Oh shit. Fidel Castro dead at age 90
- Thread starter ugk
- Start date
Bump.
Define Paradise ...to me its a state of mind.
I think he was just using it as a figure of speech, but you know what he meant in the context of previous posts.
Trying to figure out why folks are taking boats and rafts from the oppressive United States over to Cuba?
Trying to figure out why someone is called "princeprince" like one "prince" isn't enough. Your BGOL name has a stutter, I hope you don't stutter in real life.
Anybody that fights back against white supremacy/white stupidity is good. These people are not terrorist or despots.
idi Amin? Lol. You guys are being funny now.
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This means you have much to learn because there is no reason why
Marcus Garvey, Kwame Nkrumah, Fidel Castro and Mugabe should
be confounded in the same expression with Idi Amin and Saddam
Hussein. The former were soldiers of freedom, where as the latter
cannot be denied the rank of despots
Why black Americans love Fidel Castro
When it came to matching words with deeds on the topic of racial equality, the most stalwart leader of the Western hemisphere, over the course of the 20th century, was Fidel Castro.
http://qz.com/315968/why-black-americans-love-fidel-castro/
I say this as a black American who came to bond closely with Latin America as an adult, living in Mexico for almost two years, traveling and staying with families in the Dominican Republic, and making more than half a dozen visits to Cuba, where I strolled through its enchanting cities and drove into the far reaches of the countryside, forging relationships with its people, especially those of darker hue.
The author with Fidel Castro(Photo courtesy of Ronald Howard)
Now we are again feeling the heat of the burning topic, the man, who bonded black Americans to his Caribbean island. Yes, it was Fidel Castro who—even though out of power now for years—is angering so many Americans, especially police officers, over his signature action three decades ago.
It was Fidel who gave amnesty to Joanne Chesimard, known now as Assata Shakur, still wanted in the 1973 killing of a New Jersey state trooper, Werner Foerster, in a highway shootout. Shakur was convicted but was busted out of prison in 1979 by comrades. As a leading figure in the Black Liberation Army, which took bolder actions than even the Black Panther Party did, not only getting into gun fights with cops but holding up banks, Shakur became a legend in her time, a Robin Hood of the black masses.
On Dec. 17, in an historical moment, President Barack Obama announced he would seek to normalize relations with Cuba. On the same day, federal and New Jersey police officials repeated their offer of $2 million for information leading to the capture of Shakur. Last year the feds made Shakur the only woman on the FBI Most Wanted Persons list.
You can be sure on black websites and newspapers there will be attention given to the increasing calls for Shakur’s capture or negotiated return. That attention will come with a history.
Castro did not just provide a haven for fugitive revolutionaries, who made the argument, accepted by perhaps a majority of Cubans under Fidel Castro, that blacks were an oppressed people fighting for fair treatment and an end to police abuses in their communities.
No, he was a kind of Martin Luther King with power. For example, before the Cuban revolutionaries led by Castro took over Cuba in 1959, there was fairly rigid racial segregation through the country, including, for example, Santa Clara in the interior of Cuba.
When I was in Santa Clara in early 2001, a woman there told me how black and white Cubans in the 1950s and earlier had walked along different paths around the beautiful downtown Vidal Park. (All it took in Cuba to be white was to have straight hair, be fair complexioned and not want to be called “negro.”)
This racial division largely ended under the government of Fidel Castro. Moreover, Castro made an effort to reach out to blacks in the US.
When he came to New York in 1960 for a United Nations meeting, Castro got upset at the management of the hotel where he was staying, the Shelburne, and he packed his bags and took his entourage up to the Theresa Hotel in Harlem, where he famously leaned out of the window and waved to the black residents of the community. Thousands of Harlemites called out his name in a bonding-with-power they were totally unaccustomed to.
And it didn’t stop there.
In the 1980s, before the end of the Cold War, Fidel sent some 25,000 troops to fight in Angola, on the side of those opposing the then-apartheid government of South Africa. This aspect of Castro’s time in power was little reported in the US media. Fidel militantly opposed racist South Africa at a time when the US was diplomatically supporting it.
It was I who in 1987 first reported that Shakur had actually escaped to Cuba and was residing there, protected by Castro. I spent several days with Shakur at her apartment and walking along the Malecón; my Newsday colleague, photographer Ozier Muhammad, photographed her as she posed provocatively outside the US Interests Section, hands up in victory.
