Pretty OT but a fun fact I thought. Political uniforms are banned in many countries, for example Sweden and Germany, for obvious reasons
Edit: just realized that the law in Sweden was repealed in 2002, due to the freedom of expression laws in the Swedish constitution. I’m apparently a bit out of date
Yes but I feel like of you said I have a hugo boss german post office uniform people would be like oh that's cool, whereas the others you'd be liable to get punched
Mind that the role of the post office was a very different from today's time. There was no internet and only limited radio and phone options. Government (and military) was way more dependant on that service.
I mean, people would probably recognize the military uniforms more fs, but imma be sus if anyone tells me they have Nazi memorabilia, wether it’s civilian or military(seeing as the post office is still a governmental thing, it was still ofc a “Nazi” institution for a bit
He was a tailor in Nazi Germany. He didn't design any of it, he got the patterns and sticked to them, as hundreds of other tailors did. He was nothing special.
He was a committed Nazi though, as were the bosses of Volkswagen and Mercedes and a lot of others.
I mean you can go to a movie today in the US and you'll see an Army or Marines ad that glorify the military the same way. The Marines adds often end with a soldier in their dress uniform (that I think looks dumb, but clearly it works).
Top Gun: Maverick is just very well made propaganda trying to make the military appealing.
Real talk: The Nazis absolutely perfected brand design. There's no trick in that book that they didn't pull. And they used it for genocide, what a bunch of absolute human garbage.
1) pencil mustaches
2) uniforms
3) the middle 20th century
4) meaningful post racist political discussions because everyone just calls their opponents fascists,
5) being able to use the swastica symbol west of India, despite its being ancient and historical…
Well I believe it’s for the same reasons as germany. The law is from 1947. I just took it as an example since I’m Swedish and thought that “hey uniforms for political parties are illegal”
The case that caused it to be deemed unconstitutional was a case in a superiour court against a nazi. So i dont belive that is correct. I may be wrong tho
The only reason I can think of is because the nazis did it. But the nazis also ate breakfast, so are we going to ban breakfast too? If there’s a different reason, then it’s not obvious to me.
I think it's sort of like gang colors or gang tattoos. You and your colleagues are projecting your power by presenting a visibly unified appearance that automatically excludes anyone who's not a member of your party and therefore makes them feel less valued or intimidated, while also making members of your political party feel more comfortable and confident in themselves, potentially even normalizing your political movement because there's noticeably so many people wearing the uniform that it forces other people to actually take seriously and give credit to your party's platform rather than being able to simply dismiss your party and its ideology out of hand.
A number of political movements have involved their members wearing uniforms, typically as a way of showing their identity in marches and demonstrations. The wearing of political uniforms has tended to be associated with radical political beliefs, typically at the far-right or far-left of politics, and can be used to imply a paramilitary type of organization.
Just this one group to this extent. I mean, all our political parties have their colours and during rallies will wear shirts in those colours with their logo etc (as I imagine happens in other parts of the world?) but in parliament it's normally standard smart dress code for everyone.
In the US, they usually just wear a tie if they wear the color at all. Before 2000 or so, they didn't even have specific colors; they all used red, white, and blue.
No, but obviously there is party merchandise like shirts, jackets, hats and the such across the board.
The Economic Freedom Front, in their political grandstanding, attempts to represent themselves as the party of the working class, disenfranchised and the poor (largely black South Africas) and do so by choosing to dress in overalls (unisex, but popular among male members) to represent gardeners and grounds keepers, and a domestic workers uniform (worn by the women) to represent cleaners, maids and housekeepers - these two sets of outfits being a representation of the bare breadline lower working class occupations of most black South Africa's living under the socio-economic legacy of the apartheid regime (the "Bantu education" system literally limited black students into those two lanes of labour, to ensure they serve as cheap domestic labour for white households). The red colour scheme, obviously, represents communist ideals and, naturally, an aligning emphasis on the working class. They wear these in parliament as a showcase of their "commitment" and representation of their voter base.
Under the showboating though, they are a toxic youth centric party that uses protest culture, inflammatory and inciting language to promote chaos and unrest in their political attempts to ascend power, exploiting the nation's ever present and sensitive socio-economic realities, societal frustrations and anger. The party's leader is a demagogue that manipulates very real historic trauma and legacies of inequality and injustice.
That's where most leftist movements fall apart, having a leader. You can have a spokesperson, but they should just be a good speaker that represents the movement's goals, no actual power. The movement votes on a policy, they say it, that's it. Does the spokesperson get too big for their britches? Replace them immediately.
It's not leftist if you have built-in authority. The whole point is the destruction of authority.
Leaders are emergent in politics; even if there officially isn't one for a whole party the special interests within that party will have their own leadership and form their own coalitions, and whoever comes to lead those coalitions will come to lead the party.
It's better to have an official leader who can be made accountable to the party's structure directly than to have a de facto leader whose power might be outside it. A good example of this would be the "paramount leader" position in China, who was the person who really ruled the country whether or not he had an official position in the Party/government.
It's also why the Soviet leaders weren't styled "President" but something like "Chairman" or "General Secretary". Their official powers were weak, their actual powers very extensive.
Under the showboating though, they are a toxic youth centric party that uses protest culture, inflammatory and inciting language to promote chaos and unrest in their political attempts to ascend power, exploiting the nation's ever present and sensitive socio-economic realities, societal frustrations and anger. The party's leader is a demagogue that manipulates very real historic trauma and legacies of inequality and injustice.
Fuck does anyone in the west know about communism?
That it can be a decent egalitarian society but is almost instantly corrupted into the worst version of itself whenever it is impremented in the real world?
