DebateGate
General Category => 3DHS => Topic started by: richpo64 on December 17, 2008, 02:49:15 PM
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQcUkd1w_TY[/youtube]
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El Che, not really el Che himself, but Korda's photo of him, has become the symbol of youthful rebellion.
Think of Mickey Mouse. People do not like mice, nor do they want to live in ghtr same house with mice, but Mickey Mouse is the symbol of juvenile merriment.
Hitler was too old to be a charismatic symbol, and people remember his defeat. Hitler has had an army of publicists portraying him as the Devil since the 1930's. Either you hate Hitler or you are Anti-Semetic.
Che was young when he died, and was much more photogenic. Mao is not the new Che, Mao is a less effective marketing symbol: he's too traditional to use his image to show any sort of youthful rebellion: he's on the PRC's money, fer Chrissake. I don;t see how Mao enters into the topic of Che, anyway.
"Motocycle diaries" was a great film. I am not particularly fond of Che, who was, after all, a rather incompetent and misguided revolutionary, but he did have an exciting life, and like Jesus, he was betrayed and ignominiously murdered by those he fought against. He was famous because he embodied the standard myth of youthful rebellion.
Mao also was a rebel in his youth, but he died as an old, annoying man with foul breath and yellow teeth. You have to be more like Gandalf to die old and still be an iconic symbol. Of course, Galdalf does not die, does he?
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>>Think of Mickey Mouse.<<
What an incredibly stupid thing to say.
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You know nothing of icons and how they work, apparently. Mickey is the icon of mirth, just as Che is the icon of youthful rebellion. The three pointed star, the cross, the hammer and sickle, the crescent moon and star, all these are icons. Their symbolic value surpasses their origin.
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>>Think of Mickey Mouse.<<
What an incredibly stupid thing to say.
Oh, I don't know....
(http://texasscribbler.com/images/CheMouse1.JPG)
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See? that is the icon of stupid youthful rebellion. Or rebellious youthful stupidity. Or maybe Youthful rebellious stupidity.
I think I understand why it might appeal to you.
I keep thinking of you as being about fourteen, but perhaps that is just your mental age.
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Yeah. As the piece points out a picture of Hitler would cause libtards to have an instant coronary and demand the wearer be fired, shot, ridiculed, and shot again. But Che is a symbol of youthful rebellion. They actually think it's fine for American youth to make an icon out of a mass murderer. I see Mao is now in vogue. What's he a symbol of? Weight loss?
Mickey Mouse. Good grief.
This is the best picture of Che Guevara
(http://notmytribe.com/archive/CheGuevaraDead.jpg)
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No, it isn't. JUst like a picture of your corpse is sure to not be your best picture.
You don't believe me, try to sell dead Che T-shirts. I bet you could not even get Grover Fucking Norquest to wear one. Not even Ann Coulter. Not even yourself.
You are just being a smartass.
As usual.
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Hey! smartass! Do smartasses know more than nothing?
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Not your kind of smartass. You are a rare and special breed. Smartassicus knowlessthanzilchii
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You can thank the US Special Forces for training the unit that tracked Che Guevara. The Green Berets came from MACV-SOGs CCC unit. CCC was one of SOGs three cross border recon units that tracked the NVA as they moved along the Ho Chi Minh trail.
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I would not thank the Special Forces unit of the damned CIA for anything. They are a disgrace to my country.
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El Che, not really el Che himself, but Korda's photo of him, has become the symbol of youthful rebellion.
That is no excuse. The idolization of Guevara is ignorant.
You have to be more like Gandalf to die old and still be an iconic symbol. Of course, Galdalf does not die, does he?
Old wizards never die. They just fade away.
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>>I would not thank the Special Forces unit of the damned CIA for anything.<<
Very good, XO, because the Special Forces doesn't work for the CIA, they don't take orders from the CIA, and they have a completely different mission statement. I didn't know you were so up on these things.
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I would not thank the Special Forces unit of the damned CIA for anything.<<
Okay, I meant "I would not thank the Special Forces unit OR the damned CIA for anything.<<
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The point I was making here is that Che Guevara, like Nixon, like Kennedy, is an intriguing figure and a symbol of a certain type of individual. Nixon was not charismatic at least to most people, but he was a true tragic figure, an archetype of the classic tragic figure.
Che and Kennedy are archetypal charismatic figures of the Messiah type: the singular individual who arises, captures the popular imagination and then is martyred before he can grow old.
