Che Guevara: Hero or Villan?

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Many people see Che Guevara in many different way. some people portray Che as a hero like in Cuba and Argentina while The Miami Cuban community whos lives were destroyed by Castro portray him as a villan. I think Che Guevara is very much like Oliver Cromwell. To the British, Oliver Cromwell was a hero while to the Irish, he was a villan. Please put in your thoughts about Che Guevara.

There is no way that Che can classified as anything but a sadistic mass murderer

Che Guevara was a very nasty man, but a good-looking one. He was lucky - he was pretty, and charismatic, and that's why he's gone down in history books. His career as a revolutionary certainly doesn't outmatch that of thousands of others, but the romantic idea of a man driven by his desire for social justice after seeing misery in South America, walking through dense rainforests and dangerous mountains to fight evil capitalist fat cats does play people's minds.

What I didn't realise, though, was that English people liked Oliver Cromwell. Most English people I know seem to detest the man with all their hearts.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UClHAH8nFVY[/youtube]

Well, revolutionaries are very controversial figures. Still, we got to remember that before Castro there was a Batista, a puppet dictator of the U.S.A. who did quite nasty things. It probably was like it is with a lot of revolutionary groups, at first they start with and fight for noble ideals, but as things get tougher they may need to be more ruthless and pragmatic, or they may actually reach power and be corrupted by it, and in general those groups will lose their north and turn out bad.

I can give specific historical examples for that too, our guerrilla originally was a socialist movement looking to overthrow a very corrupt and uncaring government, to give power to the working class but ended up resorting to extortion, ransom and drug trade to fund itself, as original leaders died and people who cared about war and profit more than lofty ideals joined up. And then, the paramilitary groups were born as farmers tired of getting extorted as the failure government did nothing to stop it, decided to arm themselves and take matters in their own hands, something I'd personally do in their situation. But now they forgot their origins too, and nowadays they extort and kill the same people they originally protected.

About Che Guevara, we'd have to see what his original goals were, more than the end results which tend to go bad in these situations.

I find the words "hero" and "villain" a bit too simplistic to be able to deal with the complexities of the real world. However I guess I'd have to classify Che as a villain because he certainly was no hero. His supposed ideals were rather nice, and he was a very interesting person (someone doesn't have to be likeable or nice to be interesting), but the lengths to which he was willing to go were utterly terrifying. For someone who claimed to see the value of every human life he was altogether too willing to kill people. I think I read a quote from him where he was basically saying that had he been able to he'd have launched the Soviet missiles to New York and Washington. No matter what the ultimate goal, those sorts of intentions are not excusable.

That was my impression of Cromwell- that he was considered a tyrant by the Brits themselves.

Che Guavara was a photogenic martyr who looks good next to your Jimi Hendrix poster on the wall. But I not aware of him actually accomplishing much in his career- good or evil. So its hard to peg him as either a hero or a villian.

A reporter retraced the steps of Che in South America and wrote a book about it. He interviewed locals. Oddly enough even right wing death squads identify with and idolize him. But many locals in southern south america who admire him are a bit confused about who was (many had the impression he was a trafficker in stolen cars). But the Miami Cubans do not idolize him Im sure. But its hard to be a revolutionary without offending somebody.

Cromwell and his religious sourpuss buddies tried to make the Brits give up kissing, bedding plump maidens. No wonder the people hated Cromwell.

ruveyn

Guevara was a marxist and that's all I need to know....
Villain.

Open your mind a bit. People who disagree with you aren't necessarily villains. I'm not defending what Che did (see my earlier post), but you can't call him a villain simply because of what ideology he held.

Communism is the practical implementation of Marxism.
I bet the tens of millions that have lost their lives to communism in the world, especially the USSR and China, would disagree with you.
I think I'll keep my mind closed to that kind of ideology...........

Not really sure how to look at Che.

Communism has never existed (and likely never will). The Soviet-style dictatorships were not Marxist. There are/were plenty of Marxists/left-wingers who comdenm(ed) the USSR et al. (See Left Communism.) Are they villains? I'm not asking you to accept Marxism, just accept the fact that people have different opinions. I strongly disagree with basically all of ruveyn's philosophy yet I wouldn't call him a villain.

Anti-communist huh?

On paper, a correct implementation of Marxism is not bad, actually. The lives lost you mention aren't consequences of communism itself, but of an oppresive government.

I guess I will say he was a anti-hero

Well I guess that's one way to deny communist genocide......