> Still waiting for some of our petition authors and signers to explain
> how Cuba should have defended itself against the U.S. Nothing very
> convincing yet, but I'm not giving up hope yet.
>
> Doug
>
Are you as sure as all that that arresting and even executing people who engage in peaceful protest contributes significantly to the defense of the Cuban revolution? I ask as someone who has not signed either petition.
joanna bujes wrote:
>
> At 03:21 AM 04/29/2003 -0700, you wrote:
> > Edward Said and Mike Davis signed the CPD Cuba petition. <URL:
> >http://home.igc.org/~jlandy/cpd/antiwar/cuba_stmt.html >
> >Counter-revolutionaries.
>
> I don't care who signed the Cuba petition. That's what I'm getting from the
> Znet folks too: all these brilliant, revolutionary people signed the
> petition...who the fuck are you to say no? Who do I have to be?
>
> No. Won't sign.
I think you are reversing the reason people cite that list of names. I don't agree with signing it myself. But a lot of those opposed don't stop with "no, this is a mistake". There seems to be an insistence that anyone who signs has descended to depths of hell, and permanently allied themselves with the forces of evil. Isn't it possible that those who sign are simply mistaken, and have not suddenly become tools of U.S. imperialism after years of fighting it? For that matter is it not conceivable that in refusing to sign it we are mistaken? Mind you, I agree that some of the signers get a bit holy as well. I wish in general that we on the left (and I use the term colloquially, because I don't don't know a better term for what certain viewpoints have in common) would be a little more hesitant to assign bad motive, or to assume that certain errors on the part of fellow leftists who disagree are irretrievable, the step that finally pushes them far enough down the path to hell that they are unlikely to return. Look, life is too short to wait for certainty to decide what side to take in these fights; but (and I know I'm not particularly good at this myself) isn't it worthwhile to try to let the knowledge we might be wrong temper our condemnatory self-righteousness just a little?