Juan Peron is an example of what happens when a charismatic figure lives on after his own defeat and manages to return. This was also the pattern of the earlier Argentine president Hipólito Yrigoyen, though I doubt that any of you here have ever heard of him. Both Yrigoyen and Peron were removed by the military and both were eventually reelected as old men, then they fizzled. Neither would make much of a film because of that fizzle. Adolf Hitler was in many ways a tragic figure (his obsession with imposing a racial hierarchy on the world with the Germans at the top), but he has become the embodiment of total evil, and therefore a poor figure to dramatize, at least in our times.
Maybe Genghis Khan, another mass murderer, died so long ago that something interesting could be made of his life. John Wayne made a Genghis film, but it was one of his cheesiest efforts, and also probably being in it gave him cancer.
Certainly the time is ripe to dramatize Attila the Hun in Hungary, but I doubt the rest of the world is ready for a heroic Attila movie. Lots of Hungarians are naming their kids Attila. But no one else seems to have gotten on board
But everyone has heard of Evita Peron, who WAS a true tragic figure. Her tragic flaw seems to have been that her being sterile (which allowed her to not become pregnant and therefore with children to look after like most Argentine women of her time) developed into cancer, which killed her tragically, at the age of 33, which is a great age at which to be martyred. Evita was of course, also vain and a clothes horse (just like Jackie O, by the way), but those flaws did not bring her down. The cancer got her first. An EXCELLENT life to portray in the movies. Or in the musical, which was full of historical inaccuracies, but dramatically nearly flawless. In the film, it was hard to see Madonna as a teenage Evita, though.
Nixon is the archetype of the tragic figure, who manages to climb to the top, but is flawed, and whose obsession with his flaw brings about his downfall.
In 'Motorcycle Diaries', the young Che and his pal Alberto Granados manage to bum their way through poverty-stricken Chile and Peru by constantly bragging about their being doctors. Being typical Argentines and therefore ethnically European, they manage to get a number of molecules Chileans and Peruvians to befriend them and finance their travels, where this was impossible for the impoverished Indians of the lower caste. Unlike nearly all films about South America, 'Motorcycle diaries' was filmed on location in South America, and most of the extras were local people of little or no experience as actors. There is a feeling of true authenticity in this film that is very rare.
Both Granados and Guevara in "Diaries" are transformed from typical bourgeois Argentine know-it-alls into Marxists. Before the trip, Che is Fuser (a nickname derived from FUribundo de la SERna, referring to his frenetic style of playing soccer) The importance of Dr Bresciani giving Che Mariátegui's famous book 'Seven Interpretive Essays on Peruvian Reality' (1928) is hardly stressed in keeping with its importance as the motivator for the radicalization of Che and Alberto as they work with the leper patients at the isolated San Pablo mission hospital on the Amazon or one of its tributaries.
This is the wikipedia listing for Mariátegui:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Carlos_Mari%C3%A1tegui (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Carlos_Mari%C3%A1tegui)
Mariátegui's writings resulted in the formation of the now rather centrist APRA movement, currently in power in Peru, as well as the formation of the Sendero Luminoso party, which fused ideas of Mao with those of Mariategiui and Sendero founder Abimael Guzman into the violent movement that was squelched during the term of Alberto Fujimori.
Mariategui is absolutely essential to understanding Peruvian politics and the indigenist movements in South America. I would be surprised to hear that Condileeza has ever heard of him.
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>>You are a rare and special breed.<<
Why thank you numbnuts. ;D
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Che and Kennedy are archetypal charismatic figures of the Messiah type: the singular individual who arises, captures the popular imagination and then is martyred before he can grow old.
Kennedy, on the the other hand, didn't spend his spare time personally shooting dissenters.
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Kennedy, on the the other hand, didn't spend his spare time personally shooting dissenters.
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Still, dissenters in Vietnam were shot by American bullets. Kennedy could have prevented the Vietnam War and saved many, many more lives than Che ever took.
But that is not the point: Che is a world icon, Kennedy, a lesser one, because Che fulfills the myth better. Kennedy got where he was with the help of a very rich family. Che rose through his own determination from being a doctor to not just a revolutionary, but an international revolutionary. Che was also damn photogenic, Kennedy far less so.
There are reasons why the mythos of Che beats the mythos of JFK. It is not really a rational process, this attraction to Messiah figures. There are few religions that lack them, and they are the most irrational of constructs. I think it stems from the need of the pack to have a single leader (which is not really rational), rather than a leader for each tribal endeavor, as Indians tended to have.
Mao was a major Messianic figure as a young man. It would be hard to find a case of greater managerial incompetence than the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, but Che trumps Mao because he managed to get himself martyred and did not die as an old fart. Che's foray into Bolivia was a magnificent idea from an image-enhancement point of view. It was hideous and bungling incompetence from any practical stance.
