Castro Steps Down

Americans get the hump at everyone in their backyard who doesn't wanna be friends on American terms.

Such a petty attitude to hold after all these years....
 
Batista:
wiki says killed 20.000 people (no source is given)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgencio_Batista

Castro:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Cuba
Various estimates have been made to ascertain the number of political executions carried out on behalf of the Cuban Government in Cuba since the revolution. Latin American historian Thomas E Skidmore, assessed that there had been 550 executions in the first six months of 1959.[12] Among those executed were former Batista regime officials and members of the Bureau for the Repression of Communist Activities (Bur? de Represi?n de Actividades Comunistas; a unit of the secret police know by its Spanish acronym BRAC).[13][14] British historian Hugh Thomas, in his extensive study Cuba or the pursuit of freedom[15] alleged that "perhaps" 5,000 executions had taken place by 1970,[12] whilst The World Handbook of Political and Social Indicators assertained that there had been 2,113 political executions between the years of 1958-67.[12]

Cuban American emigrant sources place the number of executions in a far higher bracket. The Cuban American National Foundation alleges that since the revolution 12,000 political executions have taken place.[12] Dr. Armando Lago, of the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy, a group of academics whose board of directors is almost entirely comprised of Cuban exiles,[16] claim that between 15,000 and 18,000 Cubans were executed for counterrevolutionary activities since the revolution. He also alleges that 250 Cubans disappeared during the period, 500 died in prison for lack of medical attention, 500 were killed in prison by guards and there were 150 extrajudicial assassinations of women. Lago calculated these numbers "using old news accounts, U.S. and Organization of American States records and family histories."[17] Lago's study relies heavily on records of the US State Department and the Organization of American States.

The Black Book of Communism claims an estimate of 15,000-17,000 people who were executed.[18]

The author of the Historical Atlas, an online personal compilation of various sources, claims: The dividing line between those who have an axe to grind and those who don't falls in the 5,000-12,000 range.[12]

The highest estimates are given by R.J. Rummel, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Hawaii. He claims the number of 73,000 as the mid-point estimate of victims of the alleged democide by the Castro administration. His low and high estimates are 35,000 and 141,000 respectively. One important reason his numbers are higher than those from other sources is because he counts the estimated deaths of refugees trying to flee and for example drowning as democide.[1]
Click to expand...

It should be noted that a lot more research has been done
concerning castro then batista, also castro's regime opposes the
country in which many of these numbers have been produced and
published.

Either way if cuba was prosperous it would not have succumb to a
violent political revolution, Castro did not come with supersonic
airplanes, precision guided munition and highly trained military
he relied on civilians.
 
I can't speak on behalf of batista, i don't know much about him, but i don't doubt he was a horrible person, but going from him to castro was frying pan to fryer

anyhow castro did not rely on civilians, castro relied on media support and bribes. A few photoshoots here, a staged train derailment there. Most of his support came from hearts and minds he won among "the elite" in the US that got him funding and media spotlight.

Anyhow all of 180 something people died during the actual revolution. There was very little actual fighting because for the most part, most people didn't want to fight for batista, but at the same time, most people didn't know that castro was planning a communist regime. This wasn't a french revolution of civilians marching through the streets, it was groups of a few dozen ragtag soldiers skirmishing against regular army with poor morale. So most people were willing to sit it out and see what happened or accept the bribes and not fight on behalf of the regular army.

Most of the bloodshed and repression came after.

My whole family is cuban, many of which were alive back then, I think they'd know how it went down.
 
Flyingdebris said:
I can't speak on behalf of batista, i don't know much about him, but i don't doubt he was a horrible person, but going from him to castro was frying pan to fryer

anyhow castro did not rely on civilians, castro relied on media support and bribes. A few photoshoots here, a staged train derailment there. Most of his support came from hearts and minds he won among "the elite" in the US that got him funding and media spotlight.

Anyhow all of 180 something people died during the actual revolution. There was very little actual fighting because for the most part, most people didn't want to fight for batista, but at the same time, most people didn't know that castro was planning a communist regime. This wasn't a french revolution of civilians marching through the streets, it was groups of a few dozen ragtag soldiers skirmishing against regular army with poor morale. So most people were willing to sit it out and see what happened or accept the bribes and not fight on behalf of the regular army.

Most of the bloodshed and repression came after.

