Nice avatar!!!2SWQq@!!q!!2qQ1!@2!!!1!!!
Hello Senor Darr. Haven’t seen you in a while, but still offering good stuff, as usual.
Oh, I’ve been here, never worry. Back in the day and many times since I’ve crossed the pond and seen exotic places much as InmanRoshi has. I just don’t agree with his take on backpackers. I’ve done both. Backpaked and stayed in nice places. My secret to good experiences while traveling is to treat folks with respect and dignity. it’s simple really.
What exactly does that even mean? People have such weird ideas today about what headlines are, should be, really everything about them. But really, I’m curious what it even means that the headline was “trolling TPM’s readers”.
Sorry, it’s always bugged me that the Cuban exiles never tried to or wanted to assimilate, and politicians of both parties had to pander to them to avoid the ‘soft on Communism’ label. My ancestors fled the worst disaster in 19th century history and by the second generation had moved out of the self-imposed ghettos and fully identified with the American dream. Yeah, the island isn’t frozen in time, and yeah, the poor writer’s family escaped with their lives and hard cash, but for her dad to raise her in the “we’re going back and taking up our old life as soon as the US gets rid of Castro” attitude is simply ridiculous. I for one welcome the end of this ridiculous policy - maybe we can finally be rid of Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and her ilk.
I thought the headline took a multi-layered story – about the author’s complicated feelings about being the granddaughter of Cuban expats, the differing viewpoints amongst Cuban-Americans of different generations, the authors feelings about never having visited Cuba, about Cuba’s isolation and impoverishment by U.S. policy, as well as Cuba being a country many Americans probably have overly-romanticized notions, and which focused on that final aspect and reduced it to “Here’s why you, the reader, are screwed-up about Cuba”. I thought making the headline about the intended reader was overly provocative, and in a sense objectified the author: “I, as a 3rd generation Cuban-American, am defined by your romanticized notions and your desire to
visit Cuba, and I resent it”.
I’ve re-read the article; the author actually spends more time on how she feels about “disaster-tourism” (the aspect of the article the headline evokes) than I first realized, and my reactions to the headline would have been more appropriately directed towards the article itself.
And I shouldn’t have generalized about TPM’s headlines based on a single headline without being prepared to back it up with some sort of cogent argument. I really do not like the expression “I try not to shit where I eat”, but I usually do try to avoid doing that, especially when the eating is completely cost-free to me. I spend a lot of time at TPM. If I didn’t appreciate it I wouldn’t spend the time here.
I understand your point about people’s attitudes toward headlines. I could probably discuss this with myself ad nauseam – “on the one hand; on the other hand” (I have many hands). I’m still not a fan of the headline, but I’m glad you called me out on it (though at this point you’re probably regretting it) and hope this helps.
Oh, okay. Would you like to hear about my trips to the Jersey shore, instead?
It seems like if the “small amount in a U.S. bank account” was enough to buy a house, it must have been the equivalent of about $150,000 in today’s dollars. What kind of racket was the “import/export” business?
i don’t understand how it comes about that the government prior to the revolution never gets any mention in these discussions. Sorry, really, but if the author’s grandparents amassed considerable wealth in pre-revolution Cuba, they did so under the protection of a vicious and murderous dictator. As that radical leftwing rag The Economist noted in the immediate aftermath of the revolution, there was initially no expectation that the economics of the island would change. However, as was often the case, American Cold War policies drove Castro straight to Moscow, first class passage.
Stop glorifying the rule of the island’s previous dictator.
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Quite so, @naugiedoggie. The author inherits from her forebears a sense of entitlement and superiority which she is almost comically unaware of in this piece as she assumed her position of false superiority and sniffs at those who are curious to visit the island. As a person born and raised in the United States of America, her notion that Cuba is her “motherland” reflects very well (again unconsciously) that the author is from a privileged ghetto of people whose connections to the white ruling class and, in many cases, organized crime not only made them a ton of money but also gave them the sense that their stay in the United States was “temporary” and that they were using the U.S. and not interested integrating. This is the only group of immigrants that was showered with gifts upon arrival in the U.S., including being given Radio Martí, and yet their allegiance has never been to the U.S.A. but rather to their self-righteous idea that their wealth in Cuba was stolen from them. They sent their children to the US well before they themselves left the island to keep them from being drafted to take part in progressive programs like the alphabetization campaigns in the countryside. And let it not be forgotten that the Miami Cubans sponsor and protect violent terrorists amongst them, including the criminals associated with CANF and Brothers to the Rescue. Indeed, the most important and interesting aspects of this article are written between the lines.
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I appreciate this post very much. Thank you.
My father came from a wealthy family. He was a med student in his last year of residency. He threw a grenade at Batista, went home packed and got on a plane to New York with $50 in his pocket. The social unrest scene in Cuba at that time is hardly as black and white as you so naively paint it.
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This article perfectly captures the aggrieved, entitlement mentality of many Cuban exiles.
Exactly. You said it better than I.
Very true and perfectly stated.
Thanks so much for sharing this Miriam.
Qué pena los trolls en los comentarios.
Did you read the article? Apparently, she’s had the experience of people “telling her about their vacations in Cuba” more than once.
What too many people conveniently ignore is that communist/socialist revolutions happen for a reason and usually supplant governments that were much more oppressive than the communist regime turns out to be. This was certainly true in Russia and China, and inarguably true in Cuba, which has more doctors per capita than any Latin American country, and a healthier and more educated population than any but Costa Rica. Castro replaced a brutal dictatorial police state that propped up an oppressive oligarchy and ground average people into lives of abject penury. I remember the shrill insanity of the “Miami relatives” of Elio Gonzalez who were fixated on “saving” Elio from a life with his father in Havana. We never see any followup stories on Elio’s life after he returned–maybe because he had a normal happy childhood and is now a well-adjusted young man.
I’m glad that it’s been over 200 years so we don’t have to read tripe like this from British people that might whine and cry about those colonies they lost when there was a revolution. Get over it. The rich Cuban Batista apologists can’t, apparently.
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