What you need to understand about Cuban prisons before commenting on a political prisoner

The Cuban prison system is a closed, arbitrary, and deeply corrupt structure, where prisons operate as fiefdoms managed by chiefs with extensive powers over the lives of inmates. Extreme hunger, malnutrition, unsanitary conditions, tuberculosis, scabies, parasitism, bedbugs and other insects and rodents, gastrointestinal diseases, a lack of medication, and almost always insufficient medical care prevail within them.

Physical and psychological torture, prolonged isolation, sexual abuse, theft, drug trafficking, violence among inmates tolerated or promoted by officials, and deaths that go unpunished are also very common.

In Cuban prisons, if an inmate is skilled, brave, bold, and has financial resources, they can buy and have many things. Common prisoners smuggle in marijuana, alcohol, food, and even obtain or purchase sex from women associated with Minint and some female medical staff. In the regime's prisons, you might encounter a few individuals who are very overweight or even muscular like Arnold Schwarzenegger, alongside thousands more who are malnourished, resembling prisoners from Auschwitz-Birkenau.

In that hell, not all political prisoners receive the same treatment. The situation of each individual depends on a complex combination of factors: their identity and public prestige, their level of rebelliousness, their ability to organize and denounce, the support of their family, the opposition, the exile community, and the democratic world, their personal skills, and the current national and international political climate.

The first factor is who the political prisoner is. A person who is internationally recognized does not receive the same treatment as someone whose name is hardly known outside their municipality; their detention prompts denunciations from governments, parliaments, human rights organizations, artists, intellectuals, and political figures. Public visibility can partially protect the prisoner because it raises the political cost of murder or irreparable harm.

But that protection is never absolute. A prisoner can have the greatest international solidarity and, at the same time, maintain the highest level of defiance within the prison. They can refuse to wear the uniform of a common criminal, not stand during roll call, reject formations, not rise before the military, report beatings, and use every phone call not only to speak with their family but to inform about hunger, corruption, torture, diseases, and the crimes that occur within the prison.

You can also protest when the authorities organize political rallies, shout slogans against the dictatorship, refuse to participate in events for May Day or July 26, and organize political and common prisoners to demand better conditions.

In that case, neither his fame nor international solidarity will prevent him from being beaten, isolated, threatened, or deprived of his rights. Visits, correspondence, and phone calls will be suspended. He will be sent to punishment cells, his family's food supplies will be taken away, and violent guards and/or common prisoners will be used against him.

The regime will embark on a war to force him to lower his level of rebellion. External solidarity may prevent them from killing him, but not necessarily from torturing him.

When that rebellious prisoner has a courageous family, an active opposition, a mobilized exile, and wide international support, the oppressors know that his death would have consequences. That’s why they can avoid resorting to murder, although they continue to punish him severely.

If it maintains a high level of rebellion but lacks widespread support, the danger increases extraordinarily. They can destroy it physically and psychologically, leave it to die from hunger or illness, induce suicide, drive it to madness through isolation, or kill it directly.

Family support is crucial. A prisoner may be known internationally, but without brave family members to denounce each abuse, the political police can gradually isolate them until they are silenced. A family that stands up to the prison, protests in the streets, in front of the Communist Party offices, speaks with journalists, and mobilizes human rights organizations becomes the prisoner’s first line of defense.

It doesn't save him from all the blows, but it makes it harder for him to disappear within the system.

There are also political prisoners who choose to maintain a less confrontational demeanor. This does not make them bad activists or betray their cause. Some decide to keep their political convictions intact, but avoid protesting every abuse, constantly confronting the military, or publicly denouncing everything that occurs. They do this to survive in a hellish and cruel world. They want to avoid beatings, torture, isolation, suspension of visits, loss of family-provided food, and physical or mental destruction.

When a prisoner is well-known and receives international support, but does not declare open war within the prison, the political police may grant certain conditions. They may allow the prisoner to receive more food, books, materials for writing or painting, phone calls, and visits. They may be more willing to address some complaints. The prison will still be terrible, but the regime will try to make their hell a little less unbearable in exchange for not organizing protests or turning the prison into another front of struggle. This does not prove collaboration.
It may simply be a survival strategy.

Now, if the prisoner is not known, has no active family or external support, the regime may have no regard for him, even if he is not confrontational. He can suffer from hunger, be robbed by common inmates, and endure arbitrary treatment without concern from the political police. He does not represent a significant political cost and, therefore, is much more exposed.

Intelligence and the skills of the inmate also play a role. A person capable of earning the respect of common prisoners, building alliances, and approaching certain officials who do not act out of political fanaticism but out of economic necessity, can have collaborators and secretly bring in or take out food, medicine, information, and complaints even while being very isolated and monitored. They can assist other inmates and receive help when needed. However, even these abilities have their limits. An inmate subjected to permanent surveillance, cameras, microphones, and total isolation has significantly fewer opportunities than someone living in a collective housing unit.

The political moment also changes the treatment. When the regime is expecting a visit from a Pope, a head of state, or an important delegation, or when it tries to negotiate benefits with foreign governments, it may temporarily reduce certain abuses. It can slightly improve food quality, allow visits, or avoid actions that are too visible and scandalous.

When one believes that no concessions will be granted and that there is nothing to lose, sadism, violence, and torture may increase.
That is why there is no fixed formula. The treatment depends on the prisoner, the prison, their guards, their behavior, their family, their national and international support, and the political interests of the regime at any given time.

For example, two very brave and rebellious political prisoners, who are well-known internationally, may receive completely different treatment if one accepts exile while the other refuses to accept it. The first will see the end of aggression and punishment, while the second will face an increase in them.

If both decide to accept forced exile, but one chooses to follow most of the rules imposed by the political police while the other does not, the first will be released sooner and will not be beaten or tortured during the process, while the second will see his departure delayed and the pressures against him increase.

Those who are not familiar with this reality should act with caution before making judgments. If a person is not a specialist in urology, they should not attempt to diagnose the condition of a patient's kidneys and urinary system. They must listen to the urologist, who studied that specialty and understands how the body functions.

Similarly, those who are not familiar with the Cuban penitentiary system from the inside should not speculate, defame, or lightly accuse a political prisoner for the decisions made in a hellish environment. Criticizing without knowledge or evidence does not aid the cause of freedom.
Before judging the prisoner, one must understand what a concentration camp in the Nazi style is like in the 21st century.