#botch christian and orthodox

[papirouge]

Grimes is so fascinating to me because it's like she has zero sense of self. It's as if her entire worldview and identity change depending on who she's dating and what circle she's in. If she hangs out with communists, she becomes a communist. If she's hanging out with nazis, she becomes a nazi. If she ever starts hanging out with Orthodox Christians, she'll absolutely try to convert.

She lowkey reminds me of this former jfashion vlogger who basically became a hardcore Muslim tradwife to impress her crush (who wasn't even interested and already had a girlfriend), but decidedly less unhinged.

LOL You're so right ! I remember someone said that "Grimes was a scrote idea of an interesting girl", and this sentence lives rent free in my head lol.

I mean, it would be funny if girl wasn't there reblogging white supremacist dogwhistle meme. She's way too dumb to mingle into this cesspool with enough discernment to not have this bs eventually going into her head. but I guess dating Musk had a toll on her. It's sad that she turned into a weeb bimbo baby mama with botched face. Dating a dork is one thing, but I feel like this relationship truly hurt both her artistry and image.

And why does this gaijin weeb turning muslima for a boy tells me something ?? I know her name is hidden in some deep corner of my gyaru era brain. The wave of jfashion white girls wildin out in Japan 2005-2015 was truly a cultural moment and it drives me crazy to feel like I'm the only one to even remember it lol (gyaru_secret livejournal was a MESS!! lmao) A bunch ended up becoming babymama. I guess they thought this would help them get a longer visa lmao I remember one (Sienna - the bestie of Ashley who went back to Canada after being impregnated by a host(?)) made headline in Japan for being kicked out for overstaying there without visa - it seems her case made a big splash that caused a reinforcement of control of foreigner visa On a more sordid tone, some girls became married visa kun to become their side piece... I wonder where they are now.

[craftmanatee]

Hazbin Hotel S1 Review

I recommend the show as it is fun, but it is flawed in many places and the characters I loved the most were the ones the show focused least on and got right.

In episode 1, the very intro to the show. The mythos between Adam and Eve is changed to a point where it changes the very nature of Heaven and Hell and any philosophy behind it. Creating an enormous amounts of questions.

The intro declares Lucifer as giving Free Will to Lilith (Adams first wife) which is questionable although follows the biblical stories in a weird fashion. Kind of like cherry picking.

This is what consumed me in the first episode of Hazbin Hotel as I know the biblical stories, but I also know what they represent, and what they can explain.

But because this was a narration of the biblical mythos as a story passed down to Charlie from her mother (Lilith) and Father (Lucifer), I was eagerly waiting for a sad reveal that it was a lie.

The quintessential representation of manipulation, false beauty and evil. The right hand of GOD... . . . (Spoilers going forward)

was not revealed as that...

I would go as far as to say they doubled down on it, kind of. But it mostly feels like they are keeping us away from my suspicions until Season 2.

Hazbin Hotel Season 1 is about the Hotel, Charlie and their attempts at the goal for redemption and being let into heaven.

What I liked

There were lots of great moments throughout many episodes, and they only get better.

The show was also stylish, and the animation was progressively getting better each episode. Which is unusual, I often think the first episode is where they make their impression. But rather, they made things better as you went along.

Sir Pentious was the most fun character in the entire show. Straight up, and they did him so well. I am surprised by how the other characters were flawed, perhaps bad. But Sir Pentious? Ofcourse he didnt have as much screen time as the others. But by golly was he near perfect.

Some songs were awkward, and others real fun. But my favourite was "Loser, Baby". This is the best song, in my opinion also in its tune. But also in its lyrics. the very simple final meaning in it is like the most Christian thing in the entire show, its hilarious. I honestly do not know if the show creators know that.

