That shirt that someone paid $18 for is in reality a byproduct of the exploitation of a people which this man died trying to help.

Some of you know who he is. Good for you.

Most of you, however, do not recognize the name, only his stenciled image on the t-shirt of some suburban pseudo-rebel.

His name is Che Guevara, an Argentine revolutionary who led guerilla attacks throughout Central America in the hopes of overturning fascist governments and installing communist ones in their place.

The irony of the fact that a face which has stood for rebellion for 40 years is only a face never ceases to amaze me. Even the guy who was selling Che merchandise out of a briefcase on North Avenue last week didn’t seem to know any substantive information about him.

Western society, and in particular the U.S., has a very strange infatuation with meaningless symbols. Just about anyone can tell you who Abraham Lincoln was, but few could tell you any of his major accomplishments aside from freeing the slaves and ending the Civil War.

Everyone knows that Christopher Columbus discovered America, yet few could tell you anything about him aside from that (for the record, Columbus deserves a place alongside Attila the Hun and Hitler).

Normally this sort of thing doesn’t bother me. My issue above all else is with the T-shirts that Che Guevara’s image has been plastered on. While he was a violent, cruel leader, he did fight for the freedom of the Latin American poor, and died defending this cause which he believed in very strongly.

That alone is at least worthy of respect. My problem is with the fact that these shirts, which so many college-age rebels wear to show off their individuality, were made by the same people that Guevara was trying to help, and they are paid less in a week than most people in the U.S. make in an hour.

So, that shirt that someone paid $18 for is in reality a byproduct of the exploitation of a people which this man died trying to help. Surely I don’t need to make it any clearer than that.

There are too many people in this world who are willing to walk around sporting symbols without having any knowledge about what they actually mean. If any of you do any further reading on Che Guevara, I doubt you will find much to like; however, there is something very wrong with a country that takes a person who actively fought against capitalism and turns him into the “cyst-m’s” mascot.

Granted, this sort of thing should not bother me. It is none of my business. The sad truth is that right now the people in charge are unwilling to stop the exploitation of the world’s poor, and pretty much everything you buy is going to have been made by someone who would kill to live your life for the nine hours that it took them to make your clothes.

It’s horrible and I hate it. And yes, it is probably impossible to escape right now. All I ask is that you stop making a mockery of them by flaunting our rape of the world’s poor. It’s really, really rude. Now take off that stupid shirt and burn it.

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