Nothing goes without saying these days, it is worth stating the case. And Haiti does have leaders, even if the political variety are not an option at the moment. It isn’t about recognition, it is about what you do with it - none of your commentary offers any thoughts or ideas that might improve things. You’re pointing at suffering and just going “it’s kind of their fault”.

Of course Haiti has agency, that is the point I made. They have **not ** been free of foreign control by any measure however, between direct interdiction by the US to heavy handed influence from the World Bank and others. The US kidnapped the sitting President in 1991 for goodness sakes! Your statement that it is a failed state is a facile observation - yes, but downplaying the role others have and laying it at the feet of the Haitian people is dishonest.

For the record I absolutely agree that “shut up” is generally a poor response to any criticism, but it is warranted in this case because you are restating the known from the outside without any engagement or solution-seeking. Just saying something sucks is not only not a helpful observation, it adds to the echo chamber of hopelessness that you yourself mentioned faces the people of Haiti. So if you aren’t going to give proper context, and you aren’t going to offer up support or ideas or insight or anything, then yes, silence is the best choice.

EDIT: Also I just can’t get over

You’re right that the country would almost certainly be better off if the French and Spanish hadn’t colonized it in the first place. That almost goes without saying. (emphasis mine)

The fact that you are leaving an opening for the possibility the the genocide of the Taino and the brutal kidnapping and oppression of the various African communities may be the better outcome for them after all is insane and seriously makes me question if you are even taking this seriously.

This is beyond not true. If the colonizers hadn’t first killed off the native Taino, then forcibly kidnapped people from Africa, then made sure to destabilize their native culture groups, then made sure they could not access advanced education, then took those that found a way when people took their freedom from the colonizers, then made up an imaginary debt to cover the “cost” of the people they’d enslaved, then had the backing of the international community to force them to pay the imaginary debt all the way through 1947, then consistently interfered with and destabilized the political development of the country up to the modern day while also pushing for export-first agriculture and undermining local production with “aid” - then we could have a conversation about the foibles of Haitian leadership.

The Haitian people can and should challenge their leaders and strengthen their governance, but everyone else can either apologize and look for ways to be supportive or shut up.