Which of Tooting Carmen's controversial political statements do you agree with?

**Tooting Carmen** · 07-23-2018, 12:14 PM

(1) The poor in Cuba are in most respects better off than their counterparts in many other Latin American and Caribbean countries. At least there, they are guaranteed healthcare, education, housing and food. In addition, the Cuban police and army are generally more benign and better-behaved than in many other countries in the region. Needless to say, the US embargo is vindictive and cruel.

(2) Compared to many of the Black African dictatorships, Apartheid-era South Africa was practically a paradise. It is rather strange to argue that racism is a worse crime than embezzlement or even genocide, and the exceptional sanctions, boycotts and isolation imposed upon the country were, in hindsight, quite hypocritical and one-eyed.

(3) Ariel Sharon (less so other Israeli leaders) was easily comparable to Slobodan Milosevic, and the fact he wasn't tried for his war crimes is because international justice is only for the 'little people'.

(4) The notion that a working-class rural woman in India is freer than her counterparts in China and Russia, just because she has the vote, is utterly preposterous. It certainly doesn't mean she has a genuinely free and dignified life. Compared to her Russian and Chinese counterparts, the poverty, corruption and especially misogyny she'd face would be rather worse - her lack of safety and autonomy, plus the fact she'd have rather less access to healthcare, education, housing and food than the other two.

**~~Kamal900~~** · 07-23-2018, 12:20 PM

(1)

Cuba is better off than countries like Venezuela. The US is full of shit, no offence to Americans here.

**Tooting Carmen** · 07-23-2018, 12:23 PM

Originally Posted by Toppo900

(1)

Cuba is better off than countries like Venezuela. The US is full of shit, no offence to Americans here.

Ironically, many people used to compare Chavez to Castro, but that's actually an insult to Castro. Whatever his faults, Castro's regime created a relatively equal society with good public services, a low crime rate and (by Latin American standards) low levels of corruption - totally the opposite of what Venezuela has become.

**~~Kamal900~~** · 07-23-2018, 12:27 PM

Originally Posted by Tooting Carmen

Ironically, many people used to compare Chavez to Castro, but that's actually an insult to Castro. Whatever his faults, Castro's regime created a relatively equal society with good public services, a low crime rate and (by Latin American standards) low levels of corruption - totally the opposite of what Venezuela has become.

Castro wasn't like his partner either. His son took over Cuba and it's as calm as it could be.

**rein** · 07-23-2018, 12:31 PM

All of them.

**Tooting Carmen** · 07-23-2018, 12:35 PM

And another crucial one:

(5) Soviet Communism was at least equally bad as Nazism, and it is time the world treated it as such.

**Dandelion** · 07-23-2018, 02:08 PM

I agree on all, maybe I could add 50 cents on all, but I will to on one point.

(5) One common argument exists that after Stalin's death life in the USSR wasn't all that bad, even if it was still authoritarian and restrictive, the constant fear of repression wasn't there anymore. However, many Soviet citizens up until the fall of the empire did continue to experience it indirectly via teachers regardless. The drive for authoritarianism and less of it also came in waves. If Yuri Andropov didn't have such a poor health condition, history might have went differently. The last Secretary General of the USSR was kind of a softie, Gorbachov.

Also, Nazism would eventually also become less totalitarian over the decades, especially after Hitler. I also believe that. It might as well compare to it, but it remains a blind guess of course. In the NSDAP Hitler wasn't even the most radical person, believe it or not.