"Contrary to popular belief, Cubans already know what they have, and don't have. What they need isn't dollars that eventually end up in the regime's hands. What they need is the courage to stand up for what they already know is right. — Robert Molleda, "Change from Within Is the Only Remedy," 26th Parallel, March 1, 2008 [quoted with approbation by Henry "Economist" Gómez in Babalú, March 2]
Robert Molleda asserts and Henry loudly agrees that "what [Cubans on the island] really need is courage." What is the courage that they supposedly lack? Is it the courage to endure or the courage to resist? It seems to us that they lack neither. How do Robert and Henry, who have endured nothing and resisted nothing in their lives, though certainly inflicted much suffering on others by just being their insufferable selves, how do these gallant gentlemen propose to "teach" courage to the Cuban people? Certainly not by example. Or perhaps it's more a case of "Do as I say, not as I do (or don't do)." Or maybe they want to borrow a page from the Wizard of Oz and pin a medal on the lion?
The Cuban people don't need courage. What they need are guns, tanks and planes. That is, to be on an equal footing with their oppressors who have taken the nation hostage with guns, tanks and planes.
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Maybe they should tell Gorki that he doesn't have any courage, for example. Or the political prisoners, or the fathers and mothers who brave repression to buy food for their kids in the black market. Maybe the Ladies in White should be informed that what them and us perceived as courage is not such a thing. It's amazing how a phrase said by an independent journalist in Cuba can get this much traction..... as if the person in question hold the keys to truth as her exclusive patrimony.
Yes, they are all just like me, except I have found Oz.
Maybe if they could just forecast the next cold front everything would be okay.
El que empuja no se da golpes.
What is stopping these people from going to Cuba and becoming critics of the government. Where is their courage? I wonder why they feel that only Cubans on the island have the duty to risk their necks and livelyhood.
What nerve! you can tell those two have led very comfotable lives, they have no idea what it means to be opressed, they still believe that the pressure cooker will work, they cannot wait to see their brethen shed blood, what a pair of dolts.
The Cuban people don't need courage. What they need are guns, tanks and planes
also they need , granadas, hanguns, bombs, ametralladores, municiones, the courage vendra despues
None of us in the U.S. or anywhere else in the world has the stature to suggest that anyone in Cuba does not have courage. There are just too many examples — the Ladies in White, the journalists, etc. — who demonstrate real courage every day, regardless of the possible consequences.
I suggest you live in cuba for a while.It never ceases to amaze me how people are and how little they know.Nice to see an article that didnt whine and was positive.didnt take long for the self hating whining to come out.
Manuel, I hear some Cubans say "el que lo puso que lo quite" What are your thoughts on this?
Anonymous:
If you mean the U.S., I think that, after 49 years, the Bay of Pigs, the Kennedy-Khrushchev Pact and a thousand other betrayals, we can pretty much forget about the U.S. "undoing what it did to us." Even today, and especially today, Americans would be welcome as liberators by the Cuban people; but the Americans don't believe that or pretend that they don't believe it, and it's just as well. American intervention would usher-in another 100 years of troubles for the Cuban people and culminate in another faux nationalist like Castro. Perhaps that's inevitable in any case and is the price that we must pay for being "so far from God and so close to the United States."
As for those Cubans who contributed to putting Castro in power, both here and in Cuba, they are too old now to undo what they did even if that were possible: time has run out for them as it has for Fidel.
Thank you Manuel for your very informative answer.
The Cuban have courage.The cause of freedom for Cuba lacks international solidarity because the press does not want it as they continue censoring the facts and giving all the coverage to Castro and virtually none to his victims.So the Cuban people are suffering with no end in sight under a constitutionally “untouchable” system of oppression, exploitation and apartheid.
Even if we don't consider such a noble group as the Ladies in White; even if we don't consider such noteworthy figures as Oscar Elias Biscet; even if we IGNORE those brave souls who throw themselves into the jaws of sharks crossing the Florida straights in search of a better life; who is anyone to ignore the day to day courage in Cuba to survive oppression and to make ends meet for oneself and one's family. How is it that there are those, off the island, who oppose cagastro and yet say that what is needed in Cuba is courage? WTF IS GOING ON HERE? The LAST thing those who courageously struggle in the belly of cagastro *NEED* is to be told that they are cowards --especially by their "own" people off the island.
Man this pisses me off royally.
I need a drink.
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