obviously

I am so proud of her it makes me well up just thinking about it...this summer, when the family separations were first being disclosed, she came with me to a downtown St. Louis protest rally in 100-degree heat with her very own, hand-drawn and made sign that read 'Family belongs TOGETHER', she just wanted to be there, to have a chance to say "I do NOT support this!"...then this fall for her birthday, she asked her mother and I to make a donation to the Humane Society in her name instead of asking for an expensive present or toys. I nearly fell over...

Finally, when she came home the other day she told me that she cannot wait for the chance to get a REAL president again in 2020 and that she wants to help knock on doors and campaign in 2020 for whoever the nominee ends up being...in a world of complete shit and even shittier people in charge, my daughter warms my heart and makes me so very proud that I could cry!

Fuck Donald Trump...he is the raging narcissistic boil on the ass of humanity and we are going to lance that thing as soon as possible and then start fixing things for my daughter and her generation. We owe it to the future to make sure the present sends Trump and his ilk back onto the ashcan of history where they belong!

When I was her age I was trying to figure how to build a campfire in Boy Scouts, and there's no way I could could tell you anything about the issues of the day, even though the civil rights movement was in full sway.

than the swastika and won't get them sent home from school.

As a Cold War vet, I still find it off-putting, though.

Of course in my day it still would have gotten your ass whupped

Damn, we're just a few years removed from right-wingers slapping those symbols on Obama and Hillary... Now THEY WANT TO OWN IT??

Their parents must be white supremacists.

Like 45, he is a power-groupie; he wants to be one of the "cool", tough guys and will grovel to the strongman-types.

If the boys your wife is dealing with are lucky, they will grow out of the stupid phase they are in.

Not without their parents support!! STUPID people today!!!!

How does your wife’s analogy work? And has she pointed out to these eegits that there is no such thing as the Soviet Union anymore?

and not the "Fight the Nazis" one. I think her viseral reaction is in part having a military father and husband who served when the Soviets were clearly the bad guys. Someone earlier mentioned the hammer-and-sickle symbol is being used by the white nationalist movement as a "kinder and gentler" replacement for the swastika.

They were invaded. It was fight or die. Stalin and Hitler signed a non aggression pact and they divided up Poland as a result. Stalin would have been happy to be at peace with the Nazis if they had not invaded.

Their ideologies were very different.

The USSR lost more people in that war than any other country.

Of course it is. Everything posted on DU is simplistic by definition and necessity. Whole books can and have been written on the subject. Do you think DU would allow me to post a book? Your reply -- two short sentences -- is pretty simplistic also.

But I will bite. 1) Their ideologies are different but the same -- totalitarianism and complete allegiance to the state. 2) Yes they lost more people but that was because they were the only large country in Europe that was invaded and fought back. Of course they would lose the most. Also because Stalin was an incompetent military leader who murdered his generals before the war started. It didn't help that their supply system was based on a failed economic theory. They were keep alive by war supplies from the capitalist U.S.

However the Soviets knew the non-aggression pact was a simple Treaty of convenience.

The Soviet Army was reeling from Stalin's purges and they wanted peace to allow time to rebuild and modernize their army. Both sides knew there would be War at between them at some point.

The Nazis struck first.

So, it makes sense it is trickling down to the younger kids. Every few years it's big again, and Soviet army surplus stuff has been pretty big with none wingnuts for a long time.

Not a big deal.

She's really cares about her kids, and if she can help them see what statement they're making at least they can make a choice and not just try to be cool.

But its "cool" and my friends have one! So many talk about being "non conformists" while conforming to this nonsense.

There they can worship their Beloved Leader, just like Donnie Two Scoops does.

Try the Kool-Aid, kids, and don't forget to tip your server.

don't encourage the kids to want to go to Russia. What have they got to offer apart from free health-care and free education to the highest level ? Just lame-brained perks, fringe benefits. (not)

That free health care doesn't seem to affect the life expectancy in Russia, which has one of the lowest, if not the lowest in the developed world. 25% of Russian men will die before reaching 55 years old.

The paradise that is Russia is one of the most polluted areas on planet Earth, there are no environmental regs on auto emissions or industrial emissions, not to mention the nuclear radiation present in multiple areas like lake Karachay, the most polluted water on earth. Some areas around the lake will give you a lethal dose of radiation in about 30 MINUTES.

You would be a fool to travel to Russia, unless you have a death wish or something.


https://corrosion-doctors.org/AtmCorros/mapRussia.htm

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/science/why-russian-men-dont-live-as-long.html

communist memes going around rn, and plenty of lefties use the symbol on social media, so I would say it's very possible they're using it in that context.

And they know it gets a rise from the adults.

or a bear or something.

Trump supporters celebrated their victory.

"It turns out that United Russia won the elections in America," Viktor Nazarov, the governor of Omsk, Russia, declared in a radio interview.

http://www.nationalpost.com/m/wp/news/blog.html?b=news.nationalpost.com/news/world/make-russia-great-again-if-trump-lifts-sanctions-putin-could-finally-establish-his-country-as-an-equal-to-u-s&pubdate=2016-12-03
----------------------
Today's republicans: "Russia is our friend".

"... retired Marine Corps Gen. James N. Mattis said in May 2015 that among world threats “in the near term, I think the most dangerous might be Russia.”

