The revolution of indifference: why Cubans no longer expect anything from the government

In Cuba in 2025, rage and hope no longer dominate, but something deeper: exhaustion. It is neither resignation nor conformity; it is fatigue. It is the certainty, learned through countless broken promises, that nothing will change as long as power remains in the same hands. Faced with a regime that has spent decades managing misery and blaming the world for its failures, many Cubans have chosen to disconnect emotionally, to survive without expecting anything.

For over sixty years, power in Cuba has survived on speeches and slogans. Reforms that never materialize, plans that fail, external culprits that are repeated like a mantra. Each unfulfilled announcement, each repeated lie, has eroded the little trust that remained. No one believes in the revolutionary miracle anymore. Not even those who still mention it in public.

Everyday life is a constant test of that silent defeat. Endless queues, blackouts, hospitals without medicine, and salaries that are insufficient to afford food. The country survives thanks to remittances, the solidarity among family members, and the ingenuity of a people who manage to survive despite the state. Cubans do not expect solutions from above because they already know that there are no answers up there, only justifications.

Power confuses silence with obedience, but that is a mistake. What exists in the streets is not loyalty, but exhaustion. People have stopped protesting not because they agree, but because they are worn out. Disagreeing comes at a high price, and fear has become a custom. For years, the regime has taught that expressing an opinion can cost you your job, your freedom, or the future of your children. This is how apathy is imposed, not as true indifference, but as a defense mechanism.

Many have decided to leave. Mass emigration is not just an economic phenomenon; it is a cry for change. Every young person who leaves the country is voting with their feet. For many, leaving is the only free choice that still makes sense. Those who stay do so out of necessity, not out of hope. Exile has become the space where Cubans breathe what is denied to them in their homeland: freedom.

However, beneath that surface of fatigue lies something that those in power fear: memory. The Cuban people know who has lied, who has repressed, who has turned the homeland into a family treasure. They also know that no system can sustain itself eternally on misery and fear. When there is nothing left to lose, even fatigue becomes a seed of change.

Today, Cuba is an exhausted nation, but not defeated. Behind every vacant stare, there is a story of silent resistance. And while the regime attempts to project stability, everyone knows that there is no stability in hunger, no sovereignty in repression, and no dignity in forced obedience. Cubans expect nothing from power because they have long realized that true hope can only come from within themselves.

Indifference, then, is not defeat: it is the pause before awakening. A country without hope cannot sustain itself forever, and that day, sooner or later, will come. No rhetoric can obscure it.