Che Guevara: Good? or Bad?

what are your general thoughts on Che Guevara? do you think he is a great man who was fighting for a great cause? or a murderer who was just out for blood? explain your answer.

The problem here is that this dude's name is not thrown around too much. They don't even tell you who he is in history class. I bet that most people who clicked on this thread went, "Who the fuck?"

Since I'm too lazy to read up on this dude and elaborate on an answer(and I simply don't give a fuck), I'll just leave a link that summarizes his life and all that shit for someone to learn up on this dude.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Guevara

Having read the whole wiki article, I still haven't developed an opinion. I never go off of wiki for one thing, but I also want to know more. To the thread starter, what is YOUR opinion?

I'm just tired of every collage duchebag who wants to seem cool and "revolutionary" wearing the t-shirt. It's like wearing a big sign on your chest that says, "I have never had an original idea in my life and am a complete jackass."

I don't know a lot about him, though. But I think seeing him as good or bad would depend a lot on your position in life. As in...good if you are poor as shit and live in a 3rd world country, bad if you are a middle-class American.

In high school, people only knew about Che Guevara because of Rage Against the Machine and the douchebag shirts that Dante mentioned. Of course, that meant that people knew very little about him.

Though I don't know a lot about him, I did see a biopic called The Motorcycle Diaries about his early life, before he became a revolutionary. It shows a journey he made with a friend, and how it shaped him. Watching it made me completely understand why Che become a revolutionary.

I also know that for any bad he did, Che Guevara did something very good by helping to get rid of Batista, the dictator that the US helped put into power. You can say that socialism and communism suck, but the rule of Batista was certainly worse than either of them.

I really hate what Che Guevara has become, a figure to put on a t-shirt or backpack. He'd hate it, too, I'm sure. If you respect someone, you don't need to buy something with their image, especially if that person didn't like capitalism and the practice of selling shit with a person's picture on it. Just remember their ideals and try to live by them.

As I said, I don't know a lot about Guevara's life or everything he did, and I don't agree with all of his ideas, but I do know that he stood up for the little guy by taking on the big, bad guy, and that's admirable. Especially when the big, bad guy could easily have you killed, and not just thrown in a jail cell.

^This.
That was my first impression, I don't know wtf this person is. :?

^this.

Lots of people in my campus wear those shirts without knowing shit about him. When I asked them do they really know the history of Che Guevara they just shrugged and say "all i know he was an inspiring revolutionary hero from Cuba".

".. a what? o_O' "

well Che Guevara was a revolutionary man, yes. but this is how he became who he is:

Ernesto "Che" Guevara was a socialist and marxist revolutionary who overthrew and stood against dictators in Argentina and Cuba. he fought for the rights of the poor people, because capitolism was destroying lives in Argentina for the poor, and so was the same in Cuba. so he fought in many geurilla wars to stop dictators like Fulgencio Batista, and he did depose Batista and regain some freedom for the poor. he didnt make it any better with communism and socialism, but it was better for the poor then being under capitolist rule. surprisingly enough, it wasn't Fidel Castro who killed him, it was the American CIA who had him captured and assassinated. the reason why he was considered by some to be evil was becuse he was ruthless and would stop at nothing to overthrow dictators like Batista, even if it meant starting war. he killed many people in his quest to spread Cuban socialism, which is why by the middle-class or higher, he is evil, but by poor people, he is a hero.

One reason why Tom Morello has a pic of Che on his amplifier is because RATM stands for fight the power, and so did Che. i do agree putting Che's image on your backpack and shirt just because he is cool is more than idiotic, but Tom Morello actually knows why he has a pic of Che on his amp. i believe you should always fight for yor dreams, adn that is what Che did, even if it meant killing people.

so i do think he was a good man, because his head and heart were all in the right place. he wanted a peace that was not conceivable, but all he wanted was for everyone to be even, and that is what socilist and marxist people want. so i think he is a good man.

