Female German citizen dies fighting against ISIS in Syria. Yahoo/Reuters.

Ivana Hoffman. Yahoo/Reuters

Ivana Hoffman, a 19 year old female German Communist of African descent has died fighting in Syria. Yahoo/Reuters. Hoffman had joined the Kurdish female brigade, known as the YPJ a couple of months ago and died fighting near the town of Tel Tamr in northern Syria. Hoffman had joined the Turkish based Marxist Leninist Communist Party (MLKP) in Germany and then traveled to Syria to fight. The MLKP said she joined up to defend Christian villages from ISIS. Two other foreign fighters have died fighting ISIS recently including an Australian man and a British ex-Royal Marine. There are estimated to be at least 100 western fighters with the Kurds and at least one of them, a Canadian immigrant to Israel, is female.  

My Comment:

I'm going to take a moment to say how completely absurd this story is. A black woman, who is a German citizen, happens to be a communist. She decides to risk her life to save Christians, a group of people that tend to not get along with communists. She goes to Syria and fights an Islamic death cult that wants to bring about the end of the world. While there she dies fighting along side a group of fellow women who are all fighting to make sure they aren't enslaved. Is it just me or does this sound like the script to some kind of terrible Hollywood movie? I'm not saying the story isn't real, it is just so absurd. Nothing about this story makes sense and if you would have told me even a year ago that this would be an actual story I don't think I would believe it. 

All that being said, I've got mixed feelings about this one. I am NOT a fan of communism. At all. But I also am not a fan of ISIS and other forms of radical Islam. I've said before that fighting against ISIS is a brave act and that is, of course, true in this case as well. I'm just extremely uncomfortable with Communism. I don't know the exact political makeup of the MLKP, but the fact that they have Lenin in their name means that they at the very least are ignorant of history. Or they embrace it even knowing that Lenin was an evil person. Still, the existence of this group fighting alongside the more mainstream Kurdish militias makes me a lot less enthusiastic about westerners fighting for the Kurds. I understand that many of the Kurdish groups are far left, but to find one that is openly communist is more then a little disturbing. 

 I haven't talked too much about the fact that Hoffman was a woman. Much has been made about the YPJ. I'm not sure what to think about them. Supposedly they are decent enough fighters but I wonder how much of that is propaganda. Women have proven themselves in combat before of course. The United States have used women in non-combat roles for years now and there were thousands who fought for the Soviet Army with distinction during World War II. I don't have a problem with women serving in combat, other then the normal desire to not see women get hurt. Of course I don't really want to see men get hurt either, but for whatever reason, it means more to me if I see a woman get hurt. That's not really fair to either gender but it still bothers me a bit. 

I will say this though. These female fighters are doing far more for the cause of woman's rights then most of the so called social justice warriors here in the United States. I hear feminists complain about the so called patriarchy in the western world all the time, but it pales in comparison to what ISIS is doing. They have a society that actively condones and encourages rape. A actual honest to God rape culture. Women have no real rights in ISIS held territories and are at best little better then property. In short ISIS is everything that feminists complain about turned up to eleven. I'm very tempted to just spam this story whenever I see someone complaining about the depiction of women in video games or some other dumb thing that the social justice crowd likes to complain about. Want to fight for woman's rights? Go to Syria, pick up a rifle and fight an actual patriarchy. Not with words or dumb blog posts. But with bullets and explosives. I know that is an appeal to worse problems, and that I myself am not doing anything about ISIS either, but that doesn't change the fact that whatever complaints western women have, valid or otherwise, it pales in comparison to what is happening to women in the Middle East right now...