Mercedes’ use of Che an offensive blunder

MiamiHerald.com/columnists

The makers of Mercedes Benz — or, as some pundits are now calling the luxury car brand, "MerChedez Benz" — have issued a tepid apology for the colossal gaffe of linking the image of Ernesto "Che" Guevara to a green initiative promoting carpooling.

"Daimler was not condoning the life or actions of this historical figure or the political philosophy he espoused," the Benz parent company statement said. "We sincerely apologize to those who took offense. "

Apology accepted (sort of, but I'm not so sure that beyond the potential loss of sales and customers, the German automaker and the hordes of misinformed Che-lovers around the world understand the extent of the blunder.

After all, it all went down in a fleeting instant.

On stage this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Daimler chairman Dieter Zetsche unveiled a new technology initiative dubbed CarTogether, using for a backdrop the iconic image of Guevara taken by Cuban photographer Alberto Korda in 1960.

Guevara's beret bore not the star of the Basque-style original, but the Benz logo.

"Some colleagues still think that car-sharing borders on communism," Zetsche said as the image of Guevara appeared behind him. "But if that's the case, ! "

Even more repulsive than the kidnapped Korda image is the use of the cutesy slogan, since the political crimes and human-rights abuses that began with the triumph of the romanticized Cuban revolution — then supported as a utopian purveyor of social justice and now shunned as one of the world's longest-lasting dictatorships — continue to be perpetrated against the Cuban people 53 years later.

By using the popularized image of a violent man, an Argentine who was a key figure in the early days of the revolution, the company not only insulted Cuban-Americans, victims of Guevara's adventurism and flawed sense of justice, but the peaceful, gentle-living green movement as well.

And they insulted gay people, as Guevara was a well-known homophobe, and Jews, as the controversy has stirred up old accounts about the company's involvement with Adolf Hitler and charges that the carmaker used slave labor from the concentration camps.

"Every time I see this racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic, misogynist killer used stupidly as a capitalist tool, a mindless fashion accessory or whenever I hear him defended by mindless academics, political activists, 'intellectuals' or pro-fascist celebrities like Alice Walker or Sean Penn, I want to throw up," Juan Carlos Espinosa, associate dean and fellow at the Honors College at Florida International University, posted on his Facebook page.

"While we respect Mercedes Benz's freedom of expression, we want to make sure that they understand that this 'expression' is completely inappropriate, and has caused immense pain to the descendants of this mass murderer's victims," wrote Ernesto Suarez of Kansas City, Mo., in the petition for an apology he started on change.org.

The luxury car brand is quite popular with Cuban-Americans, and the damage Zetsche inflicted on that relationship will be tough to repair.

"My lease is up and I was thinking of another Mercedes," said Filiberto Hebra. "Sorry, Mercy. "

Hebra, a retired gay Cuban-American designer, gave Korda's image a makeover on his Facebook page using red lipstick and blue eye-shadow to turn Guevara into a drag queen.

"On the other hand, it's quite enjoyable to see how this assassin has been turned into an object of marketing by the [capitalist] system he so hated," Hebra told me.

That's how extensive the lack of knowledge on Guevara is around the world, thanks, in large part, to how easily Hollywood can spin a heroic image. The two movies on Guevara, and the two-part starring Benicio del Toro, didn't deal with the repulsive parts of his history.

In 1959 Cuba, he was one of the revolutionary leaders responsible for the staging of summary trials without the opportunity of a defense and for the ensuing mass executions of people who were deemed counterrevolutionaries and supporters of the Batista regime.

It was those executions that set the precedent for Fidel Castro to ruthlessly execute his opponents for decades — from the fiercest among them, Gen. Arnaldo Ochoa in 1989, to the humblest, the three poor black men who tried to commandeer the Regla ferry to South Florida in 2003.

Guevara, as some label him, "a revolutionary hero?"

Hardly. More like a puppet that can be used across the political and social spectrum — and now, thanks to a company that should have known better, a case study for advertising and marketing departments around the world.

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