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Glite Dictionary
communist bandit

communist bandit

1 9.7
An insulting name for a rebel in a communist group who people say steals or uses violence
  • noun
  • /ˈkɒmjʊnɪst ˈbændɪt/
  • Offensive
translation icon : bandido comunista
  • The villager described the attackers as communist bandits who raided their homes for supplies.

Examples

  • Very few informants pointed out that Wang Yulan was killed by gongfei (communist bandits) in accordance with the official interpretation replete with nationalist rhetoric.

    Academic text (2009)

  • The government labeled the rebels as communist bandits to justify their crackdown.

  • During the civil war, many communist bandits were accused of stealing from local farms.

Surface Forms

communist bandit singular
communist bandits plural

Morphology

communist + bandit

The meaning is directly and predictably composed from 'communist' (a supporter of communism) + 'bandit' (a violent robber), so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can infer it denotes an insulting label for someone seen as a communist criminal or guerrilla. Although the term carries derogatory and historical-political connotations, there is no idiomatic or non-compositional shift, making the expression transparent.

Etymology

Communist bandit began as a name used by governments to make 'rebel' fighters sound like common criminals. By calling them bandits and adding communist, authorities made these guerrillas seem violent and illegal, so the phrase came to mean a communist-linked fighter accused of theft or violence.