Communism, what a joke.

Just the other day, I saw a friend of mine and he was wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of the hammer and sickle.  In fact many of my friends say that my friend, Ian, wears some sort of communist shirt almost every day.  Ian doesn't wear these shirts to support communism, but instead because he thinks they are quite funny.  The point of this blog post isn't to point out my friends strange obsession with communism, but more why communism has become this big joke.  The point of this post also isn't to answer any questions but to pose one.  Communism used to be something that was strongly believed in, and may still be today but on a much smaller scale.  What happened?  Why is communism not taken seriously, or is it taken seriously it just seems like it isn't because we are a part of one of the more anti-communist countries in the world?

I felt a little weird commenting on my own blog post so instead I'm just going to edit my original blog and say what I think about the whole idea of communist being a joke.  Personally I think communism started out as a very serious thing and at one point in time it was a very serious way in which to govern.  At that time there were certain world powers (I'm not going to say any names, but russia and china.) who tried to spread communism, but since then Gorbachev successfully converted russia over to a more capitalist government.  Now, since virtually all supporters of Communism have been converted or are dead, it seems as though the whole idea was a joke and makes it very hard to picture the fact that people actually thought that such a government would work.  Its like an argument where there used to be equal sized teams but slowly one team switched to the other side, thus becoming a very one sided argument which is part of the reason why it is taken as a joke, because there is nobody to argue that it isn't a joke.  All you can say is that it wasn't a joke, it didn't used to be a joke.

The Taliban Vilify Another Minority

On the New York Times website I came across a five minute video Op-Ed called Last Jew in Afghanistan. This is the story of Zablon Simantov who still lives in Kabul, Afghanistan. Most Jews have fled out of fear and pressure from the Taliban even though their Jewish roots have stemmed from Afghanistan since “the seventh century A.D.” and even “as far back as 720 B.C.” Zablon admits that he even sent his daughters away from Kabul. This man is driven by his idea of destiny, and he will never leave Afghanistan because God has chosen this fate for him. The video takes the viewer inside the Flower Street Synagogue that has been ravished by the Taliban. This short film moved me because this man takes a stand in a world that is suffocating his beliefs. The Taliban have made their motives clear, and Zablon knows well that he will not be alive to see a resolution: why else would he send his daughters away? Even those Jews who want to return to Afghanistan cannot until a proper government is established and security returns to the borders. This video proves that schoolgirls are not the only ones being punished by the Taliban: Jews are receiving the barbed end of the whip as well.

WASPs: Women Airforce Service Pilots

W.A.S.P.s  were the women pilots during WWII and played a key roll in establishing the United States as a major threat against Hitler's acquisition of Europe. The roll for women in the Airforce emerged when there was a lack of skilled male pilots to take the newly produced aircraft into battle. Most male pilots were overseas fighting, thus there was a need for skilled flyers. To make use of the new aircrafts, the United States government launched a program to train female flyers. The sad part about this story is that female flyers received no honor for flying for their country, and had nothing that commemorated their efforts in the war. Of course it was revolutionary, and in fact there were few female pilots in service during WWII (if not none.) Nevertheless, women continued to get the short end of the bargain, and as the war in Europe concluded, they were no longer needed and their inspiring story came to an end.

My List is the Best List

Here is my list of WWII movies worth a watch:

The Great Escape: a movie on prisoners of war and their quest to escape a P.O.W. camp in Germany.

The Great Raid: a movie on prisoners of war and their quest to escape a P.O.W. camp in the Philippines. 

U-571: a film on submarine crews and their role in the war.

Hitler's Bodyguard: a series on the military channel illustrating the illustrious organization that was Hitler's Bodyguard.

The War: a miniseries on PBS, which contains real footage and photographs from the war

Women Needed

During World War I women did not have much involvement in the war, when it came to fighting. The women were forced to stay at home while the men went out and fought for their country. The immense number of men going out to join the army left a very high number of jobs at home undone. Since most men were gone the women were given the opportunity to fill in for the men. This gave them more power and rights. However, most of this control was stripped back away from the women once the war was over and the men returned. The only involvement the women had directly to the war was serving as nurses, working in munitions factories, sowing clothes and other similar jobs, but the women never entered the battlefields.
During World War II women had a more involvement in the battlefields. After the bombing of Pearl harbor people began to abandon some of the weak feminine views because they knew that more manpower was needed in the war. In 1942, the women’s Auxiliary Army Corps was established in a bill. This allowed women to go to combat in some areas of the military. Slowly new groups were made so that the women could have some involvement in the war. Like a new section in the Navy. However, they were still discriminated in lack of military benefits that most men received. It wasn’t until 1943 that the women gained full military status with the same benefits.
Comparing the role of women in each of these wars is very interesting because we see the evolution of women’s rights in this short span of time. In both cases the women were a crucial part to the war, but it is quite clear that during World War II they had more rights and power. However, we must notice that the women gained most of these rights because the countries knew that they need the women fighting and would probably not have received these rights if they weren’t needed.

The Riveter

World War II was fought on the battlefield by men as we know but at the same time we have learned that there is so much to a war than what you see on the beaches. When a hefty majority of the young men, a lot of the workiong population leave to go off fighting, in both world wars the women stepped right in to their position and took over the job of running the homefront. Now Rosie The Riveter was a propaganda poster designed to encourage more Americans to help the War effort and who knows how the war would have turned out without this inspirational photograph.

Pop Cluture 1940's

Enemy at the Gate- Russian WWII movie
Saving Private Ryan
BAND OF BROTHERS
The Diary of Anne Frank
Mein Kampf
The Sound of Music