My whole family is cuban, many of which were alive back then, I think they'd know how it went down.
Click to expand...
I bet they're rich.
 
they were mostly farmers who came here with nothing more than the clothes on their backs

Besides, who gives you the right to judge? what are you?
 
i mean money, how much do you have? Last i checked food, shelter and gas is not bought with revolutionary ideas.

so what is it rich, middle, poor? Last i head you were like 17 or 18 or some such so you're probably still in highschool or just in college, or am i wrong?
 
This "I'm a revolutionary" shit is getting more than a little tedious and even cringeworthy.

The world is not Star Wars, and this is not Tatooine.

"Hey Luke, come join the Socialist Alliance with me."
"Yay adventure!"

Of course killing people on a massive scale is grand and noble when you want to bypass democracy in order to enforce your own flawed vision of utopia on your own country which doesn't agree with you, but unspeakably evil when used to protect national interests in the wider world.
How this fatally inconsistent moral compass can be justified in any sane or rational mind, I have absolutely no idea...
 
Solaris said:
I'm a socialist revolutionary.
Click to expand...

that play games made in the empire and post in forum whit a lot of "infidels" and live in the empire
and have more money that the average person in africa so dont come "bashing" the "richs"

go form a guerrilla if you want to live to that self proclamation,or join ETA or something like that
 
Solaris said:
I'm a socialist revolutionary.
Click to expand...

I have yet to see you with an AK-47, rounding up "enemies" of Britain, so that's not true. At least not in the normal context of the word. Also, you're not Latin American as far as I know, so no socialist revolution for you!
 
Very funny, Solaris. Let's discuss whether you're a socialist revolutionary or not, and what the merits of that are, in a different thread - if we really find it necessary. Cease.

Y'all were saying something about Cuba?
 
Hey, I didn't bring me up.

Anyway, I the argument my parents are from their so they know whats happening doesn't hold much weight with anyone other than you, because, my father could well be castro, doesn't mean you all have to believe me and be communists.
In fact, I'm fairly sure its an argument from authority fallacy.
 
No, it's not, because all it's appealing to is the personal report of people who were in a good position to witness the events referred to - first hand evidence.

However, the question is how one example of first-hand evidence can weigh, for example, against contradictory numbers. On the one hand those people had a good view of the object, and on the other, not everyone's view is the same. My dad has lived in Scotland and is generally disparaging towards Scottish people; it doesn't mean his opinions are true.
 
repiV said:
This "I'm a revolutionary" shit is getting more than a little tedious and even cringeworthy.

The world is not Star Wars, and this is not Tatooine.

"Hey Luke, come join the Socialist Alliance with me."
"Yay adventure!"

Of course killing people on a massive scale is grand and noble when you want to bypass democracy in order to enforce your own flawed vision of utopia on your own country which doesn't agree with you, but unspeakably evil when used to protect national interests in the wider world.
How this fatally inconsistent moral compass can be justified in any sane or rational mind, I have absolutely no idea...
Click to expand...

Thank god you don't need a vision to be a demented sociopathic lunatic.
 
repiV said:
This "I'm a revolutionary" shit is getting more than a little tedious and even cringeworthy.

The world is not Star Wars, and this is not Tatooine.

"Hey Luke, come join the Socialist Alliance with me."
"Yay adventure!"

Of course killing people on a massive scale is grand and noble when you want to bypass democracy in order to enforce your own flawed vision of utopia on your own country which doesn't agree with you, but unspeakably evil when used to protect national interests in the wider world.
How this fatally inconsistent moral compass can be justified in any sane or rational mind, I have absolutely no idea...
Click to expand...

ya but it works both ways ..

Of course killing people on a massive scale is grand and noble when you want to bypass democracy in order to enforce your own flawed vision of utopia
Click to expand...

could easily describe the invasion of iraq because no one could ever argue it was for national security ..national interest (or more precisely, a handful of interest groups) ..oh and national interests =/= national security ..one does not justify the other except in the most superficial of ways

oh and "forcing democracy" is deliciously ironic
 
CptStern said:
ya but it works both ways ..



could easily describe the invasion of iraq because no one could ever argue it was for national security ..national interest (or more precisely, a handful of interest groups) ..oh and national interests =/= national security ..one does not justify the other except in the most superficial of ways

oh and "forcing democracy" is deligiously ironic
Click to expand...

