Friday, March 16, 2012

che hitler goes for a drive


Every Friday morning I meet my friend, Ed, for breakfast.  (Ed is an artist.  I discussed his work with you in little cat feet on the sand.)

The main purpose for meeting, other than enjoying some of the best huevos rancheros in Mexico, is to discuss how the Indian school is operating.  Our main concern being food and school supplies.

But we do venture afield.  One of my favorite topics is the nature of art.  How often can you sit down with an artist who understands why he is an artist and discuss, at length, his motivation?  One of these days, I need to bring you into one of our discussions.

But not today.  I have a completely different topic in mind.  As you might guess from the photograph above.

Last Friday while driving to the restaurant where we meet, I saw one of the most unusual sights I have seen in Mexico.  Or anywhere for that matter. 

A faded red construction truck drove in front of me.  On its right side (just behind the cab) was a large swastika.  Black in a white circle.  I could not have been any more startled if Fidel Castro had been standing on the street corner announcing the opening of a Subway shop while wearing a clown suit.

But I was wrong.  I could have been more startled.  And was.  Beside the Nazi spider was a painting of Che Guevara.

Who was this guy who put these icons on his truck?  A man brave enough to put two images together that look incongruous, but share one rather nasty detail? 

Of course, my camera was sitting inside my bag on the seat next to me.  I tried to speed up to snap a photograph, but he was gone with the wind. 

I did notice, though, that the left side of his truck had only a swastika.  Sans Che.  Leaving the left without Che.  But that was enough symbolism for one day.

My fellow blogger, Gary Denness over at Mexile wrote a post recently about symbols.  In fact, the two of us exchanged comments about the same two symbols on the side of the Mexican truck.  How they are powerful and why.

Symbols do not impress me.  But, there is no doubt, that both of these symbols elicit strong reactions.  For the swastika -- almost unanimously negative.

But for Che, the reactions are mixed.  My former girlfriend Linda loved him.  She thought he was sex on legs.  Of course, he was dead.  It must be easy to turn a corpse into a sex symbol.

For me, he was merely another psychotic mass killer of the Twentieth Century, who tarted up his fascist psyche with snippets from Marx.  I wonder if someone had been smart enough to put a bullet through the head of the not-yet Führer during the beer hall putsch if he would have become a t-shirt emblem for young men wishing to look cool and anti-establishment?

I doubt it.  But they both seem to have that odd look in their eyes.  The same look that the local boy gets just before the neighborhood dogs and cats start disappearing.

In my Asian travels, I have been startled at how often I see the swastika.  On monuments.  On Hindu shrines.  On statues.  Around a full balustrade of a Buddhist temple. 

Because of our experience with Hitler's Germany, the swastika has probably been forever perverted in the West.  But the symbol (in various incarnations) has long been a symbol of good luck.  And is used amongst Hindus and Buddhists. 

Even though I know this, I was still a bit startled when I examined the national costume of a Chinese minority in the Shanghai Museum.


The geometric patterns were interesting.  Then I realized why.  It was based around the swatsika that was center in the design.


I am still interested in finding the man with the truck.  I wonder if he is as steeped in political philosophy as Ed is in art.

With my luck, he will probably be wearing an Ayn Rand shirt.



Update -- A little bit of sherlocking this morning helped me find my quarry.  Here is the storied art work.  But that is just the truck.  I still know nothing about the owner.  Well, not enough to say more.

 

33 comments:

John Calypso said...

"With my luck, he will probably be wearing an Ayn Rand shirt."

Hombre you are a funny guy!  Good post - thought provoking.

Felipe Zapata said...

As I am sure you know, the swastika was around for a long time before Hitler messed it up for everybody.

As for Guevara and the swastika, both represent totalitarian government. I imagine you know that too.

Steve Cotton said...

 I dropped that in for your enjoyment.  Glad you caught it.

Steve Cotton said...

 Not only was it around for a long time before Hitler, it is still around.  Both Chinese and Japanese have a script character in their writing that is nothing more than a swastika.

John Calypso said...

 Just for my enjoyment - I am flattered ;-)

Steve Cotton said...

 And who says libertarian humor is an oxymoron?

Andean said...

Putting the rest aside-- even though it might be hard on your ears or eyes, Linda's comment is not so disimilar to many other womans.

Steve Cotton said...

 I once told her it was easy for women to love Che.  He was dead.  And much easier to control.  She slugged me.

Andean said...

: /

Steve Cotton said...

 ?

Mexican Trailrunner said...

So, Steve, who was driving the truck?  MX/Gringo?  What were the plates?  Is this a snowbird or ???  We are getting some - well, let's just say, interesting folks down here these days.

