4 ms·

Well first of all I was 15 or 16 at the time, so I guess I didn't give it as much though as you currently do, and besides, Che Guevara is (to me at least) not a

Well first of all I was 15 or 16 at the time, so I guess I didn't give it as much though as you currently do, and besides, Che Guevara is (to me at least) not a symbol of communism first and foremost, but a symbol of a man fighting for his ideas (not saying that's my opinion of him especially nowadays, I'm talking about the symbolic power, especially of the famous photograph we all know). So... no. Besides, it was in Europe. Us Europeans do not have the same epidermic reaction to communism that Americans have.

boffinAudio 3y ago
Che Guevara was responsible for the murder of an awful lot of innocent human beings. That fact is lost on the edge lords who want to worship him as a saviour of mankind. He was far, far from that.
- drt5b7j 3y ago
  [flagged]
- Shekelphile 3y ago
  Gonna go out on a limb here and say that Che almost certainly did not kill anywhere near the same number of 'innocent people' as the overtly fascist south american heads of state from the 1950s-1990s did, namely Bautista, Barrientos, Pinochet, Videla, Stroessner.
  - boffinAudio 3y ago
    14,000 people executed without trial makes Che a mass murderer, whether you like it or not. Worship of this mass murderer is repugnant: “We don’t need proof to execute a man. We only need proof that it’s necessary to execute him.” “We executed many people by firing squad without knowing if they were fully guilty. At times, the Revolution cannot stop to conduct much investigation.” “My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood…I’d like to confess, Papa, at that moment I discovered that I really like killing.” “We must eliminate all newspapers; we cannot make a revolution with free press.” “We send to Guanahacabibes [i.e., Cuban labor camp] people who have committed crimes against revolutionary morals…it is hard labor…the working conditions are harsh…”
drt5b7j 3y ago
> Besides, it was in Europe. Us Europeans do not have the same epidermic reaction to communism that Americans have. You're just making it worse and worse. I'm also European. I'm guessing you're Western European though? I'm also guessing your country wasn't under soviet occupation for 50 years? Eastern Europeans very much do have a bad allergic reaction to communism, just like Americans, and just like everyone else who came in contact with it. Che was at best a useful idiot.
- _njyk 3y ago
  It's true that in Western Europe it's fine to show the communist symbols. To Westerner, they never saw communism in action, only propaganda. Which means that kids can proudly wear their capitalistic-made Che Guevara t-shirt at school. However, in Eastern Europe it's an absolute no, wearing such shirts is worse than the nazi symbols because it shows support to extreme atrocities in front of people who were victim of them.
  - jraph 3y ago
    Communism refers to at least two separate things, though (in Western Europe). - a theoretical economic model that is opposed to capitalism - the atrocious regimes of the 20th century calling themselves communism you are referring to that have vanishingly few things to do with the first. Vanishingly few people in Western Europe support these atrocious regimes. And therefore, communism the way you are using it. What's more, there's not much propaganda for communism here (I believe there was propaganda in the past, though). The confusion is usually here and people mostly don't see communism with a good eye because of the confusion (or because they are knowledgeable and oppose the theory - which is a better reason to be against it). Now, it's true that we have weaker feelings about it than in the US (and, I guess, the parts of the words that suffered from the atrocious regimes). (The usual response to this is that theoretical communism invariably leads to these atrocious regimes, but I believe we don't know this - invariably, it seems they've been set up by possibly sadist assholes with huge egos and thirsts for power, we haven't tried without - as well as we don't know if it would work. I don't have any further useful point to make in this discussion so I probably won't engage in it.)
mongol 3y ago
You are surprising me. Where do you live? Many Europeans have lived under communism for decades, and repulse it as nothing else.
- squarefoot 3y ago
  Sentiment about communism changes a lot. We, as western Europeans, haven't been brainwashed with decades of anti-communist propaganda, at least not to the level reached in the US, neither we lived under a communist regime, so we didn't develop extreme views until recent years. A couple decades ago one could find here a good number of right militants among immigrants from the former communist countries. As much as I'm left leaning and heavily hostile to any form of right wing ideology, I honestly can't blame who suffered for example the Ceausescu dictatorship for leaning the other way; it's pretty normal to me. Nowadays however the right wing nationalist ideology is developing support also among citizens of countries who never saw communism in all their existence, but that is the result of a subtle propaganda which I would date back in the early to mid 90s.
  - mongol 3y ago
    On one hand, you have "propaganda" (your words). On the other hand, you have those that lived under it. If the views of those align, there may be more truth to the anti-communist sentiment than plain "propaganda".
- touisteur 3y ago
  The Communist Party had 2-digits percentage of votes in France until the 90s. We had coalition governments with communist (and green) ministers last time in 2002 I think? And one of the main newspapers, when people still read them, was l'Humanité, clearly further left than the mainstream left (parti socialiste, then). Hate of communism was just never as rabid 'round here. In 1993 we had one of the mainstream pop songwriters write a love song to it (Rouge) and it had the Red Army Choir singing there and sold a million discs on this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rouge_(Fredericks_Goldman_Jones_album) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rouge_(Fredericks_Goldman_Jo.... We still have 'revolutionary' communist (troskists, and other variations) like Lutte Ouvrière, la Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire at each presidential election, gathering between 3 and 6% of votes... Europe is diverse...
bonoboTP 3y ago
The parts of Europe that lived under communism (so from East Germany eastward) have a much more negative view of communism than Americans for whom it was a theoretical, faraway geopolitical issue, which they never experienced. Still, around 20 years ago when I was a teen, some edgy kids did wear Che and Marx t-shirts and it was considered cool in some circles. I'd say it is an imitation of the West. As paradoxical as it sounds, since communism is seen as edgy and cool in Western Europe, the kids in Eastern Europe who want to seem in-the-know and up-to-date had to copy it. But it was indirect in this way, it didn't grow out of the Eastern European experience.
- orwin 3y ago
  I do not think it's true. It's wishful thinking at best, but sadly (or not, depending on your views), Eastern Europe is going through an identity crisis right now, and at least in Romania/Ukraine/Russia pré invasion (don't know about other countries), you could see a lot of misery and a lot of people yearning for the 'good old days', even people who weren't alive back then. I'd say it's half 50+, half young people, mostly poor people.
  - bonoboTP 3y ago
    I'm Hungarian BTW. And you seem to misunderstand me. I'm not saying that teens yearn for Kádár or much less Rákosi. I'm saying that the Che t shirt and the rest of the "Western teen rebel starter pack" are parts of a cool identity, it's not associated in their minds with historical Hungarian communism that actually happened. It is a continuation of a historic West-imitation that's as old as taking on Roman Catholicism or adopting the Renaissance in Matthias Corvinus' court. Hungarians in the 80s didn't long for some different philosophical organization of society. They wanted the cool Western things, good home appliances, higher salaries, vacations abroad, jeans, shoes, porn magazines, Western pop rock punk music, Coca Cola, McDonald's etc. So shortly after the change of system in 1989 edgier kids also started to adopt the teen rebel fashion including Che. Just like there were a few goths and emo kids in every class later on. And today it's kpop and whatever is trending on tiktok. Western Kids larp communism so eastern kids larp the larp. Its not unlike importing Buddhism and mindfulness from California. People adopt it because it is cool in the West and adopt the western interpretation of it. Imagine if a hip Indian tech worker in Bangalore adopts Californian Buddhism. It would not be because of the local history of Buddhism, but the coolness factor put on it by Silicon Valley. It's like when pizza was backimported to all of Italy, after it got popular in America, even though it was a much more local thing in a small part of Italy before.
kortilla 3y ago
Hitler was a man fighting for his ideas as well. If you ignore the ideas it’s pretty dumb to get behind someone just because they’re enthusiastic.

boffinAudio 3y ago

Che Guevara was responsible for the murder of an awful lot of innocent human beings. That fact is lost on the edge lords who want to worship him as a saviour of mankind. He was far, far from that.

drt5b7j 3y ago
[flagged]
Shekelphile 3y ago
Gonna go out on a limb here and say that Che almost certainly did not kill anywhere near the same number of 'innocent people' as the overtly fascist south american heads of state from the 1950s-1990s did, namely Bautista, Barrientos, Pinochet, Videla, Stroessner.
- boffinAudio 3y ago
  14,000 people executed without trial makes Che a mass murderer, whether you like it or not. Worship of this mass murderer is repugnant: “We don’t need proof to execute a man. We only need proof that it’s necessary to execute him.” “We executed many people by firing squad without knowing if they were fully guilty. At times, the Revolution cannot stop to conduct much investigation.” “My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood…I’d like to confess, Papa, at that moment I discovered that I really like killing.” “We must eliminate all newspapers; we cannot make a revolution with free press.” “We send to Guanahacabibes [i.e., Cuban labor camp] people who have committed crimes against revolutionary morals…it is hard labor…the working conditions are harsh…”

drt5b7j 3y ago

> Besides, it was in Europe. Us Europeans do not have the same epidermic reaction to communism that Americans have. You're just making it worse and worse. I'm also European. I'm guessing you're Western European though? I'm also guessing your country wasn't under soviet occupation for 50 years? Eastern Europeans very much do have a bad allergic reaction to communism, just like Americans, and just like everyone else who came in contact with it. Che was at best a useful idiot.

