'm too old and grumpy to play along.]

Why does everyone there unequivocally, wholeheartedly, unquestionably support Russia?

You may not like this, but the simple answer is they don't.

Russia has barely a trace of communism anymore and it is hard right oligarchy that fits almost every definition of fascism. Not to mention HEAVILY racist and anti-LGBTQ (I have multiple friends who were from Russia and they were the ones who originally told me that before I saw it for myself in Russia)

Correct. Hexbear critically supports the role Russia plays as an anti-NATO country, and ally to the PRC, who Communists do support.

Communists in general see Western Hegemony as the international proletariat's largest enemy, as the Global North hyper-exploits the Global South. Michael Parenti explains brilliantly in this short, 2 minute clip. Overall, Communists agree with Lenin's analysis in Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, and agree that it remains the number 1 enemy of the international proletariat.

NATO is the military alliance of the largest Imperialist exploiters of the Global South, and therefore weakening NATO Hegemony is a good thing. The Nationalist, far-right Russian Bourgeoisie fights against this, because they were not allowed to join the club after the fall of the USSR like they had hoped!

Hope that helps.

I highly recommend you give Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism and On Authority a read. At least On Authority, as it's a very short piece, but the two combined should give you a basic understanding of the historical and theoretical basis of why marxists defend the use of authority. I can understand where you are coming from, I was more than a little skeptical of authoritarianism when I was younger and still identified as an anarchist, but I think if you take the time to honestly engage with our position then you will at least understand why our stance is what it is, and how we are diametrically opposed to fascism, even if you don't agree with us.

Plenty HB users are authoritarian. I disagree with them in this; however I don't think that both things cancel out, given the fascism is orders of magnitude worse than authoritarianism alone.