Points:
1) The idea of custody over Cuba goes as far back as 1832 when Secretary of State John Quincy Adams wrote: "There are laws of political as well as of physical gravitation; and if an apple, severed by the tempest from its native tree, cannot choose but fall to the ground, Cuba, forcibly disjoined from its own unnatural connection with Spain, and incapable of self-support, can gravitate only towards the North American Union." (Bolender, 5)
2) There was no Cuban representative at the signing, on the insistence of the American side. This was the start of the historical dialogue that the Cubans had nothing to do with winning their own independence; that national freedom was solely based on the actions of the United States. (Bolender, 6)
3) The portrayal of Cuba as a helpless woman had another implication: that the Cuban men were ineffective, they could not win their war of independence and so by extension were incapable of running their own country. (Bolender, 6)
4) That any Cuban leader who dared to challenge these historical facts, and "who sought to destroy Cuba's historic ties with the United States could not be acting from motives of concern for the Cuban people but must be a power-hungry dictator with regional ambitions." (Bolender, 12)
5) Of all the terrorist acts committed against Cuba, none has been more shattering than the bombing of the Cuban Airlines airplane in 1976. It remains the second most destructive act of air terrorism in North America, after 9/11. (Bolender, 21)
6) I was particularly struck by the near-complete absence of black Cubans and of any discussion of racism among Cuban immigrants. (Hay, 2)
7) I found that one important factor in the socioeconomic status of black Cubans is the discrimination they experienced from some of their white co-ethnics. (Hay, 4)
Questions:
1) How does a superpower like America continually justify it's intrusion into countries like Cuba, and then deem them inferior or incapable of self-government when it never allows the country to capitalize on their gained freedom before, instead, institutionalizing it under its authority without its own dueprocess?
2) Many heartbreaking acts of terrorism have been committed against Cuba and it's everyday citizens, yet very little is publicly known or addressed about any, including a terrorist attack that is second in terrorist air attacks only to 9/11. How is our government not able to sympathize more with this and many other of the atrocities committed against the Cuban people?
3) How empowering was American propaganda to easily classify Cuban men as effeminate, and in turn demoralizing and power-stripping [them] of any real presence and strength to defend and stand for themselves in the eyes of the American people?
4) America easily painted Fidel as a mercinary and cruel dictator, yet why did they fail to see that their own restrictions and presence of power was as dictatorial as the leader they fought to tear down?
5) Why is very little mentioned of Cuba's vast disparity due to race color? Why is very little mentioned or talked about when addressing the black/African Cuban people, when a vast number of its people are of African descent and even have darker skin than the preconceived whiter Cubans most thought about like in Miami?
Works Cited
Bolender, Keith. Voices from the other side: an oral history of terrorism against Cuba. Pluto, 2010.
Hay, Michelle A. "I've been black in two countries" : Black Cuban views on race in the US. El Paso, 2009.
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