A good (but, misguided) man who fought passionately for a cause he believed in. Even if I disagree with his ideology of socialism/communism. Did a good thing by fighting on the behalf of the poor, downtrodden and removing dictators. Other than my ideological disagreements over socialism/communism. I find the man inspiring.

As you're asking for opinion, I'll get right on that. Che Guevara by my reckoning was a terrible person. A murderer, a butcher, a totalitarian autocrat who was just as bad (perhaps worse)as the people he helped depose. It is laughable that he has become such a brand. Partly because of the irony, that he would have hated his image being used for such capitalist purposes. But also because people wear Che Guevara merchandise because they believe he stands for freedom. He does not, if you spoke against him, you were killed. He was a power-hungry revolutionary, and it seems everyone has fallen under the sway of the propaganda campaign that has virtually deified him.

Tom Morello is evidently; either ignorant or a bastard.Just a little example of what Che Guevara really stood for:

"Youth," wrote Guevara, "should learn to think and act as a mass." "Those who chose their own path" [as in growing long hair and listening to Yankee-imperialist Rock & Roll] were denounced as worthless "lumpen" and "delinquents." In his famous speech Che Guevara even vowed, "to make individualism disappear from Cuba! It is criminal to think of individuals!"

Tens of thousands of Cuban youths learned that Che Guevara's admonitions were more than idle bombast. In Che Guevara the hundreds of Soviet KGB and East German STASI "consultants" who flooded Cuba in the early '60s, found an extremely eager acolyte. By the mid '60s the crime of a "rocker" lifestyle or effeminate behavior got thousands of youths yanked off Cuba's streets and parks by secret police and dumped in prison camps with "Work Will Make Men Out of You" in bold letters above the gate (the one at Auchwitz read "Work Will Set You Free")and with machine gunners posted on the watchtowers.

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1535 - a good read for anyone who thinks Che Guevara was a hero.

I'll admit I was a little ignorant about Che. In light of this my opinion of him has dropped significantly. Without individualism we become sheep for a single shepherd to herd. We become mental slaves to the will of a single person. I have a short time on this rock and I'll be damned if I'll live under the heel of some guys boot!


Also religious groups tend to detest "free thinkers" which is why I detest religious groups.

I have never been a Che fan. Mainly because, as has been said, he was very ruthless and often a butcher. I don't necessarily agree with his ideals, but even so, his conviction and dedication is in some sense admirable. Still, he was ruthless and known to shoot those he thought to be unloyal to his cause. I think, in many ways, he was a modern version of Robespierre. Perhaps somewhat more pure in ideals and not as blatant in his hunger for power, but in both cases, what began as crusades in the name of the masses and freedom ended as autocratically run bloodbaths. Che lived a violent life and was a ruthless killer; he died violently, as he lived.

I also find it stupid that people wear Che shirts. I always wonder when I see someone in such merchandise: do you know that you are wearing the face of one of the most ruthless killers of the 20th century?

what he said

i like mostly che guevara's strong sense of duty to his beliefs. i mean MLK, Gandhi, and Ceasar Chavez all had their own goals, and did not stop to carry them out. neither did Che, which is the part about him that i find admirable. i do not condone what he was fighting to bring about, but you got to admit, he had a lot of dedication to his cause. for example: christians ask that people give money to the church. Che if he wanted money, would go out and get it, whatever means necessary.

i personally admire his determination and steadfast loyalty to his own causes. but i do not really admire as much what he was fighting for.

What is there to admire in determination to an unjust cause? You admire his single-mindedness, his sadism too? When someone is willing to go to any length to achieve their goals then they are crossing a line and do not warrant any respect. Lets admire all the psychopaths in this world, who are so committed to their goal, be it personal satisfaction, pleasure or anything else they may want, that they don't take other people into consideration. Che Guevara was a power hungry psychopath who should be vilified not glorified.

Say for example if I was a Pedophile, and that I would go to any lengths to have sex with children, jeopardizing the lives of whoever i deem fit in order to achieve what I want. Would I not be truly committed to that cause - do you not admire that determination? There is no redeeming feature in determination toward injustice.

