To the OP, not including Tyson and some old commies/wannabe commies, Vibrotronica’s answer is correct. I have both a Mao shoulder bag and cap in fashionable olive-green and I have no love for Mao or communism. The process here is one of appropriation and juxtaposition. A historical figure has been reduced to a graphic icon, removed (though not entirely) from it’s original context. He exists alongside other culturally recognizable icons such as Mickey Mouse, CocaCola and the American flag. These icons are part of a cultural visual language. Their original meanings are supplanted by the products they are attached too. Brand recognition and cultural propaganda go hand in hand. See our dear leader on that huge poster, that means he’s watching and life is great. See that large Coke billboard, “have a a Coke and a smile”, here too, life is great. By taking these images and placing them in other contexts the designer/artist/advertiser takes a familar visual cue and is able to make social commentary, memorable shock/humor/irony and give new meaning to the icon by way of creating new visual associations. Whether or not you find any merrit in this process, it still happens. Visual language evolves by it’s use/misuse. Swastikas were all the rage in the U.S. prior to Hitler’s appropriation of the symbol. It was on company adverts for flour, it was a good luck charm for sports teams and was even placed in designs for tilework and brickwork in buildings. Hitler took a poistive icon and gave it a new and horrible association. The reverse happened with Mao’s image and his cult of personality. It is now camp and quaint. It’s not that there is anything great that designers are trying to celebrate in Mao when they make shirts and bags. It’s that he recognizable and can use his image to sell something. The real irony is that we buy our American flag decals and fireworks from China, who have learned to use our icons to sell something back to us.
I think the notion that a historical icon has been reduced to a graphic icon is an entirely subjective one. What is not subjective, however, is the very graphic and very real atrocities committed by said icon. That, in my opinion, should usually trump subjective fashions. Put another way, good taste should dictate that despots should not be considered good fashion.
What happened to the pigs?
Poor pigs. 
Washington owned slaves, and while he may or may not have had some degree of reservations about the concept of human slavery, he never publically spoke out against the instituion of slavery, and in fact violated Pennsylvania by rotating slaves back and forth between Mt. Vernon and Philadelphia so that they would not be released. Washington also pressed for expanding the executive power of the Presidency far beyond what the writers of the Constitution intended, leading some to declare him a new “King George”, who didn’t chop down a cherry tree and run to tell his father because he “could not tell a lie.” The point being not that Washington killed as many as Mao or anysuch–“let’s not argue who killed who’s father…”–but that the history taught about both leaders to their respective populations does not accurately reflect what they actually did. As for Cromwell…the less said of him, the better, despite his high regard by British subjects today.
Mickey Mouse didn’t kill millions, and consign more to death in prison camps and famines resulting from obtuse agricultural planning. The Coca-Cola Company, on the other hand…
At any rate, turning brutal tyrants and bloody revolutionary sociopaths into graphic icons removed from original context serves to eradicate lessons learned from such catastrophies. A new generation of neo-Marxists–unfamiliar with the utter failure of formal Communism and almost invariably attendant repression and brutality–may think it novel and cute to worship Mao or Lenin. Those who’ve studied history would prefer to leave those ideologies buried along with Sparta, the Tokugawa Shogunate, and the Christian Crusades.
Stranger
The China-used-to-have and China-now-has comparisons are irrational. You can cherry pick tranquil villages against polluted ghettos just as easily as you can pit pigs against literacy. And by the way, calling the architect of the cultural revolution a champion of literacy is utterly bizarre in its conception.
So what you’re saying is that your subjective experience is SO MUCH MORE IMPORTANT than other people’s subjective experience, particularly if the people having those subjective experiences are a billion godless commies.
Not at all, no. What I am saying is that, objectively, we can say with damn certainty that Mao killed an awful lot of people. We cannot say, however, that objectively he has been reduced to a cultural icon that can be neatly put on your hat or bag.
Also, those billions of people don’t really have much choice when it comes to Mao seeing as most forms of dissent are still frowned upon in the PRC. Come to think of it, Mao didn’t give the warm and fuzzies to dissenters either.
I’m not defending that argument, I’m simply presenting it. Sounds spineless, I know, but please believe my intentions. It also may seem like cherry picking, but since the question here is ‘why do they believe this,’ well, here’s an answer, and inconcieved as it may be, it’s the one that affects what over a billion people believe.
Personally, I’m of the opinion that while hardly ideal, Mao and his communists were the better choice. The Kuomintang was famous for eating out of any dish that was filled for it (re: Nazi Germany), and despite their tremendous financial advantages they were simply unable to organize themselves internally. Mao and the Gang of Four era weren’t blessings; they were painful medicine that ultimately and thankfully gave way to the Deng era.
And yes, there was literacy, even in the cultural revolution. People had to read those dazibao, didn’t they?
Blue-ear disease, probably. Causing the price of pork to go up something terrible in the southern provinces.
Eek- how did I get Chez? I think I looked up the spelling to make sure it was correct- and there it goes…
Cromwell was no racist ,he was as big a bastard to the English,Scots and Welsh.
It wasnt so much a case of few mourning his passing as many actively celebrating it.
I am reminded of a parody image somebody created, rendering a portrait of Ronald Reagan in the iconic “Che poster” style.