Yes, many people do construct a mental strawman and take great pleasure in assigning & attacking it. It's also interesting how many actually do believe such strawman-like absurdities in earnest. Yes, there are people who construct an image of "but real communism has never been tried!" types and impute the term so they can attack; there are also people who truly believe "but real communism has never been tried!".

I don't know if I've ever seen anyone spouting that philosophy on HackerNews though..

This 1984 shit is getting so casual.