CUBA

Cuba's healthcare system is celebrated globally — the island produces more doctors per capita than almost any nation — but the mental health infrastructure tells a different story. Psychiatry in Cuba has historically served the state: dissidents were diagnosed with psychiatric conditions, and the line between treatment and control remains blurred. For Cuban men, engaging with the mental health system means trusting an institution that has been weaponized against free thought.

The economic crisis, intensified by tightened US sanctions and post-COVID collapse, has pushed Cuban masculinity to its breaking point. The jinetero (hustler) economy — where men survive through black-market dealings, tourism-adjacent services, and creative illegality — has become the de facto masculine role. Meanwhile, the mass emigration waves through Central America have separated families in ways that mirror the Mariel and balsero crises of earlier decades. Cuban men now scatter across Mexico, Spain, and Miami, carrying revolutionary pride and personal shame in equal measure. The men who remain on the island face daily power outages, food shortages, and a government that demands gratitude for a revolution that increasingly feels like a cage.