Senate The legacy of Fidel Castro (1926-2016), and the future of Cuba

Great guy.
Rest in peace, El Comandante.

 

These memes are really adding to the conversation, well done guys.

 

They're not wrong for what I'm actually seeing online though...

EDIT:

Ahahahaha...

Dr. Jill Stein

✔@DrJillStein​

Fidel Castro was a symbol of the struggle for justice in the shadow of empire. Presente!
7:46 PM - 26 Nov 2016

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Well, it's a bit awful that the "real Cubans" in the meme are assumed to only be the refugees living in Miami, don't you think? The ones in the island are "fake Cubans", I guess! But most political memes are ultra-simplified sound bytes designed to appeal to simple people, so they should be always taken with the appropriate distance.

 

No, not really. Since that's not at all what I got from the meme. I'm just taking "real Cubans" to mean "real Cubans" as separate from "academics who were never real Cubans," but YMMV with your own biases.

 

That's an unfair accusation, and a rabbit hole I'm preeeeeetty sure you don't want to go down.

 

you must have missed the meme i posted last page with the scumb-er I mean miami cubans in trump masks celebrating vs real cubans in cuba.

 

Nah, I just ignored it, Vivec.

I saw this online and thought of you: “Ceausescu died today. He is credited with the creation of an impressive dam which generates electricity for millions. [he also maimed and killed and imprisoned people and destroyed any and all rights and kept his country at the edge of famine] but he took anti-American stances so he was a-ok!"

 

You mean the difference between free Cubans and the ones who have to say 'All Hail Castro' or be tortured to death along with their families?
(edit since apparently this has to be stated rather than taken as obvious: There are still Cubans who love Castro as there are always people who love dictators)

Yeah, I'm sure the 'mourning' we see in Cuba is 100% legit.

And yeah, what scum those Miami Cubans are for not wanting to stay in a repressive regime and having grievances and hatred for a person who killed and tortured their loved ones along with thousands of others. How AWFUL of those people. Maybe I should go tell my friends mother what a piece of scum she is for caring about the fact her uncle was executed without trial, or how her neighbor was told to either kill herself or leave Cuba when she had nothing by Castro's soldiers. What AWFUL people they are.

The attempt to not only normalize Castro but support him is disgusting.

 

Why did that remind you of someone who no less than four times in four consecutive posts said Castro was not okay, and twice stated he didn't want to defend him? More fundamentally, why are we wasting time discussing what stupid caricatured internet comment vaguely resembles something someone said when we could instead just respond to their actual words and thoughts provided first hand?

 

Because the JCC has become a zero-sum game, Wocky. I thought that was obvious.

 

That's tremendously stupid, but I'm going to give you the benefit of ignorance. I know many Cubans that happily sing the glories of the Revolution, including Cubans outside of their country that have nothing to fear from those death torturers. I understand that Americans haven't had much contact with pro-Castro Cubans and that the idea to paint every single individual who supports Castro as brainwashed is a good way to cut through the many contradictions in the island and sleep happy at night secure on being part of the Rebel Alliance and not the Empire, but please spare us. We are not twelve.

 

That is a load of bullcrap and you know it is.

Yeah I'm sure there are Cubans who love Castro. There were plenty of Germans who loved Hitler, plenty of Soviets who loved Stalin, dictators are great for some people.

I know Cubans, I know people who left Cuba in the 50s and 60s. I know people who left in the last 20 years. I've heard their stories. So yeah, you hear the same kind of stuff from 100 or so people I tend to believe them over some arm chair internet commentator who hasn't lived it.

So yeah, there are people who love Castro, and they are no better than the people who support any other dictator.

 

"they have to say it" is the non-conspiracy version of "all my opponents are shills"

also

 

I like that, without a hint of irony, you opened a post uncritically defending anyone who fled Cuba in the 50s, inclusive of its many Batista sympathizes, and closed it trying to make "support for dictators" a mark of worthlessness.

 

Congrats on joining the same level as the Alt-Right Fascist apologists, I'm sure you all will have a lot to agree on.

 

I'm not entire sure how you got from what I said to me being a fascist apologist, but you're the expert on logical leaps so

 

Castro truly was the Road Runner to the American Empire's Wile E. Coyote, zipping and flitting through all of the Acme ruses set by our psychopathic CIA/White House overlords.

Ol' Fidel survived 10 presidents--all of whom amassed a body count far, far higher than anything that Cuban ever managed (yeah, Gerald Ford including)--and I can't help but feel some measure of affection for him. "Tenacious" doesn't even begin to describe this guy.

 

So, what? Does the Cuban exile community want us to invade and liberate Cuba for them? Blockade the island into submission until the regime cries uncle? Look, Fidel Castro wasn't a great person, and we were right to take in refugees from Cuba fleeing the regime...but if they're expecting us to fight a war for them, then that's going too far.

 

The Cuban Exile community wants us to turn our country into something ****ty which is why they constantly vote for garbage.

 

Are we talking about the gutless ****bag cowards who sit on their arse and whinge at Uncle Sam to give them their island back, so they can go about gutting its resources and partying like it's 1955?

Scenario A: Fascist dictator Batista is in power, abusing human rights, and giving the imperialist Yanks a great little island playground. Castro and his liberals are sick of it, and after a failed assault on Montcada barracks they leave for Mexico, put a small force together, and risk life and limb to topple the regime and liberate the country.

Scenario B: Useless c-words flee to Miami and faced with human rights abuses by Castro, have one half-arsed attempt at taking the country back (Bahia de Cochinos) before spending decades demanding punitive action and sulking like cowards.

Yeah, those Scenario B guys, they're the voices we should listen to!

I feel like if your point is "ebil dictator hated freedom", your knowledge base is too limited to offer anything of value here Gho.... sorry, GenAntilles.

Apparently, yes.

There's great scholarly work on Cuba that's worth reading; Hugh Thomas' "Cuba: Or the Pursuit of Freedom" looks at the history of an island that had been passed between colonial powers - including the Yanks - for its entire history. They'd had no nationalist identity and so when a Cuban launches a moderate, liberal Cuban nationalist revolution it's a bit of a big deal, he said with modest understatement. I know Americans hate the idea that a nation state does not exist purely as it's personal playground-slash-plaything, but apparently it's not the case. They have a whole pesky national identity to deal with, that upsets people who want to be furious that a country with unprecedented growth in both literacy and healthcare had a splotchy record on human rights. It's a bit like how Americans say they detest imperialism whilst being a prolific empire builder, albeit inferior to the European powers at maintaining it.

I like though that of the people commentating, the only person I can assume to have heard of the Thomas book is JoinTheSchwarz. The rest don't need pesky research to confirm their biases inform their position.

https://www.amazon.com/Cuba-Pursuit-Freedom-Hugh-Thomas/dp/0306808277