In some of Shanghai's busiest subway stations, the revered visage of Lei Feng gazes out over bustling commuters like the ghost of propaganda past.
The suitably nostalgic, sepia-tinted images - part of a drive to promote Lei Feng Day, which is today - hang in stark contrast to the glossy advertisements for designer handbags and high-end perfumes. Few passers-by seem to give the posters a second glance.
It is a fairly safe bet the organisers didn't see the irony of an accident-prone subway network being endorsed by a man who died in a traffic accident.
The 'Learn from Lei Feng' campaign has been one of the longest running and most famous propaganda exercises of the communist era. The pre-Cultural Revolution tale of a selfless, party-loving (in the communist sense) soldier who died while on duty is regularly taken down from the top shelf and dusted off whenever state leaders feel the urge to instil a sense of altruistic duty in the general populace, but there are signs it may finally be showing its age.
The real story of Lei Feng, for anyone who cares to check, is more one of general military incompetence and a young life tragically cut short in a senseless accident - but since when did propagandists let a few facts get in the way of a good story?
Lei died in 1962, flattened by a telegraph pole knocked over by an army truck he was supposed to be directing. He was just 22, a virtually unknown People's Liberation Army grunt at the time of his death.
