13120: Allen post RE: # 13094, Haitian "elite". (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Joe Allen <jaallen1@bellsouth.net>

    I have been following the "debate" on the Haitian upper class with
interest.  Some valid points were made by people who were recriminating, but
the "elite" bashers were generally in two groups: "foreigners who have had
only  very limited or no direct contact with the Haitian upper class, or
Haitians or former Haitians (naturalized), who live abroad and also have had
limited exposure to the Haitian upper class.  Only Mambo Racine  gave a
specific
example of what she disliked ( un peu tire par les cheveux), the others
stuck with the general nasty clichés.
    Simidor's post #13094 was instrumental in helping me understand some of
the venom and hate that usually clouds the true debate.  I highly recommend
post # 13094 to Corbetters who, like me,  were not paying attention over the
weekend, and may have missed it.
    Simidor writes about the "elite": " But what do you do with them? Pe
Lebrun? Koupe tet boule kay? In this day and age only as a last resort."
This will suffer no comments and the statement speaks for itself.  Only the
author can touch such a work of art.  If you wanted to be funny, and missed
the mark, just tell us, but tell us something!
    Simidor again:" Stalin tried freezing their ... off in Siberia, it did
not work.  The Chinese tried reeducation camps, and of course it didn't
work."  He forgot the "Kmers Rouges" and Papa Doc!  He goes on to say:" it
is time to try socialism with a Human face (democratic socialism)".
    It has been my observation over the years that some of my friends while
being very successful in the USA and personally enjoying the benefits of the
most capitalistic society in the world, and buying products made in
"sweatshops" at home, reserved the brilliance of their Marxist-Leninist
ideas, and
in Simidor's case Stalinist dreams, to Haiti and other countries.  His post
is a class warfare with a global reach, with the criticism leveled at the
Haitian upper class being only generic.
    This I have always believed and still do:  the failure of the Haitian
nation is the failure of all Haitians (all classes).
Price-Mars in his " La Vocation de l'Elite" is an early constructive critic
of the "elite". The brain drain of the 60's and the follies of 80's and 90's
were a fatal blow to the Haitian society.  Some of the brightest
professionals, in search of more fulfilling academic and financial lives
left Haiti.  The middle and lower classes have produced so many able
professionals that have not looked back and feel no need to pay back, even
when they were educated free of charge in Haiti.
    I would submit to the list that blaming only the upper class for our
colossal failure is an intellectually lazy argument. Listen to Garry
Pierre-Pierre's analysis in post # 13096 in which he thinks Simidor is
"absolutely correct in his assessment of the Haitian elite":  "We have a
moneyed class , which does not know how to increase or create more wealth so
that they can pass it down and increase the middle class, which in turn will
defend the elite's interests.  That's why you have "chimeres" right now
blossoming in Haiti."  As feu Marco Wainright would say: "an we ki neg kap
di plus tintin".
    How can Pierre-Pierre's  "Reaganesque" trickledown vision coexist with
Simidor's Stalinist "tabula raza"convictions? (they are on the same side!)
This is a trait the non-Haitian would not know: the Haitian "intellectual"
can argue both sides of an issue successfully (see Simidor on Bois-Caiman).
They have been getting away with it for a long time and I suspect will
continue to do so.  I don't know if those posts reflect real convictions or
if they are merely frivolous intellectual exercises.

Joseph A. Allen DDS
Miami, FL