As an Orthodox Christian, the philosophy between Heaven and Hell is a lot more ambiguous and as such many come into conversation saying Earth IS hell. With the humbling attitude of lowering yourself to others as equals, it sets a realistic perspective as to where you can start building yourself up. A lot like what Hazbin Hotel as a show tries to be, which is why I think this song is funny and amazing amidst so many confusing elements of the show.

Heaven was a big surprise, I was not expecting the show to get heaven right in anyway and they didnt. Botched it in my mind, but I still enjoyed their version of what heaven looks like compared to how hell looks like.

The Voice Acting was also very good, there were some really well directed scenes and the voice actors really managed to play in on those scenes. Specifically Angel Dust stood out to me even if many others were absolutely great, but he had scenes where he unexpectedly sounded convincing as all hell, especially in his focused episode.

What I did not Like

I have too many questions that blow holes in the world of Hazbin Hotel, and there were certain moments where rules exist that I didnt expect and it boggles my mind even more. The biggest contributor is Vaggie as she could have used her "Secret past" as a means to absolutely destroy almost every argument in the entire show. Her experience, and intentions are so righteous, its actually WEIRD that she didnt use it when she had the chance. Her character and her story was way too powerful for Hazbin Hotel, creating huge holes in the entire fabric of their own mythos.

But, what I hated the most is the representation of Lucifer, as mentioned it may be because it waits for Season 2. But my gripe with Lucifer is mostly because there is a character who represents the real Lucifer we know and thats Alastor. Alastor seems to embody most of the characteristics of actual Lucifer. This is fine, for now...

Because, I do think Lucifer (Hazbin hotel character) is good the way he is if, in Season 2 a truth about him is revealed. Alastor maybe smiling his whole way through, but Lucifer makes you believe he is all good in every way he can. But, this then has to wait.

There was a lot of moments that were too fast, or whiplashes the character building a bit too fast. Decisions that weren't realistic and were there just to "fix" certain aspects, be it a character thing or a story thing.

Some elements like vVv gang were kinda forgotten, and just did not feel like they had much to do with the story in the end anyway. A lot of characters were shown, and then dismissed. They were very interesting in design but obviously, couldn't see their underlying relevance, yet we still experienced them. It is weird.

Some if not lots of the dialogue really does feel unnecessary in its swearing. I thought people were exaggerating with their takes on it but what really sticks out is how the dialogue is clearly scripted. Characters have clear things they need to say but end up throwing swears and slurs in weird, awkward places. It is not really realistic. Ive been around people who talk like that, and as honest as they are, can also be hard to hear. But hazbin seems to think a dash of realism is by adding swears like this...

Criticisms

I think most of the shows flaws stem from the very beginning in the fantasy of creating heaven and hell as a modern society. With a modern outlook and modern philosophy while being fun in a sharp kinda 90s-00s cartoon look. It is then hard to look at a depiction of very old mythos (of which are still relevant today) as just simple things to toy with.

It is then incredibly easy but biased to criticise how Hazbin Hotel depicts heaven and hell with its modern outlook. Im not criticising my criticism of the show, rather im saying, you will reap what you sow.

Hazbin Hotel (for me) fails to create and establish the world of Hell and the world of Heaven. I know it is hard, but it didnt try much. This is why I think Hazbin Hotel has a lot of issues. There are about 3 or 4 major themes running at the same time and the show thinks it only has 1 or 2. An example is the "Circus" theme prevalent in a lot of Helluva Boss, and Hazbin Hotel, particularly Lucifer himself. Yet this circus theme is only an aesthetical backdrop, justifying the style and designs, personality of certain characters and things. Which then goes against the design in the other side, such as Heaven, or the symbolic duality of what the show is about.

Vox is represented well in hypnotizing his viewers as the television demon. Good, easy symbol for what is happening in the real world, and is (lets say) still happening in hell. This is good use of it all, until its over. They dont use it again. Not even as commentary, in symbol, anything. Vox himself seems glued to the screen as much as everyone else, which feels like it goes against his character.