As you know, things have changed since then.
The Soviets stopped supporting Cuba; and then the Soviet Union collapsed to the ground. For two decades there has been speculation that one day a liberal American president might move to end the now-half-century embargo against trade with Cuba and allow Americans to travel there freely.
Republicans and many Democrats were outraged at what they called a concession by Obama to the communism they said Cuba—through the retired Fidel’s brother Raul—still represents.
Muffled in the discussion on cable channels are the feelings of kinship and appreciation that black Americans hold for Fidel Castro.
Many of those who harbor such tenderness toward the bearded one do not shout it into microphones because they don’t wish to be accused of being anti-American. But sympathy with Fidel can be seen in decades of blacks voting in Congress. Harlem’s Congressman Charles Rangel, for instance, has been among the most progressive of all representatives when it has come to policies toward Cuba, over the year having proposed an easing of the embargo. And few on the national scene have been more militant in opposing the embargo than black California Congresswoman Maxine Waters.
In the coming days, Assata Shakur will be mentioned more frequently in news stories about Cuba, especially in the northeast. There are growing demands that the United States find a way to bring her back and to put her in jail. And in their stories, New Jersey newspapers are noting how Assata Shakur is being treated as a heroine by many in the black communities of America.
Federal officials and others are aware of how Shakur has become a kind of folk hero among black Americans and even blacks in the Caribbean, with a number of parents over the past 25 years naming their daughters Assata.
Adding to the appeal for blacks is Assata Shakur’s connection to the late rapper Tupac Shakur, who is related to Assata through his male ancestors (though not by blood) and is considered a nephew.
When I wrote about Tupac Shakur for a now defunct black weekly newspaper (the City Sun) I spoke with a top New York federal official, Ken Walton, who said Assata Shakur damn well better be careful of her every move—then, in 1996, and for the rest of her beating-heart life.
I wrote then of Walton “He told me in measured, angry words that he ‘or somebody like me’ will one day capture Assata and bring her back to the States.”
This I know to be true: Every time a fist was raised for Assata Shakur, sympathy was expressed also for the now old Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
By the way, Assata is not the only revolutionary received by Fidel with open arms. He also gave asylum to Nehanda Obiodun (formerly Cheri Laverne Dalton), the only person still wanted in the early 1981 $1.5 million Brinks armored vehicle holdup in Nanuet, New York, in which two police officers were killed.
These days it is not easy to find out where Assata Shakur and Nehanda Obiodun are or even what they are thinking. I hung out with Obiodun and wrote about her in Cuba in the 1990s, but I was blocked at every turn when I tried to get her and Shakur to meet with me and a group of Stony Brook University students I took to Cuba in January of 2012.
Obiodun has been almost completely off the radar in recent years, out of mind. But Assata Shakur has not been. “New Jersey hopes Cuba-US relations thaw will help extradite former Black Panther,” screamed a headline of Atlantic City News on Dec. 18.
And so, given all this as background, black Americans are not only reflecting nostalgically on Fidel Castro, they are concerned about the plight of Assata Shakur.
Some, perhaps many, black police officials publicly declare their desire that Shakur be captured and returned to jail in the US. But other blacks have respect for the courage she showed as she lived in exile for some 30 years, bearing in her torso the remnants of a bullet she took during that shootout in 1973.
Most of all, you can bet, there is a broad agreement with Barack Obama—that the time for hostility with the Cuban government—no longer headed by Fidel Castro but largely by his brother Raul—should be over.
When it came to matching words with deeds on the topic of racial equality, the most stalwart leader of the Western hemisphere, over the course of the 20th century, was Fidel Castro.
http://qz.com/315968/why-black-americans-love-fidel-castro/
I say this as a black American who came to bond closely with Latin America as an adult, living in Mexico for almost two years, traveling and staying with families in the Dominican Republic, and making more than half a dozen visits to Cuba, where I strolled through its enchanting cities and drove into the far reaches of the countryside, forging relationships with its people, especially those of darker hue.
The author with Fidel Castro(Photo courtesy of Ronald Howard)
Now we are again feeling the heat of the burning topic, the man, who bonded black Americans to his Caribbean island. Yes, it was Fidel Castro who—even though out of power now for years—is angering so many Americans, especially police officers, over his signature action three decades ago.
