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Fidel Castro has died

bbc.com

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Re: Fidel Castro has died

#561

Post by berntb »

School-Cotton wrote: post #542
berntb wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are "programmed" by culture. It wasn't so many generations ago when people with similar genes as me (a Scandinavian) did organized clan warfare with slavery, murder, plunder and everything else we see as bad in today's Western world. But the people then were "loving fathers and sons" too, of course. Attitudes to things you/we deplore are trivially cultural. Your argument as a whole was a bit funny... You use p…

Your argument doesn't prove violence is cultural. Maybe Scandinavia is peaceful now because most of the people with violent genes left. You're descended from the guys who stayed, not from the ones who left to colonize Iceland, Greenland, Britain, Normandy, etc.

You really think it became peaceful ca 1100? :-)

Please read some history. It was no better, it was just not internationally infamous clan societies for a while. Then we had violent national states (check e.g. Polish deluge or the 30 year war).

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#562

Post by sspiff »

cmbailey wrote: post #526
k-mcgrady wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "On the contrary, it's dangerous not to call out evil for what it is." 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. I'm not coming down one way or the other but something I found very interesting was comparin…

Fidel Castro leaves behind a nation awash with tears and blood from thousands of executions, tens of thousands of political prisoners, concentration camps for gay men, labor camps for those who thought differently, listened to jazz, or even just had long hair. These are facts I learned only after doing more research, after listening to friends who are gay and who did years of research. So we all need to be careful no…

I agree that Fidel Castro made many mistakes and is responsible for many atrocities. But the plight of Cuba is not his doing alone.

He leaves behind a Cuba that was embargoed by the US, their closest and largest trade partner after the US had staged a failed invasion to overthrow the government. This forced them into the Soviet sphere of influence for supplies and trade.

Then, when the Soviet Union collapsed at the end of the cold war, it could no longer support Cuba. The island nation was driven further into poverty and essential goods like food and medicine became scarce.

And what did the US do at that point? Did they reopen diplomatic relations and try to find some rapprochement after an era of high tensions? No. Instead they decided that now was an excellent time to extend their embargo to include food and medicine as well, which were up to that point exempt from the trade ban.

To point to a single man and his inner circle as the sole cause for the sad state Cuba is in today is just as absurd as to deny the wrongs of the Castro regime, nor did he only do bad things for the Cuban people. The "trope" of education and healthcare being available to all is not some straw man. It is a legitimate achievement, and one that many nations the world around have not been able to match, no matter their affluence.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#564

Post by forgotpwtomain »

edblarney wrote: post #54
chirau wrote: post #24

As an African, I'd say the world has lost one of the most influential leaders of the past century. To pretend here, for me, as if he was cruel to our continent would be both ungrateful and untrue. The man offered free training and medical school for most of our African doctors, he harbored, trained and armed many a guerilla group in our pursuit of independence from colonization. Up until today, Cuba still sends signi…

This is a disturbing position. I don't doubt that his doctors may have helped you. However, the man has committed grievous crimes, keeps 'his people' in abject poverty, on an 'island prison'. More than 85% of the economy is in the control of the military - his private Army. "Up until today, Cuba still sends significant numbers of doctors to remote African areas and provide expensive medical procedures for free." This…

> However, the man has committed grievous crimes, keeps 'his people' in abject poverty, on an 'island prison'.

I didn't really want to comment in this thread but to be clear, the US embargo has kept Cuba in abject economic poverty not Castro.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#565

Post by tomp »

dorfsmay wrote: post #450
id wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Communism is a very vicious ideology which leaves no room for any type of dissent. Looks like you have no idea what communism really is.

Part of the communist rhetoric is that complete free speech is not good. But before judging that aspect of communism, remember that it's other type of regime apply the same restrictions, and indeed communism was illegal in the U.S. at some point.

> complete free speech is not good

That's more of a general European rhetoric. We (unfortunately) don't have free speech even in democratic capitalism!

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#566

Post by dorfsmay »

peteretep wrote: post #543
dorfsmay wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you have to draw the line somewhere. Morale/ethics do change over time, but not killing people has been shown throughout history to be the bare minimum for a decent society, and an accepted standard today. We can discuss and expand on adding more species, kingdoms and domains, but humans are not up for discussion.

> to be the bare minimum > for a decent society So if a utilitarian-leaning society could show it was improved by killing people, you'd be fine with that?

I would not be fine with that, no, but then, I'm not fine either with killing other apes and other self-reflecting animals ; my standard vs modern society's accepted standard.

However, in that hypothetical case you describe, it might be up for discussion. My point was that by modern standards, killing other humans is not ok, and not up for discussion.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#567

Post by pvg »

unknown_apostle wrote: post #291
unknown_apostle wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok let's take GDP numbers at face value and let's assume this says much about daily life. Basically, you're stating that 50+ years of Marxist order imposed by the Castro regime has managed to keep up with countries plagued by 50+ years of general chaos in the form of pathologically corrupt regimes, nepotism, inflation, rampant violent crime, civil war, guerilla movements and narcoterrorism. Hmmm... I will contemplate…

Why does this get downvoted? People in communist countries trade in some of the classical liberties, to make a higher level of economic planning possible. In one form or another, this is the “trade-off” believed in by most genuine communists. The classical liberties are just a lie anyway, and this trade-off will result in a kind of progress and general wellbeing that would far surpass anything seen in backwards, priv…

From https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html -

"Please resist commenting about being downvoted. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading."

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#568

Post by 67726e »

tomp wrote: post #560
67726e wrote: post #547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do tell, when is the last time a sitting US president has murdered his political opponents?

Hillary expressed a wish to "drone" Assange, and Obama actually "droned" a lot of people (that the US has branded "terrorists").

Killing terrorists does not put you on the same level as Castro.

Re: Fidel Castro has died

#569

Post by jgome »

notahacker wrote: post #362
Lordarminius wrote: post #91

After reading some of the comments here, my fath in the human race is not enhanced. Castro was a genuine hero and a great man; indeed among the top 10 greatest individuals of the 20th century. He believed in freedom and dignity. He saw the US government as the enemy of progress everywhere in the world; he wanted people to be free and he devoted his life to that ideal. How many people can you say that of? > He was als…

To be honest, if you're willing to make arguments that sending troops 4000km to protect your own citizens from Galtieri's invading military junta was a more dictatorial act than, say, rounding up homosexuals, hippies and clergy and incarcerating them in UMAP forced labour camps - something even Castro conceded was a "great injustice" - then there's literally no reasoning with you ...

> if you're willing to make arguments that sending troops 4000km to protect your own citizens

You mean, the colonialists sent by the UK government?

They shouldn't have been there in the first place.

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