FOSS enthusiast, Linux user, Android enthusiast, Transformers fan (he/him)

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Joined 8 months ago
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Cake day: December 29th, 2023

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  • Citi got the rights to collect the debt (which was a double debt, because they took out predatory loans to be able to pay back the original indemnity), and because of stuff like this the US invaded and occupied Haiti under iirc Roosevelt and "made sure" they paid the US back when they were struggling to pay the debt. The US rigged elections as well, I remember the method mentioned was as follows: the population was largely illiterate the voting method was that there was paper pieces, white or drawn on, each with different meaning. The drawn on paper was placed under a desk guarded by a US Marine and you'd have to ask the clearly negative marine to receive it— very few did that.

    Interestingly, it seems even problems that don't seem related to the debt are its fault. For example, Haiti never had any major natural resources (they were a cash cow because of extremely cruel slave labor generating sugar cane, which was no longer doable) and thus they cut down all their trees to sell in an attempt to pay the debt. Now, Haiti has a deforestation problem.

    The other time the US occupied Haiti was after the broadly agreed to be democratically elected Jean-Bertrand Aristede was ousted in a coup, and we invaded to restore him. He later called for reparations of the debt. At a certain point, Aristede gets ousted in another coup, where the US says they then provided him transport to the CAR. He tells a different story, claiming the US basically forced him to resign, and there are some other sources that back this story up/


  • Wait why are you guys making Toussaint Louverture look good? He doesn't lead the initial uprising, he's one of the two leaders' second in commands. He defects to the French against the British-backed slaves although to be fair the French did issue emancipation (with strings attached). He doesn't actually get rid of slavery, he creates a state that's pretty much based on the same labor system, where slaves are still oppressed, just not referred to as "slaves." There's a good allegory— "the whip was banned by Louverture... so instead they used clubs." It's after Louverture and after Dessalines that those in charge eventually let go of the planatation based agriculture economy.

    Also are we going to take about the French Indeminity and how that made Haiti the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere? Citi bank and US' involvement in that?