Today is #StPatricksDay! Did you know that Che Guevara’s family origins are Irish? 👇
The Guevara family’s Irish origins can be traced to early 18th century Galway, where Che’s great-great-great-great-grandfather, Patrick Lynch, was born. In an interview with Che’s father, he said “the first thing to note is that in my son’s veins flowed the blood of Irish rebels”
As a white-skinned Argentinean descended from local nobility on his mother’s side, Che lived among the more privileged ranks of his country’s class- and race-conscious society.
The family plantation was lost after a series of poor investments made by Che’s father, and the family was forced to move into a fifth-floor apartment with Ana Isabel Lynch. It was in these years that Che grew close to Grandma Lynch.
In time, Che rebelled against the class structures of Latin American society, and sought to lead the continent’s poor in a revolt against both domestic dictators and imperialism.
He became world-famous as the right-hand man to a young Fidel Castro, in the improbable overthrow of Cuba’s Batista regime.
As part of a Cuban delegation following the momentous 1959 revolution in the mid-1960s, Che would visit Ireland himself, traveling to the city of Limerick. On the trip, Che is known to have sought out a local pub, where he sampled Guinness.
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11 years ago today, NATO launched a regime change war on Libya that devastated the African nation. 🧵
On March 19, 2011, a multi-state NATO-led coalition began a military assault on Libya under the pretense of stopping Mu‘ammar Ghaddafi’s “crimes against humanity.”
During NATO’s bombing campaign, thousands of civilians were killed, and entire cities like Sirte were obliterated.
Happy #StPatricksDay! This festival from the tiny island of Ireland is celebrated in almost every major city across the globe, here’s why 👇
The Irish diaspora numbers approx. 70 million people, compared to the population of Ireland which today is just 5 million. This is a direct legacy of what is commonly known as the Potato Famine. The more accurate translation of the Irish “An Gorta Mór” is the Great Hunger.
Between 1845-1952 the Great Hunger became the greatest human disaster in 19th century Europe and was engineered by England’s policy of under-developing Ireland and preventing it from industrializing.
On #StPatricksDay, we remember the Irish socialist, feminist, and revolutionary politician, Constance Markievicz, also known as the “rebel countess,” who dedicated her life to the Irish struggle for independence and became one of the first woman ministers in all of Europe.
In 1916, she fought against the British occupiers during the Easter Rebellion, as a Second-in-Command in the Irish Citizen Army, and was put into solitary confinement soon after. She was first sentenced to death, then given a life sentence instead, but was released a year later.
2 years later, she became Minister of Labour in the revolutionary Irish government. Through the political turmoil that followed in the 1920s, Markievicz continued her activism and rebellious activities, fighting for Irish independence and the rights of the working class and poor.
1. On this day, 98 years ago Vladimir Ilyich Lenin passed away. As one of the leaders of the Russian Revolution in 1917 he inspired millions of the exploited and oppressed around the world to unite and free themselves from the chains of capitalism.
2. Under Lenin's leadership the 1917 revolution created the first socialist society which changed the course of history and inspired masses of workers, peasants and the oppressed everywhere to believe that another world is possible.
3. One of Lenin's most important contributions to Marxist theory was his analysis of capitalism and from it, his definition of imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism.
On this day in 1890, legendary Lakota Sioux chief Sitting Bull was killed by U.S. government agents.
Sitting Bull was the political and spiritual Native American leader who united the Sioux tribes against the white settlers taking their tribal land.
In 1868, 25 tribal leaders signed the Fort Laramie Treaty with the U.S. government, which created the Great Sioux Reservation. But Sitting Bull refused to surrender.
Sitting Bull’s anti-treaty stance won him many followers. Upon the discovery of gold within the boundaries of the Great Sioux Reservation in 1874, the U.S. government reneged on the treaty and began to remove native tribes from their land by force.
This International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, we honor the women who have heroically resisted patriarchy, capitalism, imperialism, fascism and colonialism and have sacrificed their lives to fight for a better and just world: