En una dictadura lo corriente es ser cobarde

En una dictadura lo corriente es ser cobarde is a line Manuel Arroyo Benítez uses to make fear and concealment sound ordinary—and, in that moment, survivable. He tells his daughter Simona that people may call her a coward for leaving her newspaper job, but insists that in a dictatorship such a judgment will surprise no one. The phrase turns an accusation into cover for a family’s attempted disappearance.

The saying in context

One week after the events that prompt the plan, Manuel is trying to persuade his family to leave Buenos Aires for Fortín Tiburcio. Simona’s daughter has been crying at the prospect of going to the newspaper the next day to say goodbye. The explanation will be that she did not know her boyfriend was a subversive and has been so affected by the news that she needs time away.

Manuel anticipates the social cost of that story: people may think Simona is a coward, and may later call her a traitor. His answer is not to deny that they will be judged, but to make judgment seem manageable. Under dictatorship, he says, cowardice is commonplace; the family can accept the insult and still act.

A practical cover for flight

The line belongs to a concrete scheme, not an abstract argument about courage. Manuel says the family will leave the day after the newspaper farewell and go to Fortín Tiburcio. He proposes that Simona explain the trip as a summer holiday at a house that is already hers, recalling that the family used to go there when the children were small.

He supplies further details for the account: Guillermo and Juan have finished their exams, and Simona is going to put the house up for sale and make the necessary arrangements. A buyer would be useful, he adds. The ordinary errands and familiar destination are meant to make departure look plausible; the saying helps recast retreat as the unremarkable behavior of people living under repression.

Resistance, fear, and the family’s choice

The sentence carries a deliberate tension. Manuel does not present the family’s departure as fearless defiance: he names the expected cowardice and asks them to proceed anyway. His reassurance makes room for fear without letting the fear settle the question of whether they should escape.

The family does not immediately agree. Simona questions whether Manuel has lost his mind and doubts that anyone would buy a house stripped of its land. Guillermo objects that he has two subjects left before completing Industrial Engineering and has an exam the following month; his brother also says he has things to do in Buenos Aires. Manuel pauses, takes a breath, and asks Simona whether she wants to disappear, then asks the other two children whether they want him to disappear. The saying thus stands at the hinge between an improvised public excuse and a private decision whose consequences have not yet been settled.