Good blog post.

Steve Cotton said...

 He is a local Mexican businessman.  I guess the ruck has been around for some time, but the Che is newish.  It would be interesting to talk with him.  And I may do that.

Andean said...

-trying to keep a straight face and a tight lip 
Hitler no, Che hmm...

Gary Denness said...

I would have been surprised if old Adolf didn't have female admirers. I'm sure hindsight has a lot to do with the modern image of Hitler - his face is now as much as icon of evil as the swaztika is.  I doubt that was always so. And how does one become a dictator without a bit of charisma? Charm, I suspect, is optional.

Gary Denness said...

One of the points I made was that context plays a big part of how a brand or icon is viewed. Swaztikas aren't so bad in China, as you've pointed out. Che might represent many negative things to some people. In the UK his face is nothing more than a fashion image. His story was a bit irrelevant in the UK. We had bigger problems going on - Che would have struggled to get a few lines in the middle of a paper. Latin America was a long way away, and not a direction we Brits travelled at the time. We still don't, really. It's hard to get upset about something that means nothing to you whatsoever. 

I understand why certain controversial images don't carry the same impact across different cultures and peoples. But still....when us Westerners see Nazi symbols and regalia, it feels odd. To say the least.

I have a visit to Marx' grave planned in the near future. Not that the plan is actually revolving around his grave, mind you. But he'll be there.

Andean said...

Nothing more then a fashion image, yes, controversial for some, but widely understood especially by the young and the young at heart, not always another meaning behind it. Even a historical one.

Sparksmex said...

>>>> For me, he was merely another psychotic mass killer of the Twentieth Century

Disappointed you left it at that.  There was a whole lot more going on there

S Parks said...

maybe me

Steve Cotton said...

I suspect Linda would also say I was lacking in the charm quotient.

Steve Cotton said...

 The Marx grave is interesting.  As far as graves go.  When I visited it, I was expecting a voice to say: "You know that stuff about the inevitability of history?  I may not have got it quite right."

Steve Cotton said...

 I thought I was being kind.  If I had gone on much further, I would have stared raising questions about why the Castro boys wanted Che out of Cuba.  I decided to leave well enough alone.

Laurie Matherne said...

Che was an opportunist and a murderer. He had ideals when he began, but not later. And the swastika is here in Honduras, as are images of Che.

Steve Cotton said...

 I really need to talk with the owner of that truck. 

YucatanMan said...

 "an opportunist and murderer" is still leaving out quite a bit. Murder is never acceptable, nor is mass murder or ideological murder. Murder is murder, even when delivered by drone (and should be illegal, but International law doesn't seem to have caught up with technology in that area of warfare, does it?).

Over-simplifying to the extreme, but not as much perhaps as others, Che set out to murder those 'with blood on their hands' to paraphrase.  He set off after those who had horribly oppressed and murdered the poor and indigenous for centuries in order to spark revolutions which would deliver the wealth more widely throughout society.  Poor skills, planning and philosophy notwithstanding, there was a concept behind the actions:  revolution throughout Latin America to change the power structure.

It can hardly be argued that those who continue to monopolize power throughout Latin America (for one example, see Honduras > coup > recent > military open fire) have NOT had the blood of the indigenous and poor on their hands for centuries... still.

Steve Cotton said...

I know the refrain. You can't make an omelette without cracking some eggs. The problem is that we then end up with Hitler. And Lenin. And Stalin. And Mao. And Pol Pot. And Castro. And a whole lot of dead people who had no idea they were standing in the way of someone else's inevitable view of history.

Laurie Matherne said...

He murdered those who followed him who wanted to leave. I find that problematic to say the least.

Jack Brock said...

The truck is parked every day at the South West corner of Hwy 200 and Carranza in West Melaque.

Steve Cotton said...

That is where I tracked it down. I understand the owner has a business right there.

Gary Denness said...

I'm sure Linda was wrong. :)

Gary Denness said...

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, as they say. He didn't, perhaps, get it all wrong either though.

Gary Denness said...

The death toll from deliberate British policy during the height of the British Empire surpassed all of those fellows. Which suggests that things are complicated. Well, it suggests all sorts of things, but let's leave some of it to our imaginations.

Gary Denness said...

I was browsing Wiki today ... the Nazi swaztika still pops up in normal discourse.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympics#Champions_and_medalists 

Steve Cotton said...

 Yup.  There it is.  Of course, for me one of the defining moments of the 1936 Olympics was Jesse Owens's win in Berlin.  Interestingly, Hitler sent Owens a photograph.  FDR sent him nothing.