16800: LcDewey Re: 16770: Vishnusurf: Re: 16754: JHudicourt: Dr. Farmer (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Lc Dewey <lcdewey@hotmail.com>


VISHNUSURF wrote:


>>1) the elite, whom JHudicourt defends with a couple of convincing
>>examples,
often in fact recall with fondness that very Duvalier period "when things",
as
JHudicourt rightly notes, "were really grim". yes, things were really grim
then, but for most in haiti they are even worse now, AND many among the
morally
unrepugnant elite actually pine for that very Duvalierist time, which they
now
refer to as "la belle epoque..." for back then they did not have to sit in
such horrendous traffic and they could exploit unrecalcitrant poor people
who,
unlike the masses today--whom "that little priest" woke up in the late
1980s--have come to realize that they do not have to submit to being treated
by the
elite like draught animals.>>

During the 60's and the 70's,  the elite was equally angry when Duvalier
used to
bring  poor people from the provinces by the truckloads every time he held
a manifestation.   The elite also complained when Duvalier armed thousands
upon thousands of poor, uneducated, Haitians of dark complexion, and
deployed them all over the country, allowing them to do anything with
impunity.
When Duvalier gave children of uneducated Haitians admission by force into
elite
private schools,  a lot of  elite children were pulled out and  sent to
American schools
both in Haiti and in the US.  Many were sent to  secondary schools in Europe
also.
I doubt anyone who was really "Elite"  under Duvalier  would  refer to this
period as
"la belle" anything.  Maybe those who consider that time to be " la belle
époque" are
those who moved out of  poverty under Duvalier.  Those who entered those
elite
private schools by the force of Duvalier's guns.  Now that  Aristide is
uplifting today's
poor non-violently, they forget they  too were once poor people  who got
put on the map by Duvalier's violence.   They (today's elite) should be
grateful  Aristide
is not one half as violent toward them as Duvalier was toward the elite of
the 60’s and the 70’s
when he (Duvalier) was pulling them (today’s elite) up out of poverty.

Lc Dewey

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