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/dec/6/donald-trump-james-mattis-differ-on-vladimir-putin/

A GOP Congrsswoman referred to the rooskies as, "our friends, the Russians". I almost fell over.

I'm a boomer and thus I have lived through the cold war era. I watched the news when our intelligence agents were tortured to death in the Lubyanka. Putin was a heavy hitter in the KGB and many of ours know what he did during the cold war.

They're friends to the GOP as they have funded $30mm to Cheetolini. They're no friends of mine.

today are mostly Trumpites who have no idea what it represents, not young communists. This is a sad reflection of the state of public education (and education in general) in the US that these kids think that symbols from the USSR could be used to express their love of Trump, but this is where we are right now.

I think it's sad that youngsters and adults alike (of all political stripes) have so little respect of history and have been so taken by Trump's seeming fascination with Russia (Putin specifically) that many are willing to rewrite the USSR's sacrifices during WWII from memory. The Nazi invasion of the USSR was the last of several major invasions of Russia from Western Europe (Napoleon was before Hitler), and the Russians lost over 25 million defeating Hitler's army, which was the most fearsome the world had ever seen up to that point. The US would have lost many more lives if not for the Soviets, and we have never given them credit for it.

As part of a peace group with my grandmother. They certainly hadn't forgotten WWII, there were statues everywhere dedicated to the war (especially in what was then Leningrad), the small school in our "sister town" (2 1/2 hours up in the Caucasus Mountains) had a plaque dedicated to the boys from that school who were killed and there was even a special museum on the top floor of that school where the children were expected to study about the war, we saw more than one of those.

And I particularly remember a meeting with another peace group where an older lady who had been a nurse during WWII said to us "When you go back, please tell your president that we want peace!" I still get choked up remembering her. They haven't forgotten.

Great summary and first post! And welcome to DU!

as the villains by the actual villains, the West, who still hanker after fascism. Indeed, they have increasingly been promoting it, domestically, and have never ceased imposing it by bomb and bullet, abroad. 'Murder incorporated' - what Mussolni failed to mention when he spoke of fascism as rule by the corporations.

What is it, but the Old Adam recrudescing, after the various national models of 'One Nation' welfare-states set up after WWII ? They were always just biding their time, knowng full well that with the media under their cnontrol, it was just a matter of time before they were back 'in the box seat'.

Those "wonderful people" prefer a dictator over democracy and were thrilled when putin invaded and annexed crimea.

as mad as a long-talied cat in a room full of rocking-chairs.

..the schools used to measure our damned skirts!!!

Dont bother trying and figuring them as a whole out. Boys do boys things, why? Because it's what they do, it's what they've done since there were boys.

As a 13 year old in art class I would paint symbols of Anarchy and old German stylized uniforms. Did I believe in anarchy, Naziism, or even have the required thought developments to even understand any of it? Well, maybe a little. I mostly did it because they looked cool and it was the "taboo subject" I really could have just as easily drawn or painted something else.

However, I remember that my art teacher was a mean old SOB. When you think of a mean drunk Vietnam Vet, this guy pops up as a reference. Anyways, he used to jump my shit everytime I would paint or draw a stylized A for anarchy. Or draw two brooding characters in a dark alley wearing German WWII uniforms. So I would only draw that stuff.

I remember I did a really nice 2ft x 2ft stained glass window project. It was the A for anarchy but stylized, slanted, etc. He had a complete shit fit and called my parents in.

So what's all that mean? Lmao, absolutely nothing seeing as how I was only just one of those teen boys back in the day. I had a huge issue with authority and even 20 years in the military didnt cure me of that.

So unless their grades are bad, they are bullying, doing drugs. I just really wouldnt worry aboot it.

It’s how the alt-right recruits. They suck them in by pretending to be the absolute counter-culture of the time, and then they indoctrinate them. The kids are trying to get a rise out of people, unaware that their mind is being stolen.

And stuff in a catalog. Don't remember which one... fairly mainstream catalog like sharper image???? Anyway the looked really cool and had a little steampunk vibe to them.
Never had the disposable cash....
But they were cool

Some of them post guillotine memes, and think life under Stalin was sweet so it's possible their inspiration is coming from an online platform and not from the President himself.

A country cannot be EVIL. Millions of people are not EVIL, just because they live under a weird regime. USA is not EVIL, though Trump was elected there. The Soviet Union was not Russia - but in those entities a Strong Man and a Strong Military was made the cornerstone of government. Out on the streets normal people just lived on, and nobody was asking them if they liked it.

The Soviet Union broke down and disappeared by the force of its own citizens, who suddenly found a way to stop the madness. All these so called EVIL persons suddenly was able to change the system from EVIL to GOOD, tumble it with almost no violence - even though the system was guarded by the biggest military machine in history.

These countries was now "free" to shape a new society, and many tried bravely. Some of them succeed, but the people of Russia was not so lucky. Hopefully they will soon continue their fight for a better life.

Most of them did not chose to live where they live, they were just born there. To call them EVIL is in no way helping and encouraging oppressed people to change their surroundings to something better and more peaceful. To mark a group of people as EVIL is not a way to fight an authoritarian regime - it is the way to it.

Fight the good fight!