Actress Cameron Diaz has upset Peruvians by sporting a bag emblazoned with a red star and Chairman Mao’s most famous political slogan. The incident highlights the interesting contrast between communist iconography - hip and acceptable - and Nazi-inspired fashion accessories.
When the singer Brian Ferry praised the look of the Nazis, including Leni Riefenstahl’s films, Albert Speer’s buildings and the pageantry of the mass parades, he was obliged to apologise almost immediately. As the weblog Agoraphilia says, in Icons and Irony:
when I see someone sporting a swastika, it’s hard for me to believe it’s just a goof (“No, I wear this as a commentary on the idiocy of racism” – yeah, right) …
But in 2007, anyone who doesn’t understand that communism is murderous and brutal is either willfully blind or woefully ignorant