It was Fidel who gave amnesty to Joanne Chesimard, known now as Assata Shakur, still wanted in the 1973 killing of a New Jersey state trooper, Werner Foerster, in a highway shootout. Shakur was convicted but was busted out of prison in 1979 by comrades. As a leading figure in the Black Liberation Army, which took bolder actions than even the Black Panther Party did, not only getting into gun fights with cops but holding up banks, Shakur became a legend in her time, a Robin Hood of the black masses.
On Dec. 17, in an historical moment, President Barack Obama announced he would seek to normalize relations with Cuba. On the same day, federal and New Jersey police officials repeated their offer of $2 million for information leading to the capture of Shakur. Last year the feds made Shakur the only woman on the FBI Most Wanted Persons list.
You can be sure on black websites and newspapers there will be attention given to the increasing calls for Shakur’s capture or negotiated return. That attention will come with a history.
Castro did not just provide a haven for fugitive revolutionaries, who made the argument, accepted by perhaps a majority of Cubans under Fidel Castro, that blacks were an oppressed people fighting for fair treatment and an end to police abuses in their communities.
No, he was a kind of Martin Luther King with power. For example, before the Cuban revolutionaries led by Castro took over Cuba in 1959, there was fairly rigid racial segregation through the country, including, for example, Santa Clara in the interior of Cuba.
When I was in Santa Clara in early 2001, a woman there told me how black and white Cubans in the 1950s and earlier had walked along different paths around the beautiful downtown Vidal Park. (All it took in Cuba to be white was to have straight hair, be fair complexioned and not want to be called “negro.”)
This racial division largely ended under the government of Fidel Castro. Moreover, Castro made an effort to reach out to blacks in the US.
When he came to New York in 1960 for a United Nations meeting, Castro got upset at the management of the hotel where he was staying, the Shelburne, and he packed his bags and took his entourage up to the Theresa Hotel in Harlem, where he famously leaned out of the window and waved to the black residents of the community. Thousands of Harlemites called out his name in a bonding-with-power they were totally unaccustomed to.
And it didn’t stop there.
In the 1980s, before the end of the Cold War, Fidel sent some 25,000 troops to fight in Angola, on the side of those opposing the then-apartheid government of South Africa. This aspect of Castro’s time in power was little reported in the US media. Fidel militantly opposed racist South Africa at a time when the US was diplomatically supporting it.
It was I who in 1987 first reported that Shakur had actually escaped to Cuba and was residing there, protected by Castro. I spent several days with Shakur at her apartment and walking along the Malecón; my Newsday colleague, photographer Ozier Muhammad, photographed her as she posed provocatively outside the US Interests Section, hands up in victory.
As you know, things have changed since then.
The Soviets stopped supporting Cuba; and then the Soviet Union collapsed to the ground. For two decades there has been speculation that one day a liberal American president might move to end the now-half-century embargo against trade with Cuba and allow Americans to travel there freely.
Republicans and many Democrats were outraged at what they called a concession by Obama to the communism they said Cuba—through the retired Fidel’s brother Raul—still represents.
Muffled in the discussion on cable channels are the feelings of kinship and appreciation that black Americans hold for Fidel Castro.
Many of those who harbor such tenderness toward the bearded one do not shout it into microphones because they don’t wish to be accused of being anti-American. But sympathy with Fidel can be seen in decades of blacks voting in Congress. Harlem’s Congressman Charles Rangel, for instance, has been among the most progressive of all representatives when it has come to policies toward Cuba, over the year having proposed an easing of the embargo. And few on the national scene have been more militant in opposing the embargo than black California Congresswoman Maxine Waters.
In the coming days, Assata Shakur will be mentioned more frequently in news stories about Cuba, especially in the northeast. There are growing demands that the United States find a way to bring her back and to put her in jail. And in their stories, New Jersey newspapers are noting how Assata Shakur is being treated as a heroine by many in the black communities of America.
Federal officials and others are aware of how Shakur has become a kind of folk hero among black Americans and even blacks in the Caribbean, with a number of parents over the past 25 years naming their daughters Assata.