I think that while people perhaps should not imitate Che Guevara, he should be somewhat respected. But I say this as a person who understands the Communistic ideal, of people controlling themselves and not being controlled by those with the most money.

He was ruthless, he would kill people for stepping out of line, but it's not like he lived in a world of sunshine and fairies, and he was a sadistic murderer who killed simply for the sake of killing. I think that's something people are forgetting, the environment he was in. The country was not in good shape when Guevara and Castro seized power, to say the least. And though their actions seem completely horrible in our eyes, they were still a lot better than what Batista and his men did. We can't compare the actions of a person committed during chaos to the actions of a person during peacetime. We shouldn't look the other way, but we shouldn't expect a person embroiled in war to act like a saint.

Che Guevara fought for what he believed was right, and more importantly, he fought for other people. His motives weren't completely selfish, something that cannot be said about a lot of politicians in the world. Because of that, I can understand why people like him, despite his sins.

You're not the only one who understands communist ideals, many would describe me as a communist. (I scored Economic Left/Right: -8.62
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -9.79 on the political compass test) Though my beliefs are closer to those of Proudhon than Marx.

Che Guevara represents communism at it's worst, he endorsed Mao - who in my opinion should be one of the most hated men in history. Many people fight for what they believe is right, but sadly as their power to change things becomes more real, the ideals become polluted. Che Guevara began with the wrong idea, and stuck with it to his death. It was not the idea that would be right for everybody, it was a selfish desire for power and influence.

Unlike Mao, i do believe; that to a certain extent, he advocated the principles of communism, but the path he chose was abhorrent, disgusting. People revere him but don't revere Hitler? I don't know why, Hitler was doing what was arguably right for Germany, and wanted to give his people a better quality of life.

The circumstances do not, in any way, come close to justifying his actions, the only heroes of war are the conscientious objectors. I don't think that what he did was any better than what Batista and his men did, and without funding from the USSR, Cuba would have collapsed into a state worse than it was when Batista was in power.

i never said i admired his ideals, or what he was fighting for, i just said that his determination, and what he was willing to do for the people was admirable. yeah he was a killer, and yes he was a murderer, and killed countless people. but really he was the only other better option you had to people like Batista.

its like this: if someone broke into your home, and threatened you with a gun, and he stole all of your stuff, and then said he wanted to rape someone like your mother, or sister, or some female, then you found a window of opportunity to disarm him, and went for it, and it was a success, would you not want to kill him to? he stole everything that was yours, he threatened you with death and rape, woud you not want to kill this man? his actions and causes were not in the right place, but his heart was. he was just trying to do what was right for the people, and not just himself. he was trying to spread communism to free his people. but of course in times of war you cant expect someone to be al happy and try to be a Gandhi. he had set out to liberate his people, and that is what is admirable. how it ended up going is what was not right.

So by that last paragraph you state that it was admirable that he wanted to liberate his people, but the way he went about it was not right (you admire with his ideals not methods). But in the first paragraph you say that you never said you liked his ideas or what he was fighting for, but admired his methods, bit of a contradiction - which is it?

Hmmmm yeah - this other thread that i posted in quite a bit, called Live for the taking; got deleted. If you had read what I posted in that you would understand my beliefs on the subject. I am better than Gandhi, he supported Hitler. In no way did Guevara want to "liberate" his people - he wanted to control them! How is that liberty!? It's just taking a prisoner from one cell to another. (Live for the taking) No I would not kill someone who threatened me or my family, or harmed them. I would try to understand why he took the actions that he took, and attempt to show him the error of his ways. But no human being should have the right to make another suffer. If I punished this man, then I would become just as bad as he was. Btw - property is theft ;)

If you ask me he is the same as Lenin, Castro or any other revolutionary... He also did crimes and killed people.. the only difference is that he died young coz of his ideals which made him an icon.. The rest of them just lived too long and gave the world the opportunity to expose all their bad sides