You do understand that I am discussing WHY Che has become an icon, not that he was a particularly worthy leader, as leaders go. After all, he failed in Africa rather miserably, then he returned to his home continent (not that Bolivia is much like Argentina or Cuba) and blew it there as well.
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>>You do understand that I am discussing WHY Che has become an icon, ...<<
Fair enough. Why did young democrats/liberals/Hollyweird types create an icon out of a failed massmurderer? Someone who would do away with Hollywood entirely given his way. The left in this country also idolizes, Che's boss Fidel Castro, another mass murderer. The difference being you don't see Fidel t-shirts at Obama rallies while you do see Che t-shirts and posters at Obama rallies. Maybe after Fidel is officially dead he'll get the Che treatment.
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Maybe after Fidel is officially dead he'll get the Che treatment.
No, he won't, and I explained why. There are no old iconic figures, because a devotion to icons appeals to people with adolescent minds, such as your irrational worship of Sarah Palin. You would not do this for Ayn Rand, because she was an old bat, even though she was smarter than Sara Palin by dozens of IQ points.
The admiration for Che has nothing to do with politics, as I explained. Rightwingers are led by old farts and they tell the young dolts that Che is a non-no, so you don't see Che teeshirts at GOP rallies. Other than that, it is the need for a messiah that appeals to people, especially those with adolescent minds to whom everyone and everything is either "Love it" or "Hate it".
I like the Che story in 'Motorcycle Diaries' because it is entertaining. I imagine that I will like the new Che film as well. But this does not mean I would vote for Che or even wear his t-shirt. The same is true for most people who do wear his t shirts.
Good revolutionaries are almost always bad administrators. Leftists tend to be incompetent, rightists tend to be corrupt.
Kennedy and Obama are not revolutionaries by the way. Kennedy was not a great administrator, but he certainly had the alternative (Nixon) beat, as history has proven.
Obama's charisma is unusual, as it stems from his being a Black man who sounds like the most rational of White men in every way. No drama Obama is a good description of his personality.
No drama Kennedy, no drama Reagan, no drama Che, no drama Fidel, no drama Hitler, no drama Mussolini are NOT valid descriptions. Even Nixon had some desire to be dramatic. He referred to his GOP plans as "The New American Revolution".
Utterly bullshit, like McCain hollering (very dramatically) 'Change is coming! Change is coming!", which was bogus for what he would have done, but ironically accurate, since the change that came was from his spiralling down in smoke and flames. No White House for you, John Boy. Not now, not ever.
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http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB5/che14_1.htm (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB5/che14_1.htm)
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I have to give him credit. He's so full of shit he's convinced himself.
Che is an icon of the left, just like Fidel Castro. Had there been a t-shirt business back in 1959 democrats would have been wearing them at conventions. Since there were none, democrats took to visiting Cuba and kissing Fidel's ass. Why? He's a communist which is a second cousin to liberalism. So yes, Fidel is old now, but when the revolution was young, they loved him, and still do to this day. Look for President Barrack Hussein Obama to open up Cuba again, and then pay a visit to this icon of socialists everywhere before Fidel is sent on the bullet train to hell where he'll join Che, Mao, Stalin, and Hitler in whatever unbearable eternity they have so eagerly earned.
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You do understand that I am discussing WHY Che has become an icon, not that he was a particularly worthy leader, as leaders go.
Yes, I get that. But the biggest why of why Guevara is an icon is people believe the lie that he fought for freedom. All the BS about him fighting for the people is as stupid as arguing that Hitler was a champion of the people. I get that Guevara has a messianic myth about him, but in this day and age, seems to me, someone would have to be pretty ignorant to buy into it.
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Guevara may not have brought freedom to Cuba, but when he fought Batista, he was fighting a nasty dictatorship.
If you fight for a dictatorship like Pinochet, you will never become an icon. Never.
Obama will probably put an end to the embargo, and that will serve to bring a movement for change. I doubt that Obama will visit Cuba unless there are some major changes in personal freedoms in Cuba.
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Is Chavez the new Che' ?
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Is Chavez the new Che' ?
That's like saying, "is Chernyenko the next Lenin"? No. Chavez is, at best, a rerun.
Too old to be an icon. He will definitely change Venezuela, bit not anywhere else much.
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If the CIA had existed in Pilate's time, they would be the guys behind the scenes who tracked down Jesus and gave him up for crucifixion. For some reason, they think that tracking down Che and handing him over to his killers is something to boast about. Whatever floats their boat, I guess.
Che failed because he failed to adequately assess the degree of support he could count upon from the terrorized Bolivian peasantry and the essential prematurity of his armed resistance movement. More time should have been spent on encouraging indigenous leadership of the Movement so that the campesinos could have found the courage to resist the puppet government. People idolize Che for his courage, his selflessness and his dedication to the Revolution, i.e. to the common people. His love of humanity.