Adding to the appeal for blacks is Assata Shakur’s connection to the late rapper Tupac Shakur, who is related to Assata through his male ancestors (though not by blood) and is considered a nephew.
When I wrote about Tupac Shakur for a now defunct black weekly newspaper (the City Sun) I spoke with a top New York federal official, Ken Walton, who said Assata Shakur damn well better be careful of her every move—then, in 1996, and for the rest of her beating-heart life.
I wrote then of Walton “He told me in measured, angry words that he ‘or somebody like me’ will one day capture Assata and bring her back to the States.”
This I know to be true: Every time a fist was raised for Assata Shakur, sympathy was expressed also for the now old Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
By the way, Assata is not the only revolutionary received by Fidel with open arms. He also gave asylum to Nehanda Obiodun (formerly Cheri Laverne Dalton), the only person still wanted in the early 1981 $1.5 million Brinks armored vehicle holdup in Nanuet, New York, in which two police officers were killed.
These days it is not easy to find out where Assata Shakur and Nehanda Obiodun are or even what they are thinking. I hung out with Obiodun and wrote about her in Cuba in the 1990s, but I was blocked at every turn when I tried to get her and Shakur to meet with me and a group of Stony Brook University students I took to Cuba in January of 2012.
Obiodun has been almost completely off the radar in recent years, out of mind. But Assata Shakur has not been. “New Jersey hopes Cuba-US relations thaw will help extradite former Black Panther,” screamed a headline of Atlantic City News on Dec. 18.
And so, given all this as background, black Americans are not only reflecting nostalgically on Fidel Castro, they are concerned about the plight of Assata Shakur.
Some, perhaps many, black police officials publicly declare their desire that Shakur be captured and returned to jail in the US. But other blacks have respect for the courage she showed as she lived in exile for some 30 years, bearing in her torso the remnants of a bullet she took during that shootout in 1973.
Most of all, you can bet, there is a broad agreement with Barack Obama—that the time for hostility with the Cuban government—no longer headed by Fidel Castro but largely by his brother Raul—should be over.
A well deserved rest to a bonafide hero and true pillar of liberation.
Vaya con Dios, Hermano Fidel.
Vaya con Dios, Hermano Fidel.
I wonder,what's going to happen to Assata Shakur
nice to see all the black cubans coming out, like WTF is the fascination?
The problem is your miseducation.
Motherfuckers on here like Fidel was the second coming of black jesus, all these afro cubans. The cigars are good though.
While the United States was supporting the racist South African regime, Fidel Castro & Cuba fought for South Africa's freedom from the Apartheid Government. That's all you need to know.
I'm not African. No fucks given. Romanticizing Castro like he black jesus. GTFO People really believe he send nurses/doctors to Africa because he cared. LOFL. Y'all up here acting like this tyrant was the latin robin Hood for Africa, a place 99 percent of you here give two fucks about, and sure as hell aint moving from NYC to no fucking Kenya.
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Two sided to every story. Objectively speaking, I see why both sides(U.S. and Castro) did what they did. Best interests first. U.S. demanded to dominate this hemisphere soon after it was created. Castro wanted to go against the trend.
Now knowing the U.S. even fucks with people thousands of miles away, what hope did Castro have even if he were the greatest leader ever? U.S. isn't going to let shit like that happen here.
Then the U.S. did the embargo, built a prison industrial complex, and then have the balls to talk about human rights.
Fuckery. A lot of Americans believe that only foreign entities engage in propaganda. As with education, brainwashing starts at home first.
As far as Cubans dancing in the street in Miami, what would happen if Obama died? What about Trump? I bet you would find folks dancing and celebrating both deaths. Likewise, you'd find people openly weeping their 'guy.' Everyone with their own stories as to why they are right with their reaction.
I know if someone judges Castro without taking into account how the U.S. undermined him every step of the way, they are bullshiting. I also know the guy shouldn't be looked at as a saint, because we don't know how he would have got down if he got the true power he wanted. Truth is somewhere in the middle IMHO.
Now knowing the U.S. even fucks with people thousands of miles away, what hope did Castro have even if he were the greatest leader ever? U.S. isn't going to let shit like that happen here.
Then the U.S. did the embargo, built a prison industrial complex, and then have the balls to talk about human rights.
