From: edace (edace@earthlink.net)
Date: Sun 14 Nov 2004 - 23:30:45 GMT
> From: Scott Chase <osteopilus@yahoo.com>
>
> My recent hobby horse has been the history of the
> relationship between the US and Cuba. In the case of
> Cuban exile extremism and the acts that could be
> construed as terrorism against Castro and other
> perceived enemies, I don't think that relative
> political freedom is a factor since the exile
> extremists live in the US and are as free as anyone
> else in the US. They are also fairly affluent as a
> group, which would rule out the factor of poverty and
> looming privation. I'm not sure how oppression plays a
> role in the generation of the rabid anti-Castro
> mindset. Maybe some exiles are the product of past
> oppression in Cuba if they were imprisoned and/or
> exiled by Castro or fled after the revolution was
> hijacked by Castro. Some of them, if part of the
> Batista regime, may have been oppressors themselves
> when the shoe was on the other foot. They might also
> look at Castro as an oppressor responsible for holding
> Cuba down for his own gains and feel an indirect sense
> of oppression since they still have family members and
> lost estates in Cuba.
The key factor here is narcissism. Cuba was the last Latin American country
to overthrow Spanish rule. As other Latin American countries threw off
their colonial masters, the former elites migrates to countries where the
Spanish still ruled. By 1898 Cuba was brimming with aristocrats from all
over the Americas. At this point, it looked as if Cuba too was going down
the toilet to revolution and democracy. Lo and behold, the US intervened in
the revolution just prior to its inevitable victory and claimed Cuba as its
own. Thus the US became the new Spain. The aristocrats toadied up to the
US just as they had to the Spanish. It would be another 60 years before the
Cuban revolution would finally occur, and the aristos headed north to
Florida (where they are currently influencing US elections!)
The aristos are people who feel they are entitled to rule and to be rich whi
le others toil without hope in conditions of near-starvation. Justice, to
them, means they remain in the upper class while the lower class caters to
their needs. Injustice is when the lower class gains a measure of equality
and prosperity. This is known as malignant narcissism. The aristos are
vulnerable to memes that exploit their narcissistic mania. This doesn't
mean they harbor "narcissistic memes" but simply that memes ordinarily
considered irrational and absolutist are perceived as perfectly reasonable
in the context of their clinical narcissism.
Ted
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