A Difficult Verb to Conjugate / Fernando Dámaso

In some of my posts I have written about the need for tolerance in order to face each day in our difficult present, and confront whatever the future holds for us. Anchored in dogmatic positions, without the willingness to accept differences, there is very little we can accomplish. For many years, perhaps too many, this has been our biggest mistake. Thinking ourselves infallible, possessors of absolute truth, we have turned a deaf ear to the voices of others. The disastrous results are there for all to see.

A tolerant attitude of each citizen, whether occupying a position of management or amongst those at the bottom, would oxygenate our society, facilitate breathing and renew strength, ensuring the participation of all without exclusion of any kind, in the arduous task of restoring the nation.

If tolerance, discarding the fanatic attitudes that only leads to violence with its load of pain and resentment, is important today, how much more so will it be in the near future where all of us, those who are wrong and those who are not wrong, those who left and those who stayed, all those responsible to a greater or lesser degree for our situation, must work together, one day burying forever the differences that for many years have divided and separated us. Cuba is one, and all of her children form a part of Cuba, however they think.

To tolerate is not a verb that is easily conjugated. For too long it has been a cursed verb. To accept it and apply it in our conduct as citizens requires effort and, even more, the conviction of its necessity. But it is essential. Without it, the road to the reunification of citizens is impassable.

Citizen reunification is a necessity. Enough of watching each other as if we were enemies, of feeling happy at the misfortune of others, tripping each other up, of being two faced. Anyone who thinks differently is not a traitor, or a mercenary, or unpatriotic, or a lackey of the empire, or any other nonsense that is repeated daily. It’s just a citizen who thinks differently, and therefore, as worthy of respect as anyone else.

Translated by ricote

November 12 2010