We get what we deserve if we stay silent

Posted on Sun, Sep. 17, 2006

We get what we deserve if we stay silent
BY ANA MENENDEZ
amenendez@MiamiHerald.com

Here we go again.

One crisis and we Cubans set upon each other like a pack of rabid dogs,
scratching and snarling to the amusement of the few outsiders who still
give a damn about Cuba.

Forty-seven years and what have we learned? Our history demanded the
difficult work of self-reflection. Instead, we've poured our many
talents into the business of self-destruction.

Three journalists were fired from El Nuevo Herald. It was sad. They were
fired too quickly and their bosses were left unscathed. Fine. Anywhere
else it might have been just a controversial personnel issue. But no,
here in Miami it becomes part of a worldwide communist conspiracy,
complete with Castro agents, dark plots and wild accusations. Anyone who
dares agree with the dismissals is not just wrong: he's a degenerate,
communist puppet of the evil and malevolent prince of darkness.

When faced with a mildly complicated issue, the loudest segment of
exiles too often passes reason and heads straight to histrionic
conspiracy. On Spanish-language radio, attacks on some Herald reporters
-- who are of Cuban background themselves -- has been unrelenting. What
is wrong with us?

CENTRAL ISSUE

Meanwhile, the details of why the journalists were fired -- taking money
from the government to appear on a propaganda station -- somehow has
become a side issue. It is the central issue. The idea that journalists
shouldn't also dabble in government propaganda may be a subtle one for
lay people still unclear on the demands of a free press. It should be
absolutely obvious to a working journalist.

Those are the facts. But facts often get in the way of a good drama. And
drama is what we do best. For almost half a century we've convinced
ourselves of our exceptionalism, grown drunk on a heroic narrative of
suffering and victimhood.

It's time to grow up.

If Cuba is ever to be a place where pluralism works in anything other
than theory, we need to stop acting stupid.

It's fine to disagree with the firings. It's not fine to become a raving
lunatic over them. In the week since The Miami Herald's staff writer
Oscar Corral printed the story that started it all, the discussion has
become less and less about ethics and more about ''hidden motives,''
personal attacks, and paranoid suggestions that Castro pulls the strings
at this paper.

The blah-blah-blah crowd is so obsessed with being victims that they've
turned a run-of-the-mill caudillo into an all-powerful being able to
leap walls of logic in a single bound.

Fidel Castro, now playing dominos in his pajamas, will go to hell cackling.

EXILE-BASHING

''What is the nationality of Corral,'' demanded one e-mail. ''You are a
f. . . . bitch,'' said another. Left clapping and cheering on the
sidelines are all the people for whom Herald- and exile-bashing -- no
matter the issue -- has become a vocation.

The embittered really must have more energy than the rest of us. That's
the twisted optimism I cling to. The loudest and angriest voices are
also the smallest. I've heard from many nuts. But I've also heard from
many Cuban Americans who disagree with the extremist minority that for
too long has dominated the conversation.

Unfortunately, too many in my generation fear that to dissent from the
prevailing noise is somehow to dishonor our parents. The opposite is true.

If our parents were drawn to this country for its ideals, it's up to us
to make sure those ideals are not drowned in a sea of self pity and
pathological self-wounding.

Convictions need to be held in a space apart from ideology and
nationality. And the sane, silent majority needs to develop the courage
to speak up.

Until then, we will continue to have the leaders -- and enemies -- we
deserve.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/15536684.htm