It was LUCIFER who mentioned not watching screens as it "scrambles his brains" almost like the only character who is aware of what sins are and how it takes control of your life in the entire show, but only in this one mention.

My version of Hazbin Hotel

In my version of Hazbin Hotel, Charlie is naive at first like in this show and hopeful about getting sinners into heaven, but each episode is then dedicated to the gradual realization on how or what keeps them from achieving heaven.

Instead of Jabbing binary christian values like sex before marriage, lets focus on the actual sins, the actual materials that get people to loose control of their lives, or in other words... Sell their souls.

Charlie (or someone else) finds out about Angel Dusts drug problem. As such, she goes to figure out who distributes these drugs. She fails to thwart the drug problem, but as such, instead looks into Angel Dust, and how he can choose to reject them instead, figure out a life without them. This is where Husk steps in with his wisdom despite being a bit hypocritical, and Charlie learns through them where the real change starts.

In another, Vaggie notices Sir Pentious and his whimpy but prideful characteristics, and challenges him to finally take on his Rival, Cherry. Vaggie trains Sir Pentious several times to what seems like failed attempts, and every time Vaggie Defeats Sir Pentious, she tries again. Eventually, Pentious gives in and takes on Cherry early despite Vaggie disagreeing. Vaggie goes to stop Pentious, believing he will kill cherry. What happens instead, he defeats both Vaggie and Cherry in the way he knew best, but does not kill, and keeps his prideful tone to a minimum. Simply relishing a little on Cherries defeat, and asks that she gets even better. This is the start of Cherry and Sir Pentious relationship.

One more,

Charlie and her Father Lucifer in the show have an unexplained relationship. I do not know why they are the way they are to each other. Why is she so reluctant over her father?

Lets make Lucifer the Lucifer I wished him to be. A goody toe-shoes who never, even a little bit shows his true side (like what Alastor does). Much like Jar-Jar binks is a Sith theory, Lucifer is a good guy. Hell does not kinda look down on him like the show does, and instead everyone LOVES Lucifer in hell. He is the best guy. The only person to be reluctant and kinda sus about Lucifer is Charlie.

Yes, Charlie is the only person who has slight doubts about her Father. She is the TRUE good, while he is the FALSE good.

When Charlie tries to dismiss vaggies advice of inviting Lucifer over to the hotel for some help, she caves in and reluctantly asks for his help. Lucifer convincingly (to audience) makes conversation and finally accepts her invitation, even if HE knows she does not fully trust him. Lucifer takes all the "deserved" attention while Charlie gets pushed aside.

This is when Alastor steps in and makes his remarks that makes Lucifer dislike Alastor. And from here, the episode can go as it did because Lucifer DOES say a few damning things Im glad they did try. Despite all my criticisms. I do think, Hazbin Hotel is fun. Which is what it tries mostly to be with its musicals and style. I just wish it was meaningful.

[strigital]

there happened to be an anomalously quiet evening not so long ago, so i spent my time by the self check-outs productively and whipped out some Damie

(will try to fix the contrast later idk)

click for non-butchered quality

[epistolizer]

The Superiority Of Theism Part 6: Generic Theism Is Not Enough

From external evidences such as the cosmological and teleological arguments and evidence of a more internal or sociological nature, we see that there is likely some kind of a God that has established the material world and ordered the affairs of men.  However, if this is the route through which the skeptic is being brought to God, major hurdles have been surmounted; but we still have a significant journey ahead of us before the seeker arrives on the other side of Heaven's door.

Even if the atheist is convinced as to the insufficiency of their unbelief, there still exists a dizzying array of theistic options available to select from that would end up sending the individual down the same road to Hell if the apologetic task is botched or mishandled.   Thus it is imperative to guide the nascent theist into the arms of Christ before they are gobbled up by competing heresies, cults, and world religions.  

