Erm, yeah, that was kind of the point of my post. I think you took the wrong meaning from it. I meant exactly what it said.
The American perception of Cuba is that it is a hellhole. The Cuban perception is dependent on who you ask, where you ask them and when you ask them.
The same is true with the American perception, though. If anything though, Cubans are much more unified in thinking that Cuba now is a hell hole, mostly because it undeniably is.
Both.
10char
Doubt that. There are people who still support the system inside and outside(my father in law who is outside and the relatives of my wife who are inside).
The Miami population in Cuba tends to distort this by wishing the U.S. would enter Cuba like it did Iraq(watch Balseros).
The reality is that there is no unity in what Cuba is like because most people don't know what changes need to occur. Cubans inside are vehemently strongly to many of the changes proposed by Cubans living outside and Cubans outside think that once things change they'll simply be able to return and claim what they left behind 50-30 or even 10 years ago. To say there is any kind of unity on the view Cubans have of Cuba is false.
Well, yeah. But if they weren't in the fringe, the elections there wouldn't need to be so rigged and non-existent.
That is a total strawman, whatever some documentary might tell you.
Of course they're not unified on exactly what needs to happen in their country. Nobody in any country ever is. But a regime that bans even saying something bad against the government is generally not going to be so popular. Having an economy stuck in the 50s doesn't help, nor does (until recently) bans on things like computers and DVD players.
Doubt they are in the fringe.
Not really. The documentary doesn't tell people anything. These are the words of Alberto Beguiristain and other prominent Cubans.
I gotta ask - have you been to Cuba?
Then why can't they have free elections? Why are dissenting parties banned?
So a few "prominent Cubans" represent the majority of Miami Cubans?
No, but my aunt has, and the stories and pictures she has brought back are striking. The embargo didn't apply to her since she went to deliver medicine, and she actually went into the heart of the country - not just the tourist-friendly resort areas. The whole place is one big ghetto. Not a single car there was made after the 50s, which from the looks of things is the last time a building was repaired.
A woman's two-year-old daughter died thanks to the inaccessibility of medicine in Cuba's glorious health-care system, and the government sent her a letter saying that for all intents and purposes, her daughter never existed, since that would make the government look bad.
People are so afraid of being arrested that they've taken to mockingly making a beard symbol with their hands to refer to Castro rather than say his name.
She went to neighborhoods full of houses where the kitchen is in the backyard, and the bedroom is nothing but a mattress in an empty windowless room.
But the worst part isn't just that there are bad things there - there are in every country. It's that she has a point of contrast in having lived in these same areas as a kid. What were once nice areas are now just as run down as everything else. But maybe your wives' relatives live in one of the few, isolated upper-class areas, which she has also visited and noticed the stark contrast of with the rest of the country.
I will give the Castros credit, though. As you've said, they've successfully fought off opposition with an iron fist for 50 years without getting overthrown - quite a feat. It will be interesting to see how soon it all falls apart, especially after Raul leaves.
As a son of a Cuban refugee I think I might be a bit biased on this.
That...or the one with actual, credible experience and opinion on the matter. I think most people who worship Che are just upper-middle class suburban kids who have no idea who it is they are worshiping.
This goes back to the revolution days. Cuba did away with whatever we call 'free elections' back then through legal means and with the widespread of support of the Cuban people. Same goes for dissenting parties. Read about the writing of the Cuban constitution as we know it today.
No. They represent the people who will actually have any kind of active role in dictating Cuban policy if the Castro government were to disintegrate.
This is really ignorant. Cuba has had for the last 50 years had traffic of cars from the Soviet Union, Europe and Asia. Last time I went I saw Toyotas and Hyundais rolling around. While most Cubans still can't afford them, how many in Latin American can? The automobile is an American commodity presented as a sign of modernity to Latin Americans. Most people in Bolivia can't afford new cars anymore than most people in El Salvador or Mexico can. It is a Latin American condition. Not a Cuban one.
I have no way of telling whether this is true or not.
Lol. This isn't true. Stop reading Generation Y(actually don't, it is a pretty good blog). That may have happened in the 1980s or even early 90s. Not now. Now you get labeled a political deviant and they ignore you. Same goes for homosexuals. The human rights noise that would be made is simply more trouble than arresting people.
That is really common in Cuba and Spanish influenced architecture.
This is where you're just completely wrong. The Castros if anything have been by dictatorial standards one of the weakest rulers of the last century.
While they have support from the military, the rate of high ranking military officers who publicly have stood out against the government is pretty high. Even from the first days of the revolution you had guys like Huber Matos standing up against the government and while he was sent to jail, the Castros simply didn't have the power to execute him.
Last, there is your claim about how quickly it will fall apart, once Raul leaves what do you think will happen? Do you think they haven't made a plan for how to deal with the eventual death of the Castro brothers? Political parties formed by revolutions(like PRI in Mexico) and the PCC(Partido Communista de Cuba) prepare for such events for decades. It is the reason they're able to hold on to power for so long.
