For 300 Argentines… and Millions of Brazilians – Folha de S. Paulo, August 9, 1970

by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

Here is a summary of some of the Cuban dictator’s long list of failures. While celebrating the 17th anniversary of the attack on the Moncada barracks, he declared that:

1. Cuba will not achieve the impressive sugar harvest that men and women from the cities endured forced labor in the fields for, despite all available resources on the island being mobilized.

2. Meanwhile, cigarette and cigar manufacturing declined.

3. The blame for these failures was partly on him and partly on his ministers and subordinate officials.

4. For this reason, the people were angry with him; the discontent was so strong that Fidel even considered resigning.

Days later, the Cuban Minister of Labor spoke on radio and television and provided some details about the causes of Fidel’s failure.

1. A significant gap exists between the government’s plans and the country’s human potential.

2. Insufficient mechanization;

3. Outdated techniques employed by many rural workers;

4. Low productivity levels among workers in civil construction.

5. Heavy investment in the island’s defense.

Fidel Castro himself announced the overall result: the Cuban people will face another five years of rationing and austerity. In simple terms, this means five more years of hardship and forced labor.

That said, nobody can doubt the truth of these two statements.

1. The Cuban government is glaringly incompetent. It implements plans without enough human or technical resources and follows a foreign policy that pushes the country into unsustainable military expenses.

2. The regime shares the inevitable flaws of all types of socialism. It leads to slow, unproductive work and drains people’s motivation for personal gain.

My readers have already seen the facts described here in the daily news. They have already made the reflections I just stated, since those are the apparent results of the facts. I recapitulate all this here, not to help you remember or analyze what happened, but to invite you to take a test.

* * *

The test involves the following: I ask my reader to present the picture of Cuban reality I just described to a progressive and share their thoughts. From their response, my reader will understand what they should think about the progressive.

It is easy to understand the interest in such an investigation. In the image that each progressive projects of himself, the main idea is compassion for the poor, who are exploited by a system and a class he blames for every possible and imaginable injustice. As a result, the progressive aims to demolish both the system and the class to establish justice and find a remedy for the poor’s suffering.

Regardless of one’s view on this stance—I, for example, strongly disagree with it—the plight of the poor certainly deserves sympathy. In fact, it is the only truly compassionate part of progressivism. Interestingly, this trait is paired with two unkind perceptions of progressive psychology. One is the belief that sympathy for the poor is a privilege reserved only for progressives. They are the only ones who possess it, and anyone outside their ranks claiming to want to help the poor is a fraud or a hypocrite. The other unkind trait is the outright denial of how much the Church has historically helped the poor, long before Marx, Lenin, Dom Helder, and rebel priests appeared.

But let’s set aside these uncomfortable details and focus on compassion for the poor. This distant and secularized heritage of Christian civilization is sympathetic.

That said, I ask: how genuine is it?

* * *

Let me clarify: Those who, out of compassion for the poor, seek to dismantle the current socio-economic system must also be willing to dismantle any other system that fosters and increases poverty. For if having poverty is the reason why progressives despise our system, they must also dislike every other system that encourages poverty.

So, my dear reader, if the progressive to whom this article is shown is filled with indignation upon reading about Fidel’s failure and proposes the same measures against the bearded dictator and his system that he advocates for our current regime, then that progressive truly cares about helping the poor. If the progressive is not equally indignant at Fidel as he is at our regime, then the conclusion is clear: helping the poor is not his real goal, but just a cover.

This becomes even clearer if the progressive, instead of feeling indignant toward Castro, is filled with fury at my argument, which is so simple, logical, and irrefutable.

* * *

Someone might ask: What if a progressive does not respond favorably to the test? Is he a hypocrite?

I’m not claiming that this is necessarily the case. A progressive, whether aware of it or not, is often a socialist or communist who is afraid to admit it to themselves and others. Because they detest all forms of inequality—even the just, necessary, and harmonious ones—they mainly support socialism or communism to create a society of equals. For them, poverty, which still exists here and there and should be reduced as much as possible, is used as an excuse rather than a true cause of their outrage. They become angry when they see poverty in a society of unequal people and are not upset when encountering poverty in a society of equals (or presumed to be such).

* * *

I write these thoughts inspired by a clear, energetic, respectful, and deeply Christian appeal that three hundred Argentine Catholics published in Buenos Aires’ La Nación. They urge their bishops to stop their inexplicable omissions and prevarications and to speak out against the terrorist clergy supporting the so-called Third World.

Despite the geographical distance, I want to offer some advice to our brave brothers in the faith. If your bishops have doubts about the true motives of progressives gathering in their sacristies, tell them to consider the latter’s stance on Fidel Castro, the evil creator of poverty on the island of Cuba. Those who criticize Fidel when reading a summary of his misdeeds might still be salvageable, as they are driven by genuine Christian compassion. The others — it pains me to say — have already passed the point where a rare miracle of grace is needed for their conversion.

* * *

Brazilians reading this might ask: Why don’t you apply this test in our country?

I suggest the reader make this test himself by asking his bishop: Who, among progressive circles, has criticized Castro for Cuba’s rising poverty? Then, let him observe the many insincere and pretended silences, and draw his own conclusions.

Dom Helder, for example, is always so loquacious; why does he say nothing?