Since man is a sentient creature that lives amidst the flow of time, the primary revelation and outreach of this Deity would therefore need to consist of some pivotal event occurring in what we know as history.  As one of the world's foremost texts detailing the earliest eras of mankind's religious experience, the Bible ought to be one of the first sources considered.  

The Bible is perhaps the best-known book in the world and contains within its pages the account of the most widely known person in the world, namely Jesus Christ.  Love Him or hate Him, no other figure from ancient times has elicited as much of a response down to this very day. For though many distort His very nature and the claims made by this Nazarene carpenter, scores hoping to sway hearts and minds have often presented themselves as if they had the endorsement of what should have been a figure otherwise forgotten centuries ago.  

One of the first objections the atheist that does not want to consider the claims of Christ raises is that the Bible cannot be trusted as an objective factual account.  At best, all the Bible can provide is a chronicle of the biases of the early Church and these assumptions not even necessarily from the time when Jesus was supposed to have walked the earth.  

In this era of instantaneous global communications, any event that does not have a CNN crew there on the ground to Twitter about it is hardly even considered newsworthy. Thus, it is only natural that, given the nature of the documentary evidence that has come down to us, that the unreflective would cast a leery eye towards it.  

According to Geisler and Turek, the gap between the original autographs and the earliest surviving copies is about twenty-five years (226).  To put this into perspective, one needs to compare it with other texts coming down to us from the Classical Mediterranean.  

For example, there is a gap of 1200 years between the earliest surviving copies of Plato and the originals.  Likewise, there is a gap of 1000 years between the earliest surviving works of Julius Caesar and the originals.  Yet one does not find many scholars attempting to make careers of respectable renown and adulation by discrediting and throwing into doubt these Greco-Roman pillars of the Western tradition.  

The skeptically inclined will likely still not be impressed as to the small gap in time between the earliest surviving copies of a text and the time when the document was believed to have been written if what was written about occurred decades and even centuries before the time in which it was written down.  On this point also, however, the New Testament Scriptures in general and the Gospels in particular remain in good standing.  

For example, it is believed that most of these works were likely written down in a time frame no later than between AD 62 to 70.  Such an assertion is conjectured along the following lines of argumentation.

In Mark 13, Jesus predicts that the Jerusalem Temple will be destroyed before the generation He was speaking to at that time passed away.  That prophesy was fulfilled by the Romans in AD 70 in what the historian Josephus categorized as “the greatest war of all time”, a conflict in which the Jews not only lost the focal point of their religious material culture but also  tens of thousands of their fellow countrymen (238).   Yet not a word of this fulfillment is mentioned in the pages of Scripture even though it could have been one of the greatest "see I told you so" moments in all of history.  This causes conservative scholars to conclude that most of the New Testament had likely been written by the time of that event.

Even if the apologist is able to martial a number of these historical technicalities to blunt this particular variety of skepticism, the unbeliever is likely to respond that such details do not validate the content.  After all, numerous works can be authenticated to the era in which they are believed to describe and been written in, but are filled either with mild distortions, shushed-over omissions, or even outright lies.  

For example, the works of Julius Caesar no doubt cast events in a way to put him in the best possible light and scholars to this day speculate as to what Plato was actually doing during the trial of his beloved Socrates.  It is simply an aspect of human nature to obfuscate when we are embarrassed by our responses to certain situations whether we take pen to paper for publication or merely try to get out of a speeding ticket. The Bible, on the other hand, is one of the few books where the warts of its protagonists and even those overseeing the compilation of its documents are put out there for all the world to see.  For example, it is believed that Mark penned his Gospel under the oversight of the Apostle Peter.  Yet in that very document, Christ chastised Peter as Satan, the very embodiment of evil, and elsewhere in  the New Testament this rock upon which Christ is said to have built His church comes across like any other human being as a loudmouth coward that often fails to live up to his bellicose promises.

