By José Ernesto Nováez Guerrero on June 16, 2025
Luisito Comunica
Poverty is, unfortunately, all too common in Our America and in even more distant latitudes. However, it tends to be under represented in media analyses of our region, with the clear exception of a group of countries, such as Venezuela or Cuba, where, on the contrary, its representation is heightened, presenting it as a clear symptom of the inevitable failure of socialism.
In the case of Cuba, for some time now, a flood of “influencers” have begun to address the reality of the island, supposedly to reveal some essence of the country, but all saying the same thing.
YouTube is a great platform for observing this phenomenon. In recent years, content related to travel and gastronomy has become very popular on this gigantic social network.
The predominant focus in these audiovisuals is to highlight the exotic nature of the various experiences encountered by the “YouTubers,” from typical dishes to cultural exchanges. Poverty, when it appears, is only a backdrop, part of the reality described, like buildings, cafes, street food stalls, etc.
This changes completely when these content producers come to Cuba. The focus of the material then becomes fundamentally political, and tourism takes a back seat. Everyone starts showing you “the reality that the dictatorship doesn’t want you to see” or “the true reality of an island frozen in time,” and they all claim to have been persecuted and censored in some way, even though the content they publish seems to contradict this claim: recorded anywhere in Havana or Cuba, with interviewees expressing their opinions, predominantly, of course, those who are critical of the system.
Meanwhile, in tours of other parts of Latin America and the world, they privilege the presentation of often luxurious tourist experiences (a trip on a train with a ticket costing six thousand dollars, buffet meals or restaurants with bills of over $100, stays at resorts or on idyllic beaches), in the case of Cuba, the aesthetics of pornographic poverty are privileged, something that is not at all original, as it is the representation that has prevailed in the hegemonic media since at least the 1990s. To this end, the videos are full of views of poor neighborhoods, dilapidated buildings, garbage dumps, and other scenes from the daily life of a poor third-world country. The peculiarity is that, in the case of Cuba, these scenes are, it is claimed, proof of the failure of the political project. And, of course, when they film in hotels or restaurants, they make sure to clarify that these are not places that the Cuban people usually visit.
The popular Mexican “influencer” Luisito Comunica, with more than 44 million followers, was in Cuba in 2025 and released a series of videos about the island, led by a long initial audiovisual piece that was fairly basic in its presentation and highly political. It is interesting to note that Luisito is famous, among other things, because his material is fairly unbiased, his communication is simple and entertaining, and he avoids talking about politics. The latter has been true in material ranging from Uganda to South Korea and from Serbia to Peru.
But one of the unwritten rules of communication on hegemonic platforms is that there is a group of countries that can only be represented in certain ways, under penalty of suffering a shadow ban (i.e., a reduction in the profile’s reach), reports from countless troll accounts that jeopardize the user’s own account, or, directly, a warning from the platform for considering that your content does not comply with community standards. This is the case, for example, with Russia, China, Venezuela, Nicaragua, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and, of course, Cuba. When talking about these countries, it is important that a negative presentation predominates, according to strictly pre-established parameters.
In the case of Cuba, these parameters can be summarized, broadly speaking, as follows: the overrepresentation of poverty, giving voice only to a specific sector of the Cuban people who are critical or opposed to the project, discourse on dictatorship and repression, and zero mention of the US blockade.
If these rules are not followed to the letter, the creator could face, in addition to the consequences mentioned above, attacks from countless real or troll accounts that do not accept any view of the island other than the hegemonic discourse. This pressure often achieves its results.
Returning to the example of Luisito Comunica, one of the videos he posted in that series on Cuba was about street food in Havana, something that is common in the material he produces. To do this, he consumed, among other things, several sweets that are part of the daily life of the Cuban people. He tried what we call “coquitos,” made with coconut candy, “churros,” made with fried wheat flour, sugar, and condensed milk, and a “bocadito de helado,” something that is sold and consumed in every neighborhood in Cuba.
Soon after, an avalanche of comments on the video claimed the opposite. And those sweets became, in that discourse, extraordinary privileges of an elite, as did “guarapo,” sugarcane juice, and inexpensive “cheese pizzas,” products of popular ingenuity and widely consumed by the people. The logic is clear. For the hegemonic narrative, it is not enough to present the reality of a country, even one as battered as Cuba today, but rather to present a “truth” that complements and develops the single narrative about the island. Although he paid the ideological price, Luisito did not strictly adhere to the narrative and paid a price for it. As a result of the pressure, shortly after the video was published, he posted another one apologizing and regretting having hurt the sensibilities of the Cuban people who were going hungry. Something he has never done before, despite visiting some of the poorest countries in the world.
Of course, Luisito’s case is not unique, nor is it the worst. His representation of Cuba was even decent compared to other less influential YouTubers, such as the Spanish J. Dalmau, to give another example. This discourse by “influencers” complements the ideological education provided by the hegemonic media to shape a single truth in the minds of young and not-so-young people: the only poverty that should be represented is that of socialism. In this way, the system is made invisible, its effects are hidden, and a totally unfair and negative perspective of the reality of a country like Cuba is formed.
In this green cayman of 10 million people, we undoubtedly have extraordinary political and economic challenges to overcome, starting with the immoral and illegal US blockade. We have poverty, contradictions, a project of social justice battered by the crisis that must be saved at any cost, and we also have beautiful landscapes, noble, warm, and good people, the best tobacco in the world, and the best coffee that is brewed during long and enjoyable conversations. We have a vibrant culture, a history of struggle, extraordinary dancers, a very unique, an irreverent sense of humor, and a thunderous laugh that is heard anywhere. We have blackouts and corruption, and we also have immense solidarity, which has saved countless lives around the world.
Cuba, like any country, has its lights and shadows, but it is far from that totally negative Manichean representation. This is the island of which Nicolás Guillén said: “Ay Cuba, I give you my voice/I give you my heart!”
The island of Martí, Fidel, Che, Benny, Bola de Nieve, Wifredo Lam, Haydee Santamaría, Fina García, and so many other extraordinary Cubans. The island of “Patria o Muerte!” (Fatherland or Death!), which for more than 67 years has stood up to US imperialism at a very high price. But you will never hear that from the hegemonic media and the overabundance of “influencers” who reproduce neoliberal groupthink. The truth, as in Plato’s myth of the cave, is a quest that truly begins when we turn our backs on the multiple representations that want to pass off as reality.
Source: Cuba en Resumen