A nuanced critique from Juventud Rebelde

A dragon in our environment

 

Published: Saturday, May 4, 2024 | 09:49:04 pm.

Translated by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.

Osviel Castro Medel

https://www.juventudrebelde.cu/opinion/2024-05-04/un-dragon-en-nuestro-entorno

I cannot decipher whether the phenomenon is born out of naivety, hallucination or excessive desire to disrupt reality; I only know that it is there, biting us with its many heads, breathing fire on us, as if it were a dragon that revives over time.

We journalists have been accused more than once, rightly, of carrying it; but journalism is just a tiny plot in which the "bug" grazes and relaxes. It is disseminated in the language of bureaucrats, in officials who do not understand their obligations to him, in pluggers, inflators, disguises.

 The worst thing is that, beyond the canned language, for some, it has become a philosophy of life, a way of acting, and a cloth embedded in the neurons.

I am referring to triumphalism, a harmful tendency that resorts to fanfare and does not allow us to see moles, knots and craters. Scares away solutions or results. It constantly winks at stagnation. Germinates in appearances.

Of all its sides, one of the most disgusting is the desire to justify errors and blunders, which would mean an enormous distortion, a word very much in vogue these days.

Luis Sexto, national prize-winner for Journalism, warned us a long time ago that triumphalism should not be confused with optimism. «He observes, values, trusts and acts realistically. That one, however, lives between mirrors: taking for granted and good what is only a cloud," wrote the brilliant columnist in 2008, in Juventud Rebelde .

Sometime later, another renowned columnist, Ricardo Ronquillo Bello, expressed in these pages that triumphalism resembles defeatism, although they seem diametrically opposed. "It paralyzes and incapacitates due to excess of vainglory," he said.

Over the years, both texts remain fully valid because the triumphalists continue to see victories and laurels, even before starting any battle; they continue to abuse consignism or grandiloquence, describing as successful realities that are quite the opposite.

A triumphalist views social criticism as a poison dart, sometimes even as a "problem," instead of appreciating it as a saving arrow. She does not walk with her feet on the ground, as Raúl has asked us several times, but with her body in the air of a planet called Apología.

Save Cuba from the fact that triumphalism comes to surpass questioning, critical judgment or rigorous analysis. Save yourself from silence, false allegations, and lies, which are the answers to what is wrong, in plain sight of everyone.

 The nation does not need the sniper who shoots at all the flags and feasts on our problems and shortcomings, either. The apocalyptic vocabulary will never eliminate the hangover of those who become intoxicated with supposed triumphs. Therefore, we require balance.

I hope to see that dragon with many heads, which burns not physically, defeated. But we must do it without pomp and without arrogance, critically and consciously, without an iota of triumphalism.