Yes it does - but I don't see what that has to do with anything, because I've never supported the invasion of Iraq.
In any case, I'm constantly baffled by Solaris' unceasing hypocrisy. How can anyone be so vehemently pacifist and then turn round and say "yay socialist revolution!"
It's not simply a case of advocating violence in one situation but not another, that's not necessarily hypocritical - it's that he advocates overthrowing a democratic government in order to impose a regime upon a country that noone there wants, in order to "help" the people in that country - as opposed to doing so in order to make the political situation more favourable elsewhere. How can ANY sane person attach any sense of honour or decency to such a course of action? It would be mass murder to achieve a personal goal, nothing more. Solaris seems to be convinced that because he thinks communism is a good idea, he must be right and we all need to be forced to live under it for our own good - despite the fact that he has precious little firsthand experience of capitalism.
At the same time, he decries far more legitimate uses of force. I mean, what the hell?

The only conclusion I can come to is that he loves the fantasy image of "the revolutionary", enjoys the attention from being different, thinks he's a "rebel" - and that if he grew up in Cuba, he'd be calling himself a capitalist revolutionary instead.
 
repiV said:
Yes it does - but I don't see what that has to do with anything, because I've never supported the invasion of Iraq.
In any case, I'm constantly baffled by Solaris' unceasing hypocrisy. How can anyone be so vehemently pacifist and then turn round and say "yay socialist revolution!"
It's not simply a case of advocating violence in one situation but not another, that's not necessarily hypocritical - it's that he advocates overthrowing a democratic government in order to impose a regime upon a country that noone there wants, in order to "help" the people in that country - as opposed to doing so in order to make the political situation more favourable elsewhere. How can ANY sane person attach any sense of honour or decency to such a course of action? It would be mass murder to achieve a personal goal, nothing more. Solaris seems to be convinced that because he thinks communism is a good idea, he must be right and we all need to be forced to live under it for our own good - despite the fact that he has precious little firsthand experience of capitalism.
At the same time, he decries far more legitimate uses of force. I mean, what the hell?

The only conclusion I can come to is that he loves the fantasy image of "the revolutionary", enjoys the attention from being different, thinks he's a "rebel" - and that if he grew up in Cuba, he'd be calling himself a capitalist revolutionary instead.
Click to expand...
In what regard am I pacifist?

I'm think the following groups/actions were just in WW2, Iraq, Afganistan, support the 1917 revolution, 1916 easter rising, cuban revolution, IRA...
 
Solaris said:
I'm think the following groups/actions were just in WW2, Iraq, Afganistan, support the 1917 revolution, 1916 easter rising, cuban revolution, IRA...
Click to expand...

Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, Angola, Cambodia, Vietnam, Ethiopia, The Congo, etc

(psst... this is the part where you arbitrarily decide that inspite of all evidence and statements by the revolutionary forces, such actions were not "proper" Marxist revolutions.)
 
Bob_Marley said:
Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, Angola, Cambodia, Vietnam, Ethiopia, The Congo, etc

(psst... this is the part where you arbitrarily decide that inspite of all evidence and statements by the revolutionary forces, such actions were not "proper" Marxist revolutions.)
Click to expand...

This is the part where you (or most likely PvtF*cktard) accuse Solaris of something which you just did and get pages of praise and support for it.
 
I know, its good, isn't it? :p

The difference is I don't disown such mistakes from my political viewpoint. The western democracies have made many, many appalling errors in the course of their existence. They are something to be learned from. Was it right to prop up regiemes like South Vietnam, supply Muslim extremists with highly advanced weapons in the name of stopping communism, or to shoot unarmed terrorist suspects on foreign soil? Of course it wasn't. They are things that need to be recognised as such, not written off as the "wrong" way of promoting western interests and so don't count.
 
Bob_Marley said:
I know, its good, isn't it? :p

The difference is I don't disown such mistakes from my political viewpoint. The western democracies have made many, many appalling errors in the course of their existence. They are something to be learned from. Was it right to prop up regiemes like South Vietnam, supply Muslim extremists with highly advanced weapons in the name of stopping communism, or to shoot unarmed terrorist suspects on foreign soil? Of course it wasn't. They are things that need to be recognised as such, not written off as the "wrong" way of promoting western interests and so don't count.
Click to expand...
Cambodian didn't follow Marxist theory, it was the dictatorship of the peasantry who they claimed were the actual proletariat. No real Marxist would support a backward peasant revolution like that with Marxist rhetoric as with peasant rules comes peasant backwardness, usually in the forms of racism, anti antisemitism and other things that you would expect from an ignorant, uneducated and illiterate class.

When the peasants elected a Majority of 'Socialist Revolutionaries' to the first constituent assembly in 1917; Lenin had to close down the assembly and instead rely on urban, soviet power. He knew what would happen if the peasantry were given control of the country (like in Cambodia).

