Posted on 04/23/2009 9:49:27 AM PDT by Schnucki
The iconic image of Che Guevara found adorning students' walls and t-shirts across the world could be banned in Poland under a government proposal to outlaw materials that incite "fascism and totalitarian systems".
Poland's equality minister, Elzbieta Radziszewska, wants to expand a Polish law prohibiting the production of fascist and totalitarian propaganda so that it includes clothing and anything else that could carry an image related to an authoritarian system.
Anybody found guilty could face a two-year prison sentence.
Radziszewska said that the proposed amendment to current legislation "would help organisations fighting racism".
The proposal, which could see the faces of some of the leading lights of communist history such as Lenin and Trotsky removed from t-shirts and flags, reflects a Polish view on communism far different from the rose-tinted and romantic images often found in the West.
After experiencing 40 hard years of communism, as well as the horrors of Nazi occupation, few Poles have qualms equating under law the inequities of Nazism and communism.
"Communism was a terrible, murderous system that claimed millions of lives," said Professor Wojciech Roszkowski, a leading Polish historian and member of the European parliament.
"It was very similar to National Socialism, and there is no reason to treat those two systems, and their symbols, differently. Their glorification should be prohibited."
He added communism had accounted for the slaughter of thousands of Poles in the Katyn Massacre while its gulags had consumed countless millions of victims.
The proposed changes, which have already reached the committee stage in the Polish parliament, also testify to Polish determination to ensure that with the passing of time nobody starts to view the country's communist past with nostalgia.
In addition the Polish government hopes that tighter legislation will crack down on the trade in materials bearing Nazi emblems.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
The President will not stand for this.
Amen to that!
The iconic image of Che Guevara found adorning OBAMA CAMPAIGN OFFICES, students’ walls and t-shirts across the world could be banned in Poland......(fixed it.)
While they are right about totalitarianism, this action in itself, is totalitarian.
I wonder if they recognize the irony.
Also, that funky chicken on their flag is AWESOME!
Isn't that the same symbol pontiac used on the Firebird?
Why is it only Poland seems to “get it”?
Bin Laden T-shirts?
Amen to that!
These "students" haven't even the foggiest idea that living in the type of society that Che advocated would essentially confine them to a prison with NONE of the freedoms they take for granted living in the free world. The Eastern Europeans should know better, having been out of that prison for only two decades now.
“It was very similar to National Socialism, and there is no reason to treat those two systems, and their symbols, differently. Their glorification should be prohibited.”
Excellent! The double standard is illustrated of all places right here on FR. If Germany and Israel can ban Nazi images, if the US can ban child porn, then why not ban Saint Che’s mug? Poland gets it, we don’t, while our Pres__ent goes on an apology tour.
Still...awesome job Poland.
Good. Communist icons should be just as reviled as those of Hitler and Nazism.
So, I guess you object to Germany outlawing Nazism?
Hello? Arguendo and Sandman are correct.
Think, then act, folks. Porno is one thing, but banning certain political images is what Che would love!
What next, banning the "Viva Reagan" image shirts here by Obama's Hopeychangecorps?
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