_njyk 3y ago
It's true that in Western Europe it's fine to show the communist symbols. To Westerner, they never saw communism in action, only propaganda. Which means that kids can proudly wear their capitalistic-made Che Guevara t-shirt at school. However, in Eastern Europe it's an absolute no, wearing such shirts is worse than the nazi symbols because it shows support to extreme atrocities in front of people who were victim of them.
- jraph 3y ago
  Communism refers to at least two separate things, though (in Western Europe). - a theoretical economic model that is opposed to capitalism - the atrocious regimes of the 20th century calling themselves communism you are referring to that have vanishingly few things to do with the first. Vanishingly few people in Western Europe support these atrocious regimes. And therefore, communism the way you are using it. What's more, there's not much propaganda for communism here (I believe there was propaganda in the past, though). The confusion is usually here and people mostly don't see communism with a good eye because of the confusion (or because they are knowledgeable and oppose the theory - which is a better reason to be against it). Now, it's true that we have weaker feelings about it than in the US (and, I guess, the parts of the words that suffered from the atrocious regimes). (The usual response to this is that theoretical communism invariably leads to these atrocious regimes, but I believe we don't know this - invariably, it seems they've been set up by possibly sadist assholes with huge egos and thirsts for power, we haven't tried without - as well as we don't know if it would work. I don't have any further useful point to make in this discussion so I probably won't engage in it.)

mongol 3y ago

You are surprising me. Where do you live? Many Europeans have lived under communism for decades, and repulse it as nothing else.

squarefoot 3y ago
Sentiment about communism changes a lot. We, as western Europeans, haven't been brainwashed with decades of anti-communist propaganda, at least not to the level reached in the US, neither we lived under a communist regime, so we didn't develop extreme views until recent years. A couple decades ago one could find here a good number of right militants among immigrants from the former communist countries. As much as I'm left leaning and heavily hostile to any form of right wing ideology, I honestly can't blame who suffered for example the Ceausescu dictatorship for leaning the other way; it's pretty normal to me. Nowadays however the right wing nationalist ideology is developing support also among citizens of countries who never saw communism in all their existence, but that is the result of a subtle propaganda which I would date back in the early to mid 90s.
- mongol 3y ago
  On one hand, you have "propaganda" (your words). On the other hand, you have those that lived under it. If the views of those align, there may be more truth to the anti-communist sentiment than plain "propaganda".
touisteur 3y ago
The Communist Party had 2-digits percentage of votes in France until the 90s. We had coalition governments with communist (and green) ministers last time in 2002 I think? And one of the main newspapers, when people still read them, was l'Humanité, clearly further left than the mainstream left (parti socialiste, then). Hate of communism was just never as rabid 'round here. In 1993 we had one of the mainstream pop songwriters write a love song to it (Rouge) and it had the Red Army Choir singing there and sold a million discs on this https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rouge_(Fredericks_Goldman_Jones_album) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rouge_(Fredericks_Goldman_Jo.... We still have 'revolutionary' communist (troskists, and other variations) like Lutte Ouvrière, la Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire at each presidential election, gathering between 3 and 6% of votes... Europe is diverse...

bonoboTP 3y ago

The parts of Europe that lived under communism (so from East Germany eastward) have a much more negative view of communism than Americans for whom it was a theoretical, faraway geopolitical issue, which they never experienced. Still, around 20 years ago when I was a teen, some edgy kids did wear Che and Marx t-shirts and it was considered cool in some circles. I'd say it is an imitation of the West. As paradoxical as it sounds, since communism is seen as edgy and cool in Western Europe, the kids in Eastern Europe who want to seem in-the-know and up-to-date had to copy it. But it was indirect in this way, it didn't grow out of the Eastern European experience.

orwin 3y ago
I do not think it's true. It's wishful thinking at best, but sadly (or not, depending on your views), Eastern Europe is going through an identity crisis right now, and at least in Romania/Ukraine/Russia pré invasion (don't know about other countries), you could see a lot of misery and a lot of people yearning for the 'good old days', even people who weren't alive back then. I'd say it's half 50+, half young people, mostly poor people.
- bonoboTP 3y ago
  I'm Hungarian BTW. And you seem to misunderstand me. I'm not saying that teens yearn for Kádár or much less Rákosi. I'm saying that the Che t shirt and the rest of the "Western teen rebel starter pack" are parts of a cool identity, it's not associated in their minds with historical Hungarian communism that actually happened. It is a continuation of a historic West-imitation that's as old as taking on Roman Catholicism or adopting the Renaissance in Matthias Corvinus' court. Hungarians in the 80s didn't long for some different philosophical organization of society. They wanted the cool Western things, good home appliances, higher salaries, vacations abroad, jeans, shoes, porn magazines, Western pop rock punk music, Coca Cola, McDonald's etc. So shortly after the change of system in 1989 edgier kids also started to adopt the teen rebel fashion including Che. Just like there were a few goths and emo kids in every class later on. And today it's kpop and whatever is trending on tiktok. Western Kids larp communism so eastern kids larp the larp. Its not unlike importing Buddhism and mindfulness from California. People adopt it because it is cool in the West and adopt the western interpretation of it. Imagine if a hip Indian tech worker in Bangalore adopts Californian Buddhism. It would not be because of the local history of Buddhism, but the coolness factor put on it by Silicon Valley. It's like when pizza was backimported to all of Italy, after it got popular in America, even though it was a much more local thing in a small part of Italy before.

kortilla 3y ago

Hitler was a man fighting for his ideas as well. If you ignore the ideas it’s pretty dumb to get behind someone just because they’re enthusiastic.