Fuckery. A lot of Americans believe that only foreign entities engage in propaganda. As with education, brainwashing starts at home first. As far as Cubans dancing in the street in Miami, what would happen if Obama died? What about Trump? I bet you would find folks dancing and celebrating both deaths. Likewise, you'd find people openly weeping their 'guy.' Everyone with their own stories as to why they are right with their reaction.
I know if someone judges Castro without taking into account how the U.S. undermined him every step of the way, they are bullshiting. I also know the guy shouldn't be looked at as a saint, because we don't know how he would have got down if he got the true power he wanted. Truth is somewhere in the middle IMHO.
Two sided to every story. Objectively speaking, I see why both sides(U.S. and Castro) did what they did. Best interests first. U.S. demanded to dominate this hemisphere soon after it was created. Castro wanted to go against the trend.
Now knowing the U.S. even fucks with people thousands of miles away, what hope did Castro have even if he were the greatest leader ever? U.S. isn't going to let shit like that happen here.
Then the U.S. did the embargo, built a prison industrial complex, and then have the balls to talk about human rights.
As far as Cubans dancing in the street in Miami, what would happen if Obama died? What about Trump? I bet you would find folks dancing and celebrating both deaths. Likewise, you'd find people openly weeping their 'guy.' Everyone with their own stories as to why they are right with their reaction.
I know if someone judges Castro without taking into account how the U.S. undermined him every step of the way, they are bullshiting. I also know the guy shouldn't be looked at as a saint, because we don't know how he would have got down if he got the true power he wanted. Truth is somewhere in the middle IMHO.
Sure, but I don't see people fleeing America to go to Africa, Cuba or all these other great places people are so in love with. Just saying.
Who said those places are or were great? I'm just saying they might not be as bad without interference from the U.S. and other outside powers. There other nations with demonstrated better standards of living than the U.S., but we really don't flee to those nations either.
Let's weed through propaganda on all sides so we can find the truth. Just see too much hypocrisy from the U.S. to take this government's word for anything. These the same clowns gave us an unjust invasion and called it Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Why are you so mad....lol. Is it because Cuba helped a lot of African countries in their time of need, are you against how Cuba helped Africa?
On a side note, Cubans in America (as well as Jews with Israel) seem to have been able to dictate American policy in a way that AAs have been unable (or uninterested) to do in regards to Africa. Okay i know its not quite the same as the links are weaker but i really think apartheid would have ended much earlier if the diaspora, particularly in the USA had done more. Cuban Americans make up less than 1% of the population. Jews make up 3% i think. AAs make up 13%.
So in that respect- though i dont agree with the AIPAC and the Florida "mafia" kudos to them for organising themselves to make their voices heard.
So in that respect- though i dont agree with the AIPAC and the Florida "mafia" kudos to them for organising themselves to make their voices heard.
Washington DC
United States
United States
North Korea declares 3-day mourning for ‘close friend and comrade’ Fidel Castro
North Korea has declared a three-day mourning period for Fidel Castro, who died on Friday, state media reported, adding that the Cuban leader was the Korean people’s “close friend and comrade,” who devoted all his life to the prosperity of his country.
Trends
Fidel Castro
The mourning was announced on Monday by Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea.
North Korea has “declared a period of mourning for three days from November28 till November 30,” the paper said.
https://www.rt.com/news/368389-north...stro-mourning/
North Korea has declared a three-day mourning period for Fidel Castro, who died on Friday, state media reported, adding that the Cuban leader was the Korean people’s “close friend and comrade,” who devoted all his life to the prosperity of his country.
Trends
Fidel Castro
The mourning was announced on Monday by Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea.
North Korea has “declared a period of mourning for three days from November28 till November 30,” the paper said.
https://www.rt.com/news/368389-north...stro-mourning/
Hanoi
Vietnam
Vietnam
Fidel Castro, African hero
WP
Following his release after 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela made sure one of his first trips abroad was to Havana. There, in the Cuban capital in 1991, Mandela lavished his host, Fidel Castro, with appreciation. Castro, said Mandela, was a “source of inspiration to all freedom-loving people.”
The scene might seem paradoxical in some corners of the West. How could the global symbol of African liberation and democracy say such a thing about a man whose death last Friday provoked exiles who fled repressive Cuban rule to dance in Miami's streets? How could Mandela — imprisoned by South Africa's apartheid rulers — find common ground with Castro, who cleared his way to absolute power in Cuba by jailing untold numbers of dissidents?
