Frank Newgent
Philosopher
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What about Cuban-Americans?JAR said:
Let's go to Cuba
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Cleopatra said:
Your definition of "paradise" must be on a lower threshold than mine. If you think Cuba is a paradise, then Iraq under Hussein must have been heaven.
It was a vacation resort before Castro. And the cigars were everywhere.
I've been to Greece a few times. Didn't look anything like Disneyland.
Paid less than what they get now? Will they be better fed and healthier, or remain the same? Be honest.
Greece's problems have nothing to do with tourism. I am beginning to think you are joking. You have much bigger problems than a McDonald's on the corner.
At least they won't be killing themselves trying to escape. And Newgent says they already have prostitutes! Do you honestly believe the Cubans would be as bad off without Castro as with him? Holy smokes!
At least their TV will be better. I used to turn on their local station as I was getting ready for work in the morning, and there was Castro, rambling on about something. I'd come home in the afternoon, and he was still on! The guy has amazing staying power. But how entertaining can one guy be?
They used to read the news with music blaring in the background. Very surreal.
When they did have programming, they showed a lot of Charles Bronson movies. I love Charles Bronson movies. So maybe their TV won't improve. They'll probably get "Survivor." Can you imagine the Cubans' impression of "Survivor?"
Cleopatra said:
Do you have any specifics on this?
If you have a country that is a tourist destination, guess what? That is a product like any other.
What do you think ought to happen to Cuba? If the people need help of some sort or the other, where does the money come from. Sugar? OK, Monday is covered, what about the other 364 days of the year?
Frank Newgent
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originalgagster
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Id rather live in Cuba than any capitalist Latin American country.
Supercharts
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I would agree that the human rights situation in Cuba is intolerable. Right now over 600 prisoners are being held indefintely without charges and without the right to trial. Amnesty international describes the totality of the conditions under which they're being held as amounting to "cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment."
Oops, they're being held by the United States government at its base at Guantanamo. My mistake.
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR511282003
Oops, they're being held by the United States government at its base at Guantanamo. My mistake.
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR511282003
Charles Livingston said:
Yes they are but they contribute very little to the general ameliorization of the conditions of the population. Do you think that turning Cubans into waiters will ameliorate their lives significantly?
What jobs? Generally speaking though, tourism tends to eliminate activities that were closely realted to specific societies and to their needs. For example, the cattlemen of the Greek islands became waiters. This year the tourism in Greece experiences a severe crisis that is expected to be continued, the locals that have abandonned any other activity and they have devoted themselves to tourism have a serious problem right now.
Yes it does. Small units that are owned by the locals are profitable BUT they cannot compete in prices with the large units that belong to foreign multi-national companies and they employ immigrants in half-wage.
Although I am not sure about your point I will give it a try.
I was referring to the nature and the environement that doesn't belong to Castro. I have never been to Iraq to talk about its natural beauties.
And?
The Disneyfication of a culture is a coined term that describes the destruction of cultural diversity. I used it with this definition.
Well, this was exactly my question? Will their lives ameliorate?
I think that you must read again my post.
Guess what! I bet you that in Cuba prostitution is the oldest profession! Read again my post please, I said exactly the opposite!
LOL
Luke T. said:
I was referring to the nature and the environement that doesn't belong to Castro. I have never been to Iraq to talk about its natural beauties.
And?
The Disneyfication of a culture is a coined term that describes the destruction of cultural diversity. I used it with this definition.
Well, this was exactly my question? Will their lives ameliorate?
I think that you must read again my post.
Guess what! I bet you that in Cuba prostitution is the oldest profession! Read again my post please, I said exactly the opposite!
They'll probably get "Survivor." Can you imagine the Cubans' impression of "Survivor?"
LOL
AmateurScientist
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Cleopatra said:
Well, Americans certainly didn't invent the so-called destruction of cultural diversity by homogenizing it through the exportation of their own culture.
As I recall, the ancient Greeks did an excellent job of Hellenizing many of the Mediterranean cultures. The Romans came shortly thereafter and succeeded in Romanizing nearly all of Europe and many of the Meditarranean and Middle Eastern cultures as well. Their cultural influence may be found everywhere throughout the Western world even today, some 1600 years after their empire crumbled.
The main difference is that today, the homogenization of culture isn't being forced on people by military imperialism. Today, it's economic. As DD mentioned, it's also largely because of the relative ease, affordability, and effectiveness of air travel in bringing so many persons into contact with other cultures. The mixing of them then becomes inevitable. Today, we also have instant, world-wide communications via the internet, satellite telephone connections, mobile phones, and satellite television like CNN.
Face it, today's world is far more global than it ever has been. Ease of travel, instant world-wide communications, easy international trade, and economic forces are having profound effects on native cultures.
The cultural influences are not entirely one-way. Not only is much of the world adopting and incorporating American pop culture, but American culture is also being influenced by contact with the cultures of other nations, and by immigration, as it always has been.
You seem to forget that American culture is an amalgam of many different cultures. It is a true melting pot. The rest of the world is becoming much of the same.
You can lament it, or you can embrace it, but you cannot stop it. Human culture is evolving, as it always has.
AS
Ed said:
What you mean specifics? Numbers? No I do not have numbers but small countries that become travel destinations and where the packed tourism flourishes lose their culture and the structure of the society is ruined, to me, this constitutes that ultimate loss for a country.
True. Others have oil, other have tourism, both become nothing but targets.
So, it's ok to serve tourists for the rest of 364 days a year. Of course, I know that serving tourists is better than prostitution.
Cleopatra said:
Some places have canals that are of world economic importance. Central America and I suppose most of the Americas have been "pwnd" by all sorts of foreign cultures.
In Panama you can go watch the polleras dance by in parades on holidays. You can take a "tour" of the Cuna Islands where Cuna Indians will allow you to observe them in the native tribal setting. You can even buy molas from them.
But what is Panamanian culture?
Where is Noriega today?
/hijack....
I really should stop hijacking. This is a thread about Cuba, not Panama.
Amateur Scientist
There is joke coming from the Romans according to which Romans might have conquered the Greeks but the Greeks conquered the Romans with their culture. Greeks never imposed their culture to nobody, they just communicated it.
Americans do not impose their culture either but if a small country wants to be able to participate in the game it has to play by the rules.
To return to tourism, I see the tourists people in the touristic areas of my country. Thousands of people are supposed to visit Greece but what really happens is that they live for 10 days in a huge hotel where they suppose to taste the Greek kitchen, the Greek culture etc etc. Of course, what they are served -- culturally or... gastronomically speaking-- has nothing to do with the Greek culture. Very few, pass the gates of the hotel to see the rest of the area because it's always cheaper to stay in!!!
This is what I called Disneyfication.
Can it be otherwise? This is the question.
As for the American culture being an amagalm, well, I'd love we had this conversation once. I don't know is we can talk about an amagalm or about a collage of different elements that are glued together. What is the name of this glue? Some say that it's the Constitution ( if this is the case this is not the product of an amagalm of cultures! ) other say the American dollar...
But I digress...
There is joke coming from the Romans according to which Romans might have conquered the Greeks but the Greeks conquered the Romans with their culture. Greeks never imposed their culture to nobody, they just communicated it.
Americans do not impose their culture either but if a small country wants to be able to participate in the game it has to play by the rules.
To return to tourism, I see the tourists people in the touristic areas of my country. Thousands of people are supposed to visit Greece but what really happens is that they live for 10 days in a huge hotel where they suppose to taste the Greek kitchen, the Greek culture etc etc. Of course, what they are served -- culturally or... gastronomically speaking-- has nothing to do with the Greek culture. Very few, pass the gates of the hotel to see the rest of the area because it's always cheaper to stay in!!!
This is what I called Disneyfication.
Can it be otherwise? This is the question.
As for the American culture being an amagalm, well, I'd love we had this conversation once. I don't know is we can talk about an amagalm or about a collage of different elements that are glued together. What is the name of this glue? Some say that it's the Constitution ( if this is the case this is not the product of an amagalm of cultures! ) other say the American dollar...
But I digress...
JAR said:
Personally, I haven't observed a wave of white American immigrants that try to invade Greece... Of course, according to your Greek "brothers" that have your ideas about racial superiority and crap we are superior, the best, we have invented everything and we know everything and the Americans that they are sub-humans because --according to your Greek brothers they are the offsprings of the murderers, the scums and the mentally retarded that they were expelled from Europe-- would give half of their lives to be like us the superiors but still I haven't noticed any Americans in our boarders, begging us to accept them in our socialist parody... err I mean paradise.
So, don't worry!!
WildCat
NWO Master Conspirator
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Well for chrissake, then keep those Greeks out of America, and Chicago!! I can't walk down S. Halsted St. w/o being lured into a restaurant by the smell of gyros or flaming cheese or cheap wine. And I just know that all ther profits get sent back to Greece, not many 'mericans working in those retaurants. And they hire illegal immigrants (Mexicans) to wash dishes for the half-wage...Cleopatra said:
-No secret message here-
Actually I love Greek Town, so lighten up Cleo!