It is at this level of detail that the Christian is able to present the case that the Gospels are an actual historical account rather than a mythological legend.  Geisler and Turek write, “Now think about this: If you were a New Testament writer, would you include these embarrassing details if you were making up a story...Would you depict yourselves as uncaring, bumbling cowards, and the women --- whose testimony wasn’t even admissible in court --- as the brave ones who stood by Jesus and later discovered the empty tomb?  Of course not (277).”

Once the credibility of the New Testament eyewitnesses is established, the unbeliever is forced to confront the underlying claims of the Gospel narrative and ultimately of Scripture.  Those happen to be nothing less than what happened to Jesus and whom did Jesus claim Himself to be.

The central event in the life of Jesus was nothing less than His resurrection from the dead.  No one living in the contemporary technocratic world --- be they devout or atheist alike --- believes that rising from the dead is a common occurrence.  Where opinion diverges is on the issue of whether such an event is an impossibility or rather one requiring divine intervention in order to be orchestrated.

Skeptics not wanting to accept the account at face value have over the decades concocted a number of theories as to why the orthodox understanding as to what happened is not  entirely accurate.  These accuse the parties involved of a variety of shortcomings from a naive innocence, to incompetence, to outright criminality.

The first attempt to explain away the Resurrection is the Swoon Theory. This theory posits that Jesus did not really die on the cross but rather merely lost consciousness.  It really does take more faith to believe in this particular explanation than the one provided in the Gospels.

This theory, in fact, does not take the facts into account.  For starters, to say Jesus merely passed out or even went into a temporary coma is to seriously underestimate the brutality the Romans had perfected as an art of terror.  Even from non-Christian disciplines such as contemporary archaeology and ancient sources such as Quintilian, we learn about practices such as plunging a spear into the heart to make sure that the victim was really dead (304).

Even if the Romans had botched the job in failing to kill Jesus (as we all know of instances where government employees have been less than dutiful), Jesus would have been in no physical shape to accomplish what the Gospels said He did following the Crucifixion.  Even Jack Bauer could not have pulled it off as it must be remembered anyone in such a condition would have had their body broken beyond repair.

The following makes the Swoon Theory downright impossible.  Jesus would have been embalmed with nearly 75 pounds of spices and bandages (305).   To affect an escape, a man critically injured would have not only had to  remove these, but also to remove the two-ton stone closing the tomb as well as take on the Roman soldiers.  Had such a scenario transpired, Geisler and Turek humorously quip, "Even if he could get out of the tomb and past the Roman guards, Jesus would have been a battered...man whom the disciples would pity, not worship They'd say, 'You may be alive, but you're certainly not risen.  Let's get you to a doctor' (305)."

For starters, to accuse the Disciples of stealing the body is to ignore that all but one of Christ's most loyal Apostles were believed to have died violent martyrs’ deaths and the one that did not was essentially exiled on a desolate island.  While history and the evening news is replete with examples of those that give their lives for things that are ultimately proven to be falsehoods, seldom will someone give their life willingly for what they themselves know to be a lie.  For example, would someone like Peter, whose survival instinct was so strong that he ended up denying his beloved Jesus multiple times, have willingly allowed himself to be crucified upside down, if legends are to be believed, if he knew that the account of the Resurrection was merely a fabrication?

Ironically, as scholars eager to tear down the traditional intellectual structures of Western civilization in favor of ones more socialistic in orientation are often fond of pointing out in their preferred narrative of Jesus as a merely human Apocalyptic revolutionary, the Jerusalem and Greater Palestine of that day were powder kegs set to go off in terms of violence at any moment.  No on in authority --- be they Jewish religious leaders, the Herodians holding tenuous political power, or the occupying Roman military forces --- would have allowed news of a Resurrected Jesus to continue to spread if they could have found a plausible grave robber on which to pin the blame.

One theory that seeks to deny the truth of the Resurrection while upholding the good but somewhat naive natures of Christ's disciples is the Hallucination Theory (302).  According to this hypothesis, those that loved Jesus were so distraught with grief that Jesus merely appeared to them in their own minds as part of a mental breakdown.

While this might be a valid line of argumentation if there were only one or two followers stepping forward to claim they had seen the risen Christ, such was not the case.  Bible scholars and theologians such as Norman Geisler point out that not only did 500 see Christ after the Resurrection took place but some of these interactions were tactilely tangible such as when Thomas touched our Lord’s wounds.  Hallucinations would not be a communal experience but rather something highly individualized.

Once the unbeliever has been presented with evidence attesting to Christ’s resurrection, they will have to pay attention to his claims and the claims made about Him for no other reason than that someone having been risen from the dead needs to be considered seriously because of having accomplished something so outside the historical norm.  In the attempt to accommodate a place for Jesus somewhere in their worldview, many people as well as most religions will concede that Jesus was a very good man but certainly not God or God’s only Begotten Son.  Such a position may be even more intellectually disingenuous and self-deluding than the brand of atheism espoused by the likes of Friedrich Nietzsche. To his credit, at least this crazed syphilitic was consistent in heaping condemnation on both God and Christ.

One must either embrace Jesus as Savior, Lord, and God or one cannot embrace Him at all.  Perhaps the greatest summation of this idea was formulated by C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity when he said, “That is the one thing we must not say.  A man who was merely a man and said the things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would be a lunatic --- on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg --- or else he would be the Devil of Hell (Geisler, 346).”

The astute unbeliever then might point out that what was it exactly that Jesus said since the elaborate Christologies that developed could be accretions that attached themselves to the narrative at a later date and might not be actual components of the original texts.  After all, it is common for Christians in this hypersensitive era to point out that not everything done throughout history in the name of Jesus would necessarily be approved of by Jesus.  Dan Brown, because of his blockbuster The Da Vinci Code, will never have to work another day in his life, having capitalized on the assumption in the popular culture that the Jesus of orthodoxy presented to the ecclesiastical world might not exactly be the Jesus of raw history.

The idea that Jesus never claimed to be deity is clearly refuted by His own words recorded in the pages of  Scripture.  There are numerous instances where Jesus clearly addresses the matter to both the accepting and critical alike.

For example, in John 8, Jesus says, "before Abraham was, I AM."  This is in fact a name of God the Lord first reveals to Moses when He imparted to Moses instructions as to what Moses was supposed to say on behalf of the Israelites.  The title attests to God being self-existent and dependent on no one; in other words, the Unmoved Mover to formulate the concept in a manner preferable to those more familiar with the terminology of Aristotle and Aquinas.

In accounts of those that already believed in Jesus or would come to believe in Jesus, Jesus asked them whom they thought He was.  For example, after Thomas examined the scars of the resurrected Jesus, upon resolving his initial skepticism, Thomas declared Jesus to be his Lord and his God.  And when Peter was asked by Jesus who he thought Jesus was, Peter responded in Mark 16:16, "Thou art the Christ."  

In neither of these instances did Jesus refute the claims.  And in the case of Peter, Jesus said, "thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church."  Though theologians might debate as to whether Jesus meant the faith and devotion of Peter or rather the divinity of Christ upon which all other assumptions of the faith flow, that is not the point of this particular exposition.

The road to embracing the Christian faith can be a long and arduous journey.  The climate in which we find ourselves is of little assistance in alleviating the doubts that arise within ourselves as fallen creatures wanting to embrace our own sinful desires as well as elaborate systems of thought external to ourselves that have been crafted in the attempt to justify refusal to accept the one solution capable of rescuing man from his Hell-bound situation.  It is, thus, the purpose of Apologetics to assure the skeptic that Christianity is a faith founded on fact and that it is atheism which stretches the bounds of reason beyond belief.

By Frederick Meekins

[acandidobserver-blog]

SOME THOUGHTS ON FIDEL CASTRO

  SOME THOUGHTS ON FIDEL CASTRO

  Castro wasn’t a saint, and his government was responsible for human rights abuses; but what makes him such a revered figure around the world is that he was, as some commentators have pointed out, the David who stood up against the American Goliath. Though all too predictably, and dismally, he has been labelled as a despot and a tyrant by right-wing politicians and journalists. And along with the other character assassins, that paragon of virtue and fair play, Donald Trump, has chipped in with his tuppenceworth, denouncing Castro as a ruthless dictator who ruled through firing squads and oppression.

There were privations and difficulties in Cuba, under Fidel Castro’s government – and there were those who sought to leave the country, under pretty scarifying circumstances. But we should remember that this was a siege economy, under a relentless U.S. blockade, and that for much of that period Cuba lived under almost wartime conditions. If Britain had been blockaded for fifty plus years by the rest of Europe – because they didn’t like our political system, and wanted to impose on us another system, that they were more comfortable with – we’d be in a considerable economic mess as well.

Though the very fact that it came to power through a popular revolution against a hated regime – with people prepared to vote with their feet, and lay their lives on the line to oust the old order – shows that his movement and subsequent government did have a strong degree of popular, grassroots support. This wasn’t some system that was imposed by Red Army tanks, against the will of the people, as happened in Eastern Europe in 1945; this was a home-grown insurrection that had popular backing.

There’s a wise old adage, that you should never invade a revolution. That is the mistake which the reactionary European nations made when they invaded France after the toppling of the Bourbon Monarchy. It’s the mistake that some Western powers made when they supported the White forces in the Russian Civil War. It’s the same mistake that Saddam made when he invaded Iran. And the Americans made a similar mistake when they cobbled together an army of disgruntled Cuban ex-pats and sent them ashore at the Bay of Pigs. All of these things not only failed dismally, but they actually strengthened the very regimes they sought to damage.

Had the Bay of Pigs, by some incredible happenstance, succeeded, and the Castro government was overthrown, it would not have brought about democracy in Cuba, but the very opposite. Look what happened when American power overthrew Marxist or liberal regimes in Latin America – as in Chile, and Guatemala, and elsewhere. We had as a result fully fledged fascist regimes that ruled through terror; though without any complaints from Washington against their human rights abuses, and the absence of democracy. And of course had a similar regime-change scenario happened in Cuba, the same things would have occurred, and living standards and the mortality rate would have declined drastically as well. Cuba, because of Castro’s healthcare initiatives, has one of the highest mortality rates in the world. Indeed the ability to have a long and healthy life, is a human right as well. And one of the most important ones. Is it any coincidence that Honduras, which is an American client state, is also the murder capital of the world? Without a whisper of criticism emanating from the corridors of power in Washington. And in the event of an American sponsored counter-revolution Castro and his comrades would have been the first to be executed, and you would have had someone like Pinochet or Galtieri in charge. And on the subject of human rights abuses the noisy politicians in Washington would have taken a Trappist vow of silence.

And would Havana have kept its old world charm and character, if unregulated free market forces were let rip? Or would it have all been bulldozed to the ground to be replaced by something that looks like downtown Detroit.

Castro was criticised for declaring himself to be a communist and throwing in his lot with the Soviet Union. But did he have any choice in the matter? America, or rather the American political class (regardless of their party affiliations) was viscerally opposed to the Castro regime from the very outset, irrespective of how it labelled itself ideologically. Eisenhower wouldn’t even see him when he arrived in America after the revolution. They tried to destroy his government in a botched invasion. Then they repeatedly sought to execute Castro, by increasingly bizarre and demented means. It isn’t for nothing that Castro once remarked that if assassination attempts were an Olympic sport, he would be a gold medal winner. They even tried to slip him drugs that would make him mad, and others that would make his beard fall off. With all that going off it’s a wonder that he kept his sanity and didn’t descend into paranoia.

And on top of those assassination attempts and plots, and some people reckon they ran into the hundreds, there were regular acts of terrorism and economic sabotage to try, though thankfully unsuccessfully, to destroy the morale of the Cuban people, and to damage the economy. Sugar cane crops were burned in the fields and a ship was blown up in Havana harbour, with considerable loss of life.  And of course there were sanctions imposed on Cuba by America from almost the day of the Revolution, to the present time. And which are still, anachronistically in force, despite the renewal of diplomatic relations. Indeed at one point America arrogantly expected other Western nations to join in the sanctions too, in order to choke and cripple the Cuban state and to punish its people for having the nerve and temerity to defy the big brother to the North.

If Castro hadn’t thrown his lot in with the Soviets it is difficult to see how his regime would have survived at all. It was his lifeline, economically and military. That, and the fact that Cuba was an island, saved his regime from being obliterated.

Hypocritical American politicians solemnly tell us that they want to see democracy restored in Cuba. But it wasn’t a democracy before Castro and his associates appeared on the scene. Though to read some right-wing journalists you’d think that pre-Castro Cuba was some kind of paradise or utopia. The revolution succeeded, after Castro landed on the island with only a handful of comrades – in overthrowing the Batista regime, which had far greater forces at its disposal – in considerable measure, because of popular revulsion against the corrupt Batista dictatorship. Havana at that time was full of casinos and bordellos, and was a safe haven for half the gangsters and Mafia godfathers in America.

All too predictably the healthcare reforms in Cuba have been ignored by those purblind critics. The fact that Havana brokered a stunning peace deal between the government of Columbia and the Farc guerrilla army, to end a dreadful civil war that has lasted for decades and claimed tens of thousands of lives, was never mentioned by these ideological nay-sayers, though that deal was praised to the skies by the UN Secretary General, Banki Moon, and the leader of Columbia has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize as a consequence. And what of the meeting between the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, and the Pope, that took place in Cuba, to try to reconcile the Eastern and Western branches of the Christian Church, after America and the Europe Union recklessly encouraged the violent overthrow of the democratically elected government of Ukraine and helped to plunge Ukraine into conflict between the Catholic West and the Orthodox East of that nation. That too has disappeared inside the Ministry of Truth. (Indeed the Pope, who is also a Latin American, has proved himself to be a good friend of the Cuban people). Cuban forces helped to liberate African countries from centuries of European Colonialism, and Nelson Mandela has lavished praise on Castro for all he did to help in the overthrow the racist, Apartheid regime, in South Africa. (Indeed because much of its population is descended from African slaves, shipped over by the Spanish colonialists, there are strong bonds of affection and friendship between Cuba and Africa). If words and ill-feelings could have assassinated Castro he would have been dead years ago. But despite that long death wish he has outlived all the politicians who vilified him and some indeed who sought to annihilate him – from Kennedy, who was himself assassinated, to Nixon, who had to resign in disgrace, and all the way up to the lamentable George W. Bush, whose own exercises in regime change have had such a catastrophic effect across the world. Some people have said that though he did survive all those Presidents, they were democratically elected in and out of office, while he was a dictator. That’s true. But he didn’t try to kill them the way that they, or at least a number of them, wanted to murder him. They didn’t want Castro merely ushered out of office, they wanted him ushered out of life – with a bomb, or a bullet, or a phial of poison – and into the graveyard, along with his government.

It is to Obama’s immense credit that he had the guts and courage to break the log-jam and restore diplomatic relations with Cuba. Constructive engagement is always better than ideologically driven megaphone diplomacy on the part of grandstanding politicians; which achieves nothing. Though how that hopeful development will fare under the highly unpredictable Mr. Trump, is anybody’s guess.

Castro, for all his flaws, is a towering and iconic figure of our age. And he will be remembered long after his petty political critics, and their journalistic compatriots, have been forgotten and entombed in oblivion.