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10 comments:
I like the Che artwork. His he a specific hero for them? Can understand if he is.
Che is an icon. I'm not convinced he is not a Stalinist.
Well, Fidel did send Cuban troops to fight on the Golan heights in 1973.
Yeah Sappho, Re: Che I'd like to think he would too...
you stalinist idiots. Che and Castro were not class-struggle socialists in any sense. Castro has been a nasty right-wing dictator for 40 years -are you too blind to see this?
I would really prefer people to leave a name - even if it is just an alias - when making a comment.
What on earth is this latest anonymous comment about - it seems the anonymous person thinks that "class struggle socialists" should not support progressive measures by governments in power - such as promoting literacy, excellent health care, etc. Acheivements of the Cuban government not usually associated with "nasty right wing dictators"
There are some leftists so busy pinning labels to other leftists that they don't get their hands dirty with actual "class struggle" themselves. Anyone who thinks Che and Fidel are just Stalinist stooges is one of those. Compare Cuba to any comparable Caribbean nation with few natural resources and a blockade against it.
I refuse to romanticise the revolution in Cuba but these are people who have fought and lived the struggle rather than pontificated and pigeonholed.
"...these are people who have fought and lived the struggle rather than pontificated..." what planet are you on? Castros cuba puts genuine trades unionist in prison, and for 30 years harrassed and imprissoned gays. Castro and Che represent knee jerk empty politics masquerading as socialism which is the very opposite of what is required to change the world.
I don't give a fig about the literacy level in cuba, excellent healthcare etc, these don't make a socialist country. The very basics -free trades unionis, democracy, freedom of expression these are denied to cubans by your socialist castro.
Grr: So what's your alternative, a right-wing coup orchestrated by the US and the "Little Havana" thugs will be fine and dandy? Do you believe they will be sweet reasonsable and indulging in democratic processes? No. It would be a blood bath as they will be expropriating everything they can possibly lay their hands on. It would amount to revenge. And I am sure every industry in Cuba will be privatised by the mates of Uncle Sam.
Plenty people will be locked up and far far worse....
I do give a "fig" about the literacy levels and the health care as this is a country which experiences an imbargo by the US. As been pointed out, compare it to any other Caribbean country.
Castro is a stalinist and rules partly by repression and partly by mass mobilisation. So it is contradictory. That doesn't mean you don't criticise them over their stance on L&G rights etc. or a better democratic system of government and so on BUT you always defend them against imperialism.
When it comes down to it you defend Cuba against American imperialism as that's the alternative. A vile alternative at that.
The question is, what factors are under the conrol of the Cuban government are which are not.
Given the state of seige, the continual economic blockade, the assasination attempts, and the US subsidies for exile terrorist anti-Castro groups, then the curtailing of the abstract democratic norms is inevitable in Cuba - the actually existing alternative is capitalist restoration.
There is far too little criticall thought given to the semi-anarchist notion of "socialism for below" that much of the British far left counterpose in an ahistorical way to actually existing developments.
Cuba is a country with a socialist government, that does not mean that it has a socialist economic system, nor that it is perfect, it simply means that the left are in power. But they are in power in a complex context that undermines their freedom to act, and also in a very poor country.
If we are ever to acheive sosialism that means that we need that the left must take opportunities for state power, which is complementary to grassroots struggle from below.
Once in power then the outscome will be messy, becasuue of the deliberate destabilistaion of the capitalists, and also due to the difficultly of just surviving economcially.
But the quality of the left in power does depend upon the nature of the politicall leadership. As these are transitional societites between capitalism and socialism, they can go in either or both directions. So while the Cuban leadership deserve defending, North Korea does not.
In complex cases such as the DDR, there was much to defend and much to despair of at the same time (though Western leftists who ignore the Western subsidies for the West Berlin economy as the reason for the Wall are missing the big picture)
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