The fear of Americans & Cubans in the U.S. coming to Cuba and making laws for Cubans who've had to eat 5 cent bread for the last 50 years is bigger than Fidel Castro passing away.
Trust me on this one, things won't fall apart because the Castros are gone.
I think what you need to realize is that the revolution and what you call a dictatorship in Cuba is pretty unique. In terms of how unique it was it is right up there with the Peronist movement.
The majority of Cubans on the island today can read and write because of it, I do not know about your parents but my wife's parents have university level educations because of it.
The revolution was a slash and burn operation. Do away with a system which had casino companies and fruit growing operations running the country and create a system for the people.
Whether it has had failures is pretty much not up for discussion because it does. But it is really a lot more complicated than saying that Castro simply is ruling with an iron fist. The Cuban people have allowed Castro to do all he did. The expropriation of company property, the social programs, the cultural isolation. It is as much the fault of the Cuban people as it is the Castros.
Cuba never had been a particularly politically stable country, but they did have some form of elections until Batista.
Certain prominent Miami Cubans would dictate policy in Cuba... and one such Cuban policy would be for America to invade? That's just nonsensical on many levels.
Other Latin American countries have their own problems. Cuban was doing fairly well economically until Castro came along.
However, this seems to confirm that your wives' relatives live in a unique (even if not rich) part of Cuba, since the fact that there are no new cars there is not only something observed by my aunt, but also present in an entirely book of pictures of modern Cuba we were given.
It is, regardless of whether it contradicts your preconceived notions. It really shouldn't be much of a surprise to anyone who knows anything about the nature of Castro's dictatorship, but clearly you don't.
I actually didn't even know that Generacion Y had confirmed this, though that just seems to prove it. I was merely passing on my aunt's experiences.
And if you really believe they don't arrest political dissedents anymore, three words: Orlando Zapata Tamayo.
And it wasn't before, because they weren't that poor.
That's just a fact. Cuba's GDP per capita was, in 1958, on par with Japan, whereas it is now ten times less (and no, Japan's GDP per capita has not grown ten times since then in comparison to the rest of the world). Cuba is importing sugar now. Think about that. They are importing sugar. A huge portion of their economy was based on exporting sugar, because it was so abundant and because the land was so furtile. In fact, one of my great-grandparents worked for Hershey, helping him get sugar. Their baseball team was called the Cuban Sugar Canes. But now nobody's growing anything, because it would just be confiscated.
This sentence suggests that you know absolutely positively nothing at all about Fidel Castro.
You don't get to stick around as a dictator for 50 years by being gentle. Even if you were popular at first, eventually people would tire of you. Castro had to have been as brutal and oppressive as he was to get as far as he did.
Why would they need to if he was in jail? That they arrested him should show you something it itself.
Of course they've made plans, but nobody will simply have the political strength to hold the regime together that the Castros did.
That's just idiotic. Americans aren't going to make laws for Cubans. Really they (and we) have much more to fear from a mass exodus away from Cuba to the U.S.
True, it might happen for other reasons. It might even happen under Raul. But it'll happen soon.
Not really; obviously circumstances are going to be unique in each individual case, but it's pretty much the same result that Russia and China and North Korea had, just each of them to different extents.
And thanks to Castro, that means hogwash. A highly educated person might as well be a waiter, because thanks to the extra tips they get, that's pretty much as high-paying a job as they're going to get.
Oh lordy, I cannot believe the propaganda spewed here. "The people"? That's why the people can't have a say in their government, or even have a negative opinion of their government. That's why the people can't legally leave the country, because it's theirs now. That's why they're leaving in tiny drafts, risking their lives, just to get out of "the people's" country. And how many people are doing the same to get in?
Well hey, I guess by the same standards the North Koreans "let" their system become the tyranny it is today.
I happen to know dozens of Miami Cubans in my family alone. None of them want to invade Cuba or any of that hogwash, but all of them are anti-Castro. This includes conservatives, moderates, liberals, and mega-liberals, and every one of them despises Fidel Castro, in some cases as much as they despise Ronald Reagan. My great uncle was a member of the Communist Party of Cuba. Castro took over, he fled to Miami, and he became a Republican (though he did vote for Obama).
Given what I've already seen from you, I'm not surprised that a statist piece of sh*t like you supports a tyrannical piece of sh*t like Castro, though it does surprise me that your wives' family is moronic enough to like the man who destroyed their country. Frankly though, if they're perfectly fine with people who oppose them going to jail, they can go suck on turds for all I care. People like them and like you are a disgrace to humanity, as are all the others who "allowed", as you say, an evil tyrant impose his will on his country. F*ck them.
Cuba never had been a particularly politically stable country, but they did have some form of elections until Batista.
Certain prominent Miami Cubans would dictate policy in Cuba... and one such Cuban policy would be for America to invade? That's just nonsensical on many levels.
Other Latin American countries have their own problems. Cuban was doing fairly well economically until Castro came along.