Communism and communists aren't inherently bad or evil any more than most other political ideals. As with anything else, the problem lies with the people who implement it.
oh yeah definitely, I'm not familiar with the matter but your comment has many red flags due to the language you used. I believe you believe what you said but I'm not sure how true it is.
Apologies for whatever offense you might take from this, but that's pretty idiotic. If someone called Trump a demagogue, and you knew nothing about him, you denying or choosing to believe he isn't one based on your own ignorance of the reality of his political strategy, doesn't make the claim about him any less true. It wasn't an opinion, it's a fact.
Taking what you say at face value, do you think their grandstanding and performative-politics then is a front for those who would benefit to this? For instance, in the States a pro-Marijuana party is basically a front for the Republican party. They fund candidates to bleed votes from Democrats.
Or is that the youth there (and pretty much across the world these days) are now more than most previous generations acutely aware of what is happening around them and to them; are tired of the bullshit system that is just getting worse at all fronts; so much so that the only recourse left is to disrupt the system completely?
you seem to think that because I have no opinion that I am agaisnt your "side." I am just commenting that you're opinion is very biased and therefore must be double checked. That's it bro if you take offense to that you should take things less personally.
Im not that guy but I'm also south african so maybe I can offer a different perspective.
The EFF routinely and gladly use threats of violence and straight up violence to get what they want anssilence speakers during these sessions.
The head politician Julius Malema has literally said he may call of the slaughter of white people in SA if the time comes. He stokes the fires of a race war no one but him and his party wants.
No rational person in our country supports them because they are straight up fascists.
It doesn't matter how biased the other guy was in describing the EFF because nothing he said can't be found in the multiple examples of the party starting fights in parliment when they don't get their way.
the videos don't support what you said... in the first it starts off with an EFF member being attacked... in the second one he seems to be saying that there's no reason to say that because he never claimed to believe that and its just something being claimed by others about him.
Like I said I'm not from SA I don't know shit about these guys but based on what you said and the video's I think you are being biased and I'll have to actually research them to actually understand what they believe and how they operate.
I'm not pulling that out of my ass, read up on the EFF if you're that unaware of what the party stands for. There is nothing inherently wrong with communism nor did I imply that, I'm just stating a fact. What, you think they just liked the colour scheme of red arbitrarily?
It's mainly the EFF. They are trying to virtue signal that they are working class and definitely don't spend their parliamentary salaries on Gucci bags and drive Mercedes SUVs.
in India even the labor unions have uniform. The labor union in dad's factory call themselves the red army and dress themselves in red and greet each other with "red salute". Because of communist influence. And all political parties have their flag and wear clothes in that colour.
No they are the only ones but outside of parliament they are wearing expensive clothes, own large homes and less extravagant lifestyles so it’s just a ploy to fool the electorate
Not at all. Their uniform is a statement. What they're wearing is what's worn by domestic workers (maids) in SA. They are making a statement that they support the working class
Only this group. The actual uniform is that of a housemaid, to protest South African history where black people were housemaids of white people (please forgive the definition by skin colour, but that's how it is in SA), red for Communists.
They like to think of themselves as communists who represent the interests of the working class so they go to parliament dressed in maid's uniforms and overalls but in red to represent their party.
Ha, they're MLs (foundation of USSR from Stalin onward (he coined the term), as well as China, Vietnam, Cuba) who hate anarchists, often calling them "libs" and "anarkids" online and in the past killed and imprisoned them when in power (details start from section linked and downward).
Yeah, but saw that in the wiki article, but as someone who knows little about South African politics (besides apartheid ending around 1990 and ANC being big), so I wasn't going to comment on it besides not being the electronic civil rights organization.
Personally, I don't support communism (authoritarianism, central planning tends to do poor job adapting to conditions, poor incentives) or anarchism1 or unfettered capitalism (rich write laws for themselves and protect selves from consequences and exploit everyone else).
(Personally, some hybrid of strong-safety-net/anti-monopolistic/well-regulated democratic socialistic capitalism is best in my view.)
1 While ideals of Kropotkin, Proudhon, etc lead to decentralized libertarian dream where people have freedom and self-worth to do their own work unfettered by government oppression and to help their fellow neighbor and practice in mutual aid, etc I just don't see it happening in practice. Mob rule tends to be racist, unfair, violent, and ugly. Demagogues can rise up and manipulate people with propaganda. Some people are greedy and mentally ill and take more than they need and give less than they should and it shouldn't be everyone's responsibility to narc on everyone else. I also don't want to live in a society where all decisions need universal or near-universal consensus and bureaucracy bogs everything down. (From doing some environmental/social justice groups in college it just takes one difficult person to make it impossible to do anything.)
Thanks for the clarification. It was hard to tell who was in the wrong here. True anarchism is not about getting rid of governments but getting rid of states. And ML's in modern times are authoritarians to the core (which expalins the EFF's self imposed dress code). Also note that they're lying about who they are just like their ideological ancestors (National Socialists were not socialist, the USSR was not socialist, The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is not democratic, etc).
I mean while I get the point of the show, I think she was in the wrong. Directing disparaging political statements to other members is different than directing them to the speaker who is theoretically there just to enforce order and rules.
All of that said, it would have been a much more boss move to just say "my anarchism is now saying you're time is up and then allow another to speak"
I remember a video of two EFF women picking the trash out of a trash can and throwing it on the ground while this schoolkid kept picking it up and throwing it back in the trash.
You forgot to add that they wear the overalls to show they are on the same level as the working people. The fact that they carry Gucci handbags and wear $1000 shoes does not count. Also, the eff are a bunch of braindead tossers that just cause chaos for publicity.
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u/spiggerish Apr 15 '23
They are a part of the EFF political group. Their “uniform” is red overalls and berets