<<Either you hate Hitler or you are Anti-Semetic.>>
Not always - - you could be a member of the Polish Home Army and hate Hitler AND the Jews.
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>>If the CIA had existed in Pilate's time, they would be the guys behind the scenes who tracked down Jesus and gave him up for crucifixion.<<
Get some help.
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It's true. Whenever people are repressed by an oligarchy, a movement arises to overthrow the oppressors and a repression or reaction to the movement is the oligarchy's typical response. The oligarchy seeks external allies since it can't appeal to its own people. In this case, the oligarchy was allied to the U.S. and the CIA and Special Forces as arms of the U.S. government would lend their assistance to the government's puppet oligarchs. Oldest story in the world.
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Che failed because he failed to adequately assess the degree of support he could count upon from the terrorized Bolivian peasantry and the essential prematurity of his armed resistance movement. More time should have been spent on encouraging indigenous leadership of the Movement so that the campesinos could have found the courage to resist the puppet government. People idolize Che for his courage, his selflessness and his dedication to the Revolution, i.e. to the common people. His love of humanity.
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Not exactly. The Juan Jose Torres government (1970-71) was leftist, and most of the peasants in the area where Che was trying to start a rebellion had recently acquired the land from the government at no charge. The land was dense yunga, like a jungle. Strategically, it was like trying to overthrow the government of the US from the Brooks Range in Alaska or the Idaho Panhandle.
The peasants may or may not have been terrorized, but more important were the facts that they were unaware of who Che was and what he wanted to do, as well as there was a huge reward on his head.
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Thanks for the correction. I read the diaries a long time ago so my recollection may be flawed. Why was he trying to overthrow a leftist government and how "leftist" could it have been if it accepted U.S. military aid in tracking down Che? Wouldn't there have had to be a quid pro quo involved?
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People idolize Che for his courage, his selflessness and his dedication to the Revolution, i.e. to the common people. His love of humanity.
Yes, I am sure that is exactly why people idolize Guevara. But as I said, in this day and age someone would have to be pretty ignorant to buy into it.
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His love of humanity??????????????????????
Good Lord man. You have got to be freaking kidding.
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>>Thanks for the correction. I read the diaries a long time ago.....<<
Ah huh.
As Michael said, nothing he posts is original, unless of course he has forgotten what he read, than it's all original BS.
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Thanks for the correction. I read the diaries a long time ago so my recollection may be flawed. Why was he trying to overthrow a leftist government and how "leftist" could it have been if it accepted U.S. military aid in tracking down Che? Wouldn't there have had to be a quid pro quo involved?
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Che planned to go to Bolivia before the Torres government came to power, mostly because Bolivia shares borders with seven other nations, and has been traditionally very unstable. So far 60 presidents in 173 years. That is an average of one every 2.88 years.
Bolivia has received aid from the US for a very long time, and part of the terms at the time allowed military "advisement", ostensibly to deal with illegal cocaine export as well as guerrilla activity. Torres had little choice to allow this. The quid pro quo was the US gave money to Bolivia in return for access and military training.
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<<As Michael said, nothing he posts is original, unless of course he has forgotten what he read, than it's all original BS.>>
Get over it, BSB, when I'm wrong I'm the first to admit it. I never claimed to be infallible and I'm thankful to anyone who's able to correct me. Which in this group doesn't include too many people. I can appreciate why you're afraid of substantial debate on the issues, where you're all fulla shit, and prefer to confine your "arguments" to ad hominem sniping and insults, but I really don't give a shit. I'll continue saying what I have to say and you just keep on with your shit-smearing. It too speaks volumes.
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Che Guevara was at one time a very competent guerilla leader. However, by the time he had been in Bolivia for a short while he was spent physically, and mentally, and his 15 minutes of fame, and hour of infamy were over. Anything else is pure mythology.
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Afraid to debate issues with you, Mr. Tee? Please, why woud anyone debate issues with you? I've been watching you post the same childish junk for about 6 years.
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<<Afraid to debate issues with you, Mr. Tee? Please, why woud anyone debate issues with you? I've been watching you post the same childish junk for about 6 years.>>
Exactly what I meant. Interesting avoidance repertoire though, spanning the spectrum of "childish junk," "homicidal mania," "acute depression," etc. Oh, well. Let me know when you've got something of substance to add. I'm always interested.
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Afraid to debate issues with you, Mr. Tee? Please, why woud anyone debate issues with you? I've been watching you post the same childish junk for about 6 years.
Don't be too hard on MT, he may not be a real communist , but he is the best apporximation of one we have ever had.
If he agreed with You or I much at all he would be someone elese.