This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Charles Phipps: Major modifications to the page. This, hopefully, separates it from the Dirty Communists page.
Historically, from 1917-1920 there was something called the First Red Scare, it did involve some communism-phobia but was mainly about a widespread fear of anarchists.
KEVP: Ian Fleming invented the organization "SPECTRE" because he needed a really BIG enemy for his hero James Bond to fight. It was never exclusively a "Red" organization. Groups like THRUSH and KAOS were based on SPECTRE. None of these groups were particularly Communist, in fact they tended to be more Nazi. In fact, in "The Man From U.N.C.L.E", U.N.C.L.E. was an international organization (The United Network Command for Law Enforcement) that included the Soviet Communist character Ilya Kuryiakin (sp?) who worked together with American Napoleon Solo to fight the evil organization THRUSH.
The point I am trying to make is that SPECTRE, THRUSH, KAOS and similar organizations (like HYDRA in Marvel comics) don't belong under the heading "Red Scare" but should have their own category.
Looney Toons: Call it Equal Opportunity Subversives or something similar, maybe?
Morgan Wick: Call it something that doesn't give away that it's a fork of Red Scare. In fact, expand it to include Communist organizations. This trope is about Communists in general, not just pastiches of SMERSH and other conspiracies. Since it's the opposite number of Heroes "R" Us, maybe Villains R Us? Though that implies a specific mode of operation, that the organization is The Man Behind the Man for a series of villains Our Hero encounters over the course of the season or series.
Ununnilium: Maybe more like Terror Is An Acronym, since terrorism is generally the modus operandi of such organizations. `.` (IIRC, a comic book with HYDRA was the first time I ever heard that word.)
(random passer-by) I always thought of "THRUSH," "SPECTRE," and other such groups as convenient fictional stand-ins ("nudge nudge, you know who we're REALLY talking about here") for various and sundry Soviet intelligence organizations, created to allow the writers to tell spy stories without all the political baggage and controversy that would have resulted if the writers had actually CALLED the bad guys the "KGB" or "NKVD."
There was even a sketch on the Benny Hill Show that hung a lampshade on this trope. It was a spoof of "The Avengers," if memory serves, and someone or other was lecturing our intrepid hero (Benny Hill) that the opposition were working for "a certain Eastern power." And our hero nodded and said, loudly, "Ah, Russia!"
Ununnilium: Sometimes yes, sometimes no, IMHO.
And Terror Inc feels too much like a buisness, which these usually aren't.
Morgan Wick: All I know is, I don't really like Terror Is An Acronym. How about Super Secret Subversives? I'm running low on ideas, I know...
Daibhid C: I've removed the Winter Guard, because they were a team of Russian heroes, created during the days of Glasnost. They didn't like their American counterparts much (especially when they invaded Russian territory), but they weren't really villains.
