Legacy of Che Guevara - 1960's & 70's Symbol of Rebellion

1960's & 70's Symbol of Rebellion

"Through the image, the complexities of Che's life and thought are reprocessed into an abstraction that can serve any cause. It has been painted as graffiti in Bethlehem, carried in demonstrations from Palestine to Mexico and borrowed by such artists as Pedro Meyer, Vik Muniz, Martin Parr and Annie Leibovitz. It has been used to represent causes as diverse as world trade, anti-Americanism, teenage rebellion and Latin American identity."

— Isabel Hilton, New Statesman

Guevara, who has been variously described as "the rock-hero biker revolutionary", "the martyr to idealism", and "James Dean in fatigues"; became a potent secular symbol of rebellion and revolution during the May 1968 protests in France. In the view of The Guardian's Gary Younge, "(Che's) journey from middle-class comfort to working-class champion and his long-haired unkempt look, mirrored the aspirations and self-image of the Woodstock generation as they demonstrated against the Vietnam war." For her part, the 1960's literary icon Susan Sontag spoke glowingly of the "inspiring beautiful legend" that was Guevara, comparing him Lord Byron, Emiliano Zapata, and José Martí. Moreover, the slogan Che lives! began to appear on walls throughout the West, while Jean-Paul Sartre, a leading existentialist philosopher who knew Guevara personally, encouraged the adulation by describing him as "the most complete human being of our age."

"That he was shot after capture demonstrates the fear that the Bolivian authorities felt even of an imprisoned Che. They were afraid to bring to him to trial: afraid of the echoes his voice would have aroused from the courtroom: afraid to prove that the man they hated was loved by the world outside. This fear will help to perpetuate his legend, and a legend is impervious to bullets."

— Graham Green, 1960's playwright

In addition, more radical left wing activists responded to Guevara's apparent indifference to rewards and glory, and concurred with Guevara's sanctioning of violence as a necessity to instill socialist ideals. Even in the United States, the government which Guevara so vigorously denounced, students began to emulate his style of dress, donning military fatigues, berets, and growing their hair and beards to show that they too were opponents of U.S. foreign policy. For instance, the Black Panthers began to style themselves "Che-type" while adopting his trademark black beret, while Arab guerrillas began to name combat operations in his honor. Addressing the wide-ranging flexibility of his legacy, Trisha Ziff, director of the 2008 documentary Chevolution, has remarked that "Che Guevara's significance in modern times is less about the man and his specific history, and more about the ideals of creating a better society." In a similar vein, the Argentine writer Ariel Dorfman has suggested Guevara's enduring appeal might be because "to those who will never follow in his footsteps, submerged as they are in a world of cynicism, self-interest and frantic consumption, nothing could be more vicariously gratifying than Che's disdain for material comfort and everyday desires."