Communism demands a dictatorship of the proletariat, Marx is very clear that the proletariat is the urban working classes, not the peasantry.

Cambodia was as Marxist as the Peoples Democratic Republic of Korea [North Korea] is democratic - in name only.
 
I'd bloody die before I let the bloody townies collectivise my turnips.
 
Well I for one would rather be ruled by ignorant workers then ignorant peasants.
Besides dictatorship by one cast of people over many others always turns out great.
 
I can't understand why people would go socialist. Bolshevism was a goddamn societal virus, and the USSR and Pol Pot, etc, were history's worst nightmares.

WHY OH WQHY WOULD YOU ABANDON FREE DEMOCRACY FOR LUNACY?
]



You guys really need to meet the people who still ahve nightmares because socialists chopped their parents' heads off in front of their eyes when they were 8. You need to meet people who had their fingers chopped off by communists.

Not real socialism, you say? I cringe to imagine what real socialism would be. **** real socialism. We've had enough.
 
Solaris said:
Cambodian didn't follow Marxist theory, it was the dictatorship of the peasantry who they claimed were the actual proletariat. No real Marxist would support a backward peasant revolution like that with Marxist rhetoric as with peasant rules comes peasant backwardness, usually in the forms of racism, anti antisemitism and other things that you would expect from an ignorant, uneducated and illiterate class.

When the peasants elected a Majority of 'Socialist Revolutionaries' to the first constituent assembly in 1917; Lenin had to close down the assembly and instead rely on urban, soviet power. He knew what would happen if the peasantry were given control of the country (like in Cambodia).

Communism demands a dictatorship of the proletariat, Marx is very clear that the proletariat is the urban working classes, not the peasantry.

Cambodia was as Marxist as the Peoples Democratic Republic of Korea [North Korea] is democratic - in name only.
Click to expand...

What makes you think that the proletariat is any more educated and less ignorant and racist than the peasants?
 
The Monkey said:
What makes you think that the proletariat is any more educated and less ignorant and racist than the peasants?
Click to expand...
Generally the urban working classes are more educated, almost always had some form of schooling, no matter how basic and were therefore literate.

Urbanisation also created high denisty areas of workers, allowing ideas to spread and be developed. Literate workers could understand and read Marx. These combined factors allowed a sense of class conciousness to develop.

Peasents rarely care for anything that doesn't have a direct impact on their survival, they usually suffer great hardships and are a very backward group of people. In the 19th century in russia peasent culture was indescribably backward, barbaric and brutal.

Violence was common, domestic abuse a way of life, people were very hungry all the time and had very little acess to vitamins a minerals.

The peasent class is just too brutal and too brutal, any attempt at peasent rule will always end in mayhem like Cambodia.
 
Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge were not peasants, I think Pol Pot was a teacher.
 
Mr Stabby said:
Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge were not peasants, I think Pol Pot was a teacher.
Click to expand...
It was a peasent revolution. They stuck the urban working classes in labour/death camps and proclaimed the peasentry as the true prolertariat.
 
Like the Russian October revolution, it wasn't a proper revolution, it wasn't a mass movement, it was controlled by a small number of people, it wasn't the peasants who were responsible for the Cambodian death camps, it was Pol Pot who was not a peasant.

Agrarian communism isn't any more ridiculous than normal communism, Russian communism caused a lot of peasants to die.
 
Solaris said:
It was a peasent revolution. They stuck the urban working classes in labour/death camps and proclaimed the peasentry as the true prolertariat.
Click to expand...
The reason the peasants revolted instead of the workers was that there were no working class to speak of when the revolutions occured in Asia. It's not really a "people's" revolution if it's done on the behalf of a few percentage of the population, is it?
 
You're just racist against the peasants, solaris.

I'm going to start the apathetic peasants alliance, but owing to the nature of peasant culture, only a couple will turn up. And that's after the offers of free turnips.
 
If you need some private security contractors Solaris to "negotiate" with the peasants, you know my number.
 
Gray Fox said:
This is the part where you (or most likely PvtF*cktard) accuse Solaris of something which you just did and get pages of praise and support for it.
Click to expand...

Here, have this hamburger:
whopper.jpg
 
I don't get it, you're both Dutch why do you hate each other so?

You guys should be best friends, wearing windmills and picking clogs together.
 
He's Belgian :arms:

And I don't hate him, but he apparently hates me and I couldn't tell you why.
 
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