A Cuban content creator identified as Eve published a reel on Facebook that was a direct blow against those who accuse Cubans of "romanticizing poverty".
Eve's message is clear and straightforward: "To content creators, listen up, stop saying that people are romanticizing poverty; no one is romanticizing anything in my life, there is poverty, it exists, it’s real."
"Not everyone has electricity at home, not everyone has air conditioning, not everyone has everything that you might have. Stop saying that you are romanticizing poverty," she clarified.
The reference to the "split" is not a minor detail. Cuba is experiencing its worst energy crisis in recent history, with blackouts in Havana lasting between 30 and 32 hours daily, and in provinces like Matanzas, there have been over 72 hours without service with just two hours of electricity.
Energy Minister Vicente de La O Levy admitted in May that Cuba has no reserves of fuel oil or diesel for electricity generation. The deficit reached 2,174 MW on May 14, with the system generating less than one-third of the country's needs.
In that context, having a functioning split air conditioner is a privilege that the vast majority of Cubans cannot afford.
Eve's video addresses a tension that has been simmering on social media for months.
On Monday, a neighbor from the Playa municipality in Havana described on Facebook the exhausting nightly ritual forced upon her by the crisis: she receives electricity only between 3:00 AM and 7:00 AM, and at that hour she must get up and try to complete as many household chores as possible.
A few days ago, another Cuban wrote that she no longer remembers the last time she ate with electricity or rested without worrying about a new blackout.
"It’s not just that there’s no electricity, it’s that there’s no electricity, there’s no water, there’s no life, and people are feeling depressed," summarized Mileydis González on her social media.
But Eve turns the argument around: it is not the Cubans who turn their misery into appealing content, but rather some creators—with better economic conditions—who accuse those who speak out about their real situation of exaggerating or turning their suffering into a spectacle.
The reality it describes is backed by figures that support it.
According to the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights, 89% of the Cuban population lives in extreme poverty, with incomes below $1.90 a day per person. Sixty-one percent of households cannot afford to buy the essentials for survival, and seven out of ten Cubans have stopped having breakfast, lunch, or dinner due to lack of money or food in the course of 2026.
The average monthly salary on the Island amounts to approximately 0.50 USD per day, a figure that makes it impossible to ensure basic nutrition. 80% of the population believes that the current crisis is worse than the Special Period of the 1990s.
The Cuban regime does not officially recognize poverty as a structural problem and has responded to complaints with criminalization and silencing, while the population continues to face blackouts, hunger, and an exodus that has reduced the island's population to approximately 8.62 million people.
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