The answer lies in Cuba's robust, and sometimes pivotal, support for many African groups as they fought to bring the era of colonialism to an end. And now, upon Castro's death, many of the loudest and most unequivocal tributes to him have been voiced by African leaders who inherited the political movements stemming from the independence struggles spanning the 1960s to the 1980s.
In 1988, for instance, a deployment of 36,000 Cuban troops played a decisive role in beating back U.S.-supported South African apartheid-era forces stationed in Angola. Those battles precipitated neighboring Namibia's independence from South Africa and reinvigorated anti-apartheid fighters at home. The United States, especially during the Reagan years, supported the apartheid government as a bulwark against communist expansion. All told, at least 4,300 Cubans died in the fighting in Angola.
But Castro's troops weren't just mercenaries for the Soviets. Castro intervened against apartheid largely out of his own convictions, not at Moscow's bidding, historians note.
Cuban troops, as well as technicians, teachers and doctors, would end up staying in Angola for years, to defend against the possibility of another incursion and to build the beginnings of the post-colonial Angolan state. After Castro's death, the secretary general of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, which fought alongside the Cubans and has been in power since independence, said that Castro was his country's Mandela.
In the ’60s and ’70s, Cuban troops — or African fighters trained by Cubans — also prevailed against the Portuguese in their former colonies of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde. They fought against Mobutu Sese Seko, who led the Congo (later Zaire, then the Democratic Republic of Congo) after the killing of the country's first prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, who was perceived in the West as leaning toward the Soviets. And in 1977, Castro sent 17,000 troops to help Ethiopia's Communist leader, Mengistu Haile Mariam, wrest control of the contested Ogaden region from neighboring Somalia. Castro would later claim that almost 400,000 Cuban troops served in Africa, “side-by-side with their African brothers for national independence or against foreign aggression.”
WP
Following his release after 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela made sure one of his first trips abroad was to Havana. There, in the Cuban capital in 1991, Mandela lavished his host, Fidel Castro, with appreciation. Castro, said Mandela, was a “source of inspiration to all freedom-loving people.”
The scene might seem paradoxical in some corners of the West. How could the global symbol of African liberation and democracy say such a thing about a man whose death last Friday provoked exiles who fled repressive Cuban rule to dance in Miami's streets? How could Mandela — imprisoned by South Africa's apartheid rulers — find common ground with Castro, who cleared his way to absolute power in Cuba by jailing untold numbers of dissidents?
The answer lies in Cuba's robust, and sometimes pivotal, support for many African groups as they fought to bring the era of colonialism to an end. And now, upon Castro's death, many of the loudest and most unequivocal tributes to him have been voiced by African leaders who inherited the political movements stemming from the independence struggles spanning the 1960s to the 1980s.
In 1988, for instance, a deployment of 36,000 Cuban troops played a decisive role in beating back U.S.-supported South African apartheid-era forces stationed in Angola. Those battles precipitated neighboring Namibia's independence from South Africa and reinvigorated anti-apartheid fighters at home. The United States, especially during the Reagan years, supported the apartheid government as a bulwark against communist expansion. All told, at least 4,300 Cubans died in the fighting in Angola.
But Castro's troops weren't just mercenaries for the Soviets. Castro intervened against apartheid largely out of his own convictions, not at Moscow's bidding, historians note.
Cuban troops, as well as technicians, teachers and doctors, would end up staying in Angola for years, to defend against the possibility of another incursion and to build the beginnings of the post-colonial Angolan state. After Castro's death, the secretary general of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, which fought alongside the Cubans and has been in power since independence, said that Castro was his country's Mandela.
In the ’60s and ’70s, Cuban troops — or African fighters trained by Cubans — also prevailed against the Portuguese in their former colonies of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde. They fought against Mobutu Sese Seko, who led the Congo (later Zaire, then the Democratic Republic of Congo) after the killing of the country's first prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, who was perceived in the West as leaning toward the Soviets. And in 1977, Castro sent 17,000 troops to help Ethiopia's Communist leader, Mengistu Haile Mariam, wrest control of the contested Ogaden region from neighboring Somalia. Castro would later claim that almost 400,000 Cuban troops served in Africa, “side-by-side with their African brothers for national independence or against foreign aggression.”
