651–660 of 842 posts
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.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13042460 and marked it off-topic.
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…
On the contrary, it's dangerous not to call out evil for what it is. Of course it might be wise to try to analyze what genetic/family/social/economic/political factors shape people like Castro, Gaddafi, Franco etc. — but if you think you're dealing with people like you and me you fail to grasp the phenomenon. Dictators that prosecute and murder their opponents, like Castro did, share a very predictable set of psychop…
* A tendency which is underappreciated in politics. Consider for example, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad as an instantiation of George W. Bush for the Iranian political market.
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> Only those who actively attempt to undermine the Cuban democracy are imprisoned
Did you know that if you try to overthrow the government of the United States you'll be arrested? Crazy stuff.
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…
On the contrary, it's dangerous not to call out evil for what it is. Of course it might be wise to try to analyze what genetic/family/social/economic/political factors shape people like Castro, Gaddafi, Franco etc. — but if you think you're dealing with people like you and me you fail to grasp the phenomenon. Dictators that prosecute and murder their opponents, like Castro did, share a very predictable set of psychop…
Do they? What facts have you go to support your thesis?
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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 e…
>I agree that Fidel Castro made many mistakes and is responsible for many atrocities. But the plight of Cuba is not his doing alone. In American English, the phrase, "He murdered thousands," can't be followed by the word "but..."
Yet I hear good things about them too. Why can't the same be applied to Fidel? He committed atrocities and he did good for the country. And indeed much of the suffering (the "millions" not the "thousands") was directly caused by US actions, so don't come with the holier than thou.
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Right after the USA acknowledges ALL of their crimes against humanity, which are far more and spread much more wider. No cuban children sleeps in the streets tonight. You can't say that about northamerican children.
How could you possibly assume that no children in Cuba sleep on the streets?
Of course, this idea gets lost to the mind of the Western middle class because in general they just don't think about the poorest members of their society (or some just think they deserve their fate).
The Communist era had numerous well-documented flaws, but really, the things it got right aren't spoken about enough in the West. We could learn something from that. For example, the levels of education of the population in the Soviet Union were never attained in the United States. How do we fix that in the Capitalist system? Do we want a more educated population in the first place? Do we want to live in a society with no children in the streets? If we do, what do we have to change in our society to attain that? It's important not to take a whole system for granted as a full package ignoring its flaws, be it Communist or Capitalist.
But indeed, the saying _is_ correct: "Millions of children will sleep on the streets tonight. None of them is Cuban."
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Even so, were would it have been if intervention attempts by Uncle Sam against Cuba succeeded? Name one country that is better of than it was before western intervention.
South Korea is the poster child here, depending on how you define "western intervention".
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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 e…
Then when Fidel came to power one of the things he promised was to reduce the reliance on US trade. And he nationalized all of the private property and assets belonging to American individuals and companies.
And in response to that, the embargo was introduced. AND THEN there was the Bay of Pigs.
So lets not pretend the embargo is what destroyed US Cuban trade. Fidel did that all by himself, without the help of the embargo.
Also, the US didn't push Cuba into the Soviet sphere.. Fidel already had close tied to the Soviets before the embargo. It was one of the reasons for putting the embargo in place.
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There are legal, efficient ways out of poverty in the UK. There are none on Cuba.
Cubans do not live in poverty. There are neither rich nor poor. And if you think there's an "efficient" way to escape poverty in the UK, you've never been poor.
Unlike the USA, the UK has efficient universal healthcare and access to quality education, plus working safety net for the citizens. It might not be easy to rise from the poverty, but it is possible and indeed, most Britons are doing OK.
As to your small personal dab, I grew up in a Communist country and am familiar with the package, don't need no lectures from guys in Che t-shirts.