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Fidel Castro has died

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Re: Fidel Castro has died

#511

Post by selectodude »

realusername wrote: post #361
apsec112 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, that's a crazy exaggeration. There is nowhere in America where the entire neighborhood has no electricity, no running water, no sewage, and no paved roads. Such places are common in Africa and India. https://www.facebook.com/126979a/posts/10101269399749522

There are indeed places in the US without running water right now (see Flint as an example). I also don't think comparing with in development countries is relevant.

There are places all over the world that have suffered disasters taking out normal services. That doesn't mean that the services never existed or the country as a whole isn't industrialized yet.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#512

Post by throwaway-hn123 »

gaius wrote: post #484
throwaway-hn123 wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have and the worst sink estate in London i nothing like as bad as Havana You really haven't bruv.

When were you in Cuba?

What does that have to do with you pretending to have knowledge of life in sink estates in London, chief?

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#513

Post by skj »

fspear wrote: post #479
narrowrail wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>us who have been directly affected by Castro's actions Do you believe this puts you into a position of objective analysis?

No. And I'm not against objective analysis, however by humanizing such individuals in the name of "objectiveness" you are disregarding the suffering of a lot of people.

Only if you believe that "normal" humans can't be responsible for terrible suffering. Countering that belief is, I think, the OP's point.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#514

Post by blfr »

jknoepfler wrote: post #119

I would encourage the commenters in this thread who see Fidel's legacy as a black-and-white matter of an "evil dictator who did bad things and was wrong about economics" to step back, bear witness to the objective facts about Fidel Castro's life ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidel_Castro ), think sincerely about what could lead a highly intelligent and charismatic person to become or follow Fidel Castro (as many ha…

the complexities of global politics in the 20th century

All the complexities in the world won't cover up the fact that communism was by far the worst evil of the 20th century, beating nazism by a mile, by tens of millions of people killed to no benefit. It had no redeeming qualities. Murder, slavery, and poverty is all communism gave to the world.

Now its major protagonists can burn in hell together. I hope they do.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#515

Post by rospaya »

narrowrail wrote: post #470
kristianc wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Judging on the comments on this thread most people (I'm not specifically referring to you) are making statements based on what they've heard, not by what they've personally researched, and unfortunately a lot of that information is biased or propaganda. By any objective measure - and according to experts on human rights and liberty - Cuba is one of the most repressive countries on earth. https://freedomhouse.org/co…

Well, Freedom House, according to wikipedia: "U.S. Government funded non-governmental organisation (NGO) that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom, and human rights Representatives of Cuba said that the organization is a U.S. foreign policy instrument linked to the CIA and "submitted proof of the politically motivated, interventionist activities the NGO (Freedom House) carried out against th…

Do you want dozens of other sources to confirm it, if Freedom House isn't enough? It's obtuse to claim Cuba has political freedom.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#516

Post by pmarreck »

sooheon wrote: post #216
pmarreck wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque Tu quoque fallacy, for the record

It's only a fallacy if it is being employed to absolve Castro of every crime. I think the point of the comparison was to remind pots not to call kettles black.

What makes you think it requires a total absolution to be tu quoque? If I murder 100 people and punch a grandma, and I point out it was OK to punch a grandma because I just saw YOU do it, it's still tu quoque despite the fact that nobody discussed the 100 I murdered

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#517

Post by Trombone12 »

bzbarsky wrote: post #274
betolink wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many did Fidel kill?

Finding unbiased numbers is hard, obviously. Maybe we'll know more about it 50 years from now, but at the moment our knowledge is approximately what it was for the Soviet Union right after Stalin's death or so, yes? That said, I have yet to see anything resembling a credible source that claimed more than 10,000 direct deaths caused by the Castro regime. I've seen much higher numbers (50,000 or more) in terms of indir…

10k over 50 years? Wow, that's a lot less than I imagined from how he is described as a mindless killer, and the dictatorship as drenched in blood.

For comparison Puerto Rico have had about 10k murders in the last 15 years alone[1], and that's in less than half the Cuban population.

From 1998 figures[2] and 2002 population numbers I guesstimate that officially about 820 murders occur per year in Cuba, and the 10k in 50 years evens out to 200 per year.

[1] http://www.estadisticas.pr/iepr/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=nf...

[2] http://www.sld.cu/sitios/dne/buscar.php?id=3297&iduser=4&id_...

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#518

Post by rospaya »

edblarney wrote: post #388

Today, most Cuban ex-pats around the world are celebrating his death. Liberal Arts students across the Western World are saddened. To me that's funny.

To me it's equally funny how it's ok to group one side into wimpy liberal arts students (you forgot their MacBooks and lattes!) and the others into ex-pats.

These days it's like superhuman to be able to look at an issue from two sides.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#519

Post by coredog64 »

quonn wrote: post #478
wildmusings wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are talking about Fidel's regime and how he decided to rule. Batista was an evil man and a bad ruler, but the economic and societal destruction of communism is in its own category, as is the level of totalitarian control that the Castro regime has imposed, which includes a committee in each neighborhood responsible for suppressing dissent. Because of how backwards Cuba is today, everyone thinks it was always like…

> but the economic and societal destruction of communism is in its own category The Human Development Index puts Cuba at position 40, despite the huge economic disadvantage of the embargo. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index#2015_H...

The urban parts of Cuba started out in a pretty good position.

> "One might best summarize the complex situation by saying that urban Cuba had come to resemble a Southern European country (with a living standard as high or surpassing that of France, Spain, Portugal and Greece) while rural Cuba replicated the conditions of other plantation societies in Latin America and the Caribbean," according to analyst Mark Falcoff. [0]

I've left off the bit about racism as that's already been much discussed in this thread.

[0] http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/castro/peopleevents/e_precastro...

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#520

Post by Lordarminius »

GunboatDiplomat wrote: post #438
Lordarminius wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is propaganda, disgustingly incorrect propaganda, so far off base the only conceivable way you could have written it is to be maliciously lying. Your emotional reaction(disgust) is up to you. Be objective. Pray,what part of it is untrue? What is incorrect and where do I lie? Kindly be specific.

> He believed in freedom and dignity. That's exactly why he never allowed free election, a free press, free speech, free markets, or freedom to leave his island paradise. >He saw the US government as the enemy of progress everywhere in the world That just makes him an idiot. The US government has been the primary proponent of progress, spreading free markets and democracy around the globe. >What opposition? Imperiali…

> The US government has been the primary proponent of progress, spreading free markets and democracy around the globe

Who would have guessed? The Iraquis, libyans, Chileans (after 1972), maybe the people of Zaire under Mobutu,or the oppressed blacks in apartheid South Africa , heck forget that look at the blacks in America!, and the native American Indians!!, how great their lot is; the list of people who have 'enjoyed' American democracy is long.

> Fidel was a brutal dictator and his memory deserves to be pissed on. Any who celebrate him are ignorant, evil, or fools.

I guess that includes me and many others on HN and around the world. Have a nice night :)

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