However, this seems to confirm that your wives' relatives live in a unique (even if not rich) part of Cuba, since the fact that there are no new cars there is not only something observed by my aunt, but also present in an entirely book of pictures of modern Cuba we were given.
It is, regardless of whether it contradicts your preconceived notions. It really shouldn't be much of a surprise to anyone who knows anything about the nature of Castro's dictatorship, but clearly you don't.
I actually didn't even know that Generacion Y had confirmed this, though that just seems to prove it. I was merely passing on my aunt's experiences.
And if you really believe they don't arrest political dissedents anymore, three words: Orlando Zapata Tamayo.
And it wasn't before, because they weren't that poor.
That's just a fact. Cuba's GDP per capita was, in 1958, on par with Japan, whereas it is now ten times less (and no, Japan's GDP per capita has not grown ten times since then in comparison to the rest of the world). Cuba is importing sugar now. Think about that. They are importing sugar. A huge portion of their economy was based on exporting sugar, because it was so abundant and because the land was so furtile. In fact, one of my great-grandparents worked for Hershey, helping him get sugar. Their baseball team was called the Cuban Sugar Canes. But now nobody's growing anything, because it would just be confiscated.
This sentence suggests that you know absolutely positively nothing at all about Fidel Castro.
You don't get to stick around as a dictator for 50 years by being gentle. Even if you were popular at first, eventually people would tire of you. Castro had to have been as brutal and oppressive as he was to get as far as he did.
Why would they need to if he was in jail? That they arrested him should show you something it itself.
Of course they've made plans, but nobody will simply have the political strength to hold the regime together that the Castros did.
That's just idiotic. Americans aren't going to make laws for Cubans. Really they (and we) have much more to fear from a mass exodus away from Cuba to the U.S.
True, it might happen for other reasons. It might even happen under Raul. But it'll happen soon.
Not really; obviously circumstances are going to be unique in each individual case, but it's pretty much the same result that Russia and China and North Korea had, just each of them to different extents.
And thanks to Castro, that means hogwash. A highly educated person might as well be a waiter, because thanks to the extra tips they get, that's pretty much as high-paying a job as they're going to get.
Oh lordy, I cannot believe the propaganda spewed here. "The people"? That's why the people can't have a say in their government, or even have a negative opinion of their government. That's why the people can't legally leave the country, because it's theirs now. That's why they're leaving in tiny drafts, risking their lives, just to get out of "the people's" country. And how many people are doing the same to get in?
Well hey, I guess by the same standards the North Koreans "let" their system become the tyranny it is today.
I happen to know dozens of Miami Cubans in my family alone. None of them want to invade Cuba or any of that hogwash, but all of them are anti-Castro. This includes conservatives, moderates, liberals, and mega-liberals, and every one of them despises Fidel Castro, in some cases as much as they despise Ronald Reagan. My great uncle was a member of the Communist Party of Cuba. Castro took over, he fled to Miami, and he became a Republican (though he did vote for Obama).
Given what I've already seen from you, I'm not surprised that a statist piece of sh*t like you supports a tyrannical piece of sh*t like Castro, though it does surprise me that your wives' family is moronic enough to like the man who destroyed their country. Frankly though, if they're perfectly fine with people who oppose them going to jail, they can go suck on turds for all I care. People like them and like you are a disgrace to humanity, as are all the others who "allowed", as you say, an evil tyrant impose his will on his country. F*ck them.
Your comments are the most nasty I have read on DP. You deserve an award they are so insulting.:fart
As a son of a Cuban refugee I think I might be a bit biased on this.
He's a little kid talking about a country he's never been to after hearing things from people who don't live there. It is like trusting Ray Charles to tell you how to drive around L.A.
Hey, I've been to Cuba. It's a hellhole! I'd say that it was easily better back in the 1950s when my dad's family was successful over there.
Of course it's a hell hole. The US has been treating Cuba badly for years, not to mention the Bay of Pigs.
I applaud the Cubans under Castro for their bravery for standing up to the US Bully tactics and dirty tricks.
The US has pressured (in the past, I dont know about currently) many other countries into not trading with Cuba. Lack of international trade can severely cripple the ability of a country to get what it needs and sell what it has excess of.So it can't trade with other countries? Trading with Canada, Europe, Asia, etc., and they are still stagnant just because they can't trade with the US? Really? That's the only reason?
The US has pressured (in the past, I dont know about currently) many other countries into not trading with Cuba. Lack of international trade can severely cripple the ability of a country to get what it needs and sell what it has excess of.
Look at UN votes about the embargo. Only the US and Israel support it.
The UN does not run the world economy. You are doing a Strawman argument.
No. I'm trying to show that Cuba can trade with the rest of the world.
The problem with Cuba is that no one can invest there because of the government. Without capital accumulation you will have no economic growth! People are barely living at subsistence, so how can people save money?
No. I'm trying to show that Cuba can trade with the rest of the world.
The problem with Cuba is that no one can invest there because of the government. Without capital accumulation you will have no economic growth! People are barely living at subsistence, so how can people save money?
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