Two sided to every story. Objectively speaking, I see why both sides(U.S. and Castro) did what they did. Best interests first. U.S. demanded to dominate this hemisphere soon after it was created. Castro wanted to go against the trend.
Now knowing the U.S. even fucks with people thousands of miles away, what hope did Castro have even if he were the greatest leader ever? U.S. isn't going to let shit like that happen here.
Then the U.S. did the embargo, built a prison industrial complex, and then have the balls to talk about human rights.
As far as Cubans dancing in the street in Miami, what would happen if Obama died? What about Trump? I bet you would find folks dancing and celebrating both deaths. Likewise, you'd find people openly weeping their 'guy.' Everyone with their own stories as to why they are right with their reaction.
I know if someone judges Castro without taking into account how the U.S. undermined him every step of the way, they are bullshiting. I also know the guy shouldn't be looked at as a saint, because we don't know how he would have got down if he got the true power he wanted. Truth is somewhere in the middle IMHO.
This been my main argument,how the hell can folks look Castro as a dictator,but ignore that black people are getting killed,the United States killed innocent people in the Middle East and folks can ignore all that,but want to talk about this shit Castro done.
Then you have folks coming after Kaepernick over a shirt,he wore in August talking about,he's pro-Castro when he says Cuba has a high literacy rate,has free healthcare, and helped South Africa get rid of "apartheid".
My personal favorite,you have people that say all the good doesn't wipe away all the bad Castro did to his people,but somehow when it comes to the founding fathers doing all the bad they did to black people,they say they were wrong,but they did alot more good...I'm like...what the fuck...
So,I guess,when it comes to all the shit the United States everybody wants to talk about all the good,but never the bad,but when it comes to certain countries,people want to talk about all the bad but never the good.....
all the hypocrites in here acting like Cuba was some paradise, I will bet not one person here is willing to move there.
*raises hand*
Let me start off by saying I am sorry you had to endure what you went through (I saw the list after this post). No one should have to endure that. (Sorta unrelated but if you selling drugs...)
Even as a kid when I heard the word "dictator" Castro was not what I had in mind. I guess he wore the name? Or was it just given to him? What I'm trying to get to is that there are layers to Castro and what he represents. Communism at its core is not a bad thing. AT ALL. With the propaganda surrounding Cuba and the man it's hard to really tell what is truth and what is not. What makes you special Jagu is that you can first hand tell the story of dictators because you lived in it. It should be hard to find an adult Cuban refugee from when he gained power - they should be way older than 90. The public outside of Cuba (and I include those that fled and their children) I think either does not have a true grasp on what CUBA is and how CASTRO changed it. My point is that there are unknowns here. And I'm not going to say Castro was a saint and did no wrong. But in its fundamental core, even if it is a third world country, even if most of the people are poor - SOMETHING went right in that country. The documentaries I've seen, people speaking on being Cuban in Cuba, people researching in the country - something went right. Great for Castro fighting the Black fight, and sending doctors. Why have we not heard of Cubans denouncing Castro? It's been days.
I'm not for a dictatorship. But again I'm not sure if Castro was a dictator. You can't be for your people, and be a dictator. I honestly think it's the ideals that everyone is rallying around. That's what it is. I don't want my business to be taken from me...but if I get to do what I love with a degree the government paid for, and I'm not hungry, and I'm healthy, and there is enough money to survive, AND I'm happy/content...I don't know what else to ask for. No country is going to give you 100%, but dammit having a leader that was willing to fight for the people sure does make it more appealing to be ok with a 'dictatorship'.
There is nothing fun about control...out of control control...but I seriously wonder if that was the real story here...
PS
NK is not on the same level as this. That dictatorship is just that. One man killing all he wants for the sake of keeping control because he has to hide his country THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF HIS COUNTRY from the world. That might have been Cuba's communist cousin but it could not be more different in terms of policy. Just throwing that out there.
cuba aint so hot for afro cubans, just saying though
Who takes a clown-ass mutha fucka like Snoop seriously?
These dumb-ass rappers and entertainer definitely don't speak for me on anything.
Scary ass crab can't even go to Long Beach.