Category: Translator: Norma Whiting

But this leads to other equally important questions: is there at least the intention to create such an agenda? would the opposing sectors and those of civil society be invited or allow to participate in its construction? Who would assume the public engagement of its compliance?

Without getting answers to these essential questions we will not be at the gates of a dialogue aimed at a solution for Cubans, but to an arrangement that would require their demonstration of faith once again, such as the one that made the empowerment of a dictatorship possible 50 years ago. So it is that, even for some of us who have declared ourselves opponents of the embargo as obsolete and retrograde politics, its unilateral and unconditional relaxation could be more harmful than beneficial at this juncture, given the regime’s ability to maneuver advantageously in critical situations. A negotiation, to be effective, requires certain conditions.

On the other hand, the intensification of the embargo would only lead to further hardship for Cubans, to an emphasis on violence in Cuba, the exodus, and the possibility of social chaos of unpredictable consequences. No opposition leader would be able to control such a scenario.

As we can see, is not a simple problem.

The Cuban opposition doubts

Internally, among members of the Cuban opposition, a climate of reserve prevails about the efficacy of a “negotiating” proposal that has not been clearly defined. Thus, in the absence of formulas that will allow solid advantages for Cubans or the attainment of long coveted democratic conquests, all optimism becomes intangible.

If the embargo is unconditionally adjusted, the Cuban government would be gaining momentum and consolidating its economic power. As a result, we would run the risk of “going forward” in reverse, towards capitalism with the Castro elite at the helm. A grim scenario.

The success of the negotiations would then consist in drawing such a clever and innovative strategy that it would allow trade and investments derived from “the easing” in effect reach Cubans, and that they might “gain autonomy” and advance in their rights, in a time period that the parties might consider reasonable. Because no discreet economic benefit should justify the absence of political and civil rights.

The opposition fears are not unfounded. Certain personalities conveniently interpret the effect of Raúl’s reforms, magnifying them, which is more alarming if the opinion comes from an experienced politician like Arturo Valenzuela –one of the signers of the letter to Obama- who considers the release of “the Cuba interchange” as a way to give power to Cuban citizens (…) the best way to empower the people”. Valenzuela speaks about “a Cuba that’s significantly changing” (interview published by the BBC/Mundo May 19th, 2014). And he really doesn’t lie: Cuba is changing, but not exactly for the benefit of Cubans, as the deterioration of the economy shows six years after “updating the model”, the growing exodus and the increment in repression against the dissidence.

It should be understood that Valenzuela isn’t necessarily interested in the aspect of Cuban civil liberties. After all, he is a politician from a foreign country and, as such, he defends other interests, not ours. However, his claims border on insult by stating that “there is a policy change in Cuba that encourages citizens to develop their business potential. At this time, about half a million entrepreneurs are beginning to rewrite the history of their country by starting their own businesses, creating jobs for their families and communities”. He is obviously referring, in such pompous terms, to the proto-entrepreneurs of small shops –like owners of small restaurants, rolling carts, taxis, trinket stands, and the whole gamut labeled under the insignia “small business owners”- out of which only a tiny minority would qualify as “entrepreneur” under the standards of a half decent country. In fact, the Cuban “civil society” does not even have the right to freely associate.

On the other hand, it seems counterproductive that any of the proposals that advocate “the momentum of the Cuban civil society” might include even their representation in their pro-democracy planning. Seemingly, not one of those aspiring to mediator-debater sees a modicum of talent or legitimacy among us.

In this sense, the 2010 experience was sobering, when the Catholic Church mediated with the government (at the government’s request) in the liberation process of the prisoners of Black Spring, but, to date, this has not yielded any advance as far as respect for their rights and freedoms or for the rights and freedoms of the rest of the Cuban people. The expectations raised by that process ended in another civic shipwreck.

Indeed, civil society is a weaker and minority sector, as befits a nation that has lived under a dictatorship for more than half a century.  However, this is no reason for the influential exile sectors to exclude dissident voices and the claims of the opposition in the right to participate in changes they have been demanding for decades. Such exclusion extends not only to the staunch defenders of the tightening of the embargo, but to those dissident sectors that have been opposed to it. The handiest pretext is that the regime would not approve negotiations if the opposition was represented. Thus, it is more productive to ignore it.

It is clear that we are living in times of change, though no one knows for sure if the changes will be for the better. Since we continue to be the kite at the mercy of the string and the wind, it wouldn’t be so bad that, for once, at least we might know where we are being led.

Friday, May 30th, 2014 | Miriam Celaya

Translated by Norma Whiting

It seems surprising, after the resounding disappointment of Eastern Europe’s “Marxist-Leninist” experiment, the proven economic inefficiency and widespread corruption of the model, in addition to the repression applied against any manifestation of free thinking, to find, among relatively young Cubans, who in addition consider themselves libertarians, such expressions, full of admiration and longing for that “beautiful and giant nation” as they refer to the defunct Soviet Union, especially in a social environment that is increasingly more distant to that monster’s, so such a stance is an anachronism similar to dancing a milonga* amid a rhumba carnival dance troupe.

Paradoxically, these diehard nationalists, whose common denominator is the absolute rejection of anything that smacks of “Yankee imperialism”, are the staunch defenders of what was once the metropolis of Cuba for thirty years, the USSR — that peculiar form that the Russian imperialism took for a time — and they don’t accept that a “bureaucratic elite” which held power, and particularly Mikhail Gorbachev, brought about “the betrayal of possibilities” of a socialist system that could not be sustained after 70 years of tight control over the economy, natural resources, political power and over society as a whole. They believe that in a few months barely a handful of bureaucrats swept off the socialist moral force and its achievements against millions of the “aided,” who later ratified at the polls the return to capitalism. That’s why our sleepless party animals are demanding another opportunity for the standardization and consecration of poverty. This is indeed the point: like postmodern Cathars, they demonize material wealth, as if poverty itself constituted supreme virtue.

Noting this, but being aware of everyone’s right to express their own political and ideological credo, which is what freedom is about — and also democracy, which these subjects distrust so, because it was born in bourgeois societies, and it’s fitting of them — we have to add that these are groups (the principle of the “collective” is essential) lobbying for the rights of workers, especially those of laborers, though they might not be, based on the absolute rejection of “capitalism”. They are so many other messiahs, especially those who worship that other ardent killer, Che Guevara, who, after executing so many Cubans, promoting so much violence in different regions, received a taste of his own medicine and made a disappearing act.

Their ideas and political strategies are, therefore, based on the old outlawry-Twentieth Century principle of socialism’s struