Ozzie Guillen's comments about Castro

[SportsFromA2]

Marlins suspended him for 5 games today:


http://twitter.com/#!/AmyKNelson/sta...18743302152192

the comments:

Guillen, who has long had a reputation in baseball for freewheeling comments, came under fire after TIME published an interview with him in its April 9, 2012 issue. In the story, Guillen is quoted as saying “I love Fidel Castro.”

According to the TIME story, Guillen then amended his comment somewhat: “After a second of reflection, the most unfiltered figure in baseball, if not sports, wants a do-over. ‘I respect Fidel Castro,’ says Guillen, a Venezuela native who also says he respects Hugo Chavez. ‘You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last 60 years, but that mother—— is still here.’ ”

http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2...-fidel-castro/

oh and despite what OG said tried to say about Time/context/translation:

“I don’t want to make excuses,” he added. “But I meant that I was surprised Fidel Castro stayed in power so long. That’s what was missing in the translation. … I’m not saying the journalist was wrong. I was wrong. I was thinking in Spanish and I said it wrong in English.”

A spokesperson for TIME later released this statement: “TIME’s interview with Ozzie Guillen was conducted entirely in English. We stand by our story.”

http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2...-fidel-castro/

it's not the first time he's praised Castro:

Guillen’s recent comments aren’t the first time first time he has been reported as praising the Cuban leader. A 2008 Men’s Journal article asked him “Who’s the toughest man you know?” Guillen’s response, according to the magazine: “Fidel Castro. He’s a bulls— dictator and everybody’s against him, and he still survives, has power. Still has a country behind him. Everywhere he goes they roll out the red carpet. I don’t admire his philosophy. I admire him.”

http://keepingscore.blogs.time.com/2...-fidel-castro/

here's some thoughts on what Guillen said from a Cuban-American guy:

We asked Mediaite Editor (and Cuban-American) Frances Martel to explain what Ozzie Guillen is saying when he says he loves Fidel Castro.

I think what he said is completely out of line, disgusting and hurtful.

He thinks he is joking around about a harmless bearded old guy, but in that community he is evoking the executions and disappearances of thousands of people’s parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, friends; he is forcing the pretty large former political prisoner population to relive what they suffered for having an inconvenient opinion. I don’t think it’s ever appropriate to use the word “admire” for someone who sent thousands of LGBT people, poets, writers and, yes, baseball players before a firing squad for “counterrevolutionary activity,” or someone who arrested men for having long hair and used a proxy war in Angola to essentially exile young and potentially counterrevolutionary youth.

It is also really unsettling how dismissive the media has been about this simply because the Miami Cuban population has a reputation for being loud and a little wacky. There is a very profound psychological wound in the Cuban-American community based on an experience that no American can really understand– having the government take away everything you own, many being forced into years of agricultural labor for saying something inappropriately positive about America– and I do think there’s a general lack of respect for it in our country compared to the way we treat the victims of Stalin or Hitler or Mao or any other dictator. The outrage against John Galliano comes to mind.

Guillen can probably come back from it because Americans in general don’t really care about Fidel Castro, and there is a contingent that will find his “trolling” amusing. He happened to pick a convenient dictator to praise. That said, I don’t think anyone that speaks this way about someone so antithetical to American morality should have a place in the public eye.

http://www.sportsgrid.com/mlb/ozzie-guillen-fidel/

[det2orl]

We've always known Ozzie is a dumbass.

[The Black Hand]

Is Fidel still with us?

[phillyfan]

Is Fidel still with us?

No, he stopped posting a while ago.

[Go Blue Girl]

what an absolute joke he was suspended for this. Not smart to say, given where he manages, but suspension? Whatever happened to free speech? He didn't insult, slander, or invoke any racial slurs. This is stupid.

[det2orl]

what an absolute joke he was suspended for this. Not smart to say, given where he manages, but suspension? Whatever happened to free speech? He didn't insult, slander, or invoke any racial slurs. This is stupid.

He's more than free to say it. He is also free to deal with consequences of what he said. And unless his owners and MLB make some sort of effort to discipline him they face some serious fan backlash.

[det2orl]

No, he stopped posting a while ago.

[auburntigerdude]

what an absolute joke he was suspended for this. Not smart to say, given where he manages, but suspension? Whatever happened to free speech? He didn't insult, slander, or invoke any racial slurs. This is stupid.

GBG, here in Miami I have learned and been warned by Cuban co workers to leave the CASTRO talk along. Don't mention it at all. The Cuban community RUNS Miami Dade County and has a strong influence in Broward County. You can't say anything near positive about Castro at all. Castro to them is Hitler to Jews, the KKK and Skinheads to Blacks, Stalin to Russians, Mao to China and Ho Chi Minh to Vietnamese.

He offended the sponsors and big Latin American businessmen who are Marlins supporters. He offended the fanbase of the tam, the new stadium is in Little Havana home to some old school Bautista cubans who want Castro and his regime dead.

He has made pro Castro and Pro Chavez comments before and folks were afraid of something like this happening and he did. This would be the equivalent of Jim Leyland saying, "I love the Ku Klux Klan, I admire that for a 150 years almost they are still here."

Folks want Ozzie FIRED!! No one is buying his apolog, I'm not buying it because he has said it so many times before.

Time will ease the tension but this won't be forgotten.

As mentioned freedom of speech works both ways, folks can say, "You suck" and then they can say back, "No, You Suck." No one's harming his freedoms here.

Freedom of Speech doesn't mean I can say what I want with no consequences . . . it says the government can't lock you up for saying what you want.

[General283]

Ozzie was saying it in jest. Does the entire Cuban population of Florida not have a sense of humor?

[sseelhoff]

Ozzie was saying it in jest. Does the entire Cuban population of Florida not have a sense of humor?

Not about Castro. That's some serious stuff down there. Most of the Cubans living in S.Fla. had everything they own confiscated, and family members killed.

[det2orl]

Not about Castro. That's some serious stuff down there. Most of the Cubans living in S.Fla. had everything they own confiscated, and family members killed.

Hard to imagine anyone that doesn't understand this. You have people willing to get out in the ocean on anything that can float to get away.