At the same time it is in an odd position because it was also very early on, before it was widely known what was happening with the Soviet government, adopted by anti-authoritarian socialist and communist groups, some of whose members risked their life against Stalin, and it was later knowingly adopted by groups opposed to the Soviet regime, such as e.g. the Trotskyist 4th International, as well.
This makes it quite different to symbols that are singularly attached to totalitarian governments and movements, in that it also has nearly as long history of use by their opponents.
Personally I think it's unhelpful to use it, but I also understand those who use it as an attempt to "reclaim" socialist imagery that has been relentlessly abused.
I have seen people here advocating anti-authoritarian socialist ideologies of the types that would get you executed by regimes like those of Mao and Stalin.
Or your preconceived notions of conservative people are wrong.
It's not a preconceived notion that /r/the_donald is filled to the brim with hate speech and trolls. You simply have to go there and look for yourself.
Before the election, there was a narrower meaning, but as soon as the Clinton campaign mentioned it and the media picked it up, any hope of the term having any concrete meaning was lost forever. (This isn't helped by the fact that people love using it to attack arbitrary conservatives, in much the same way that SJW is sometimes used to attack anyone who expresses views supportive of social justice without behaving badly).
EDIT: I don't let myself get worked up about downvotes in political conversations, but this one has me pretty curious. My comment wasn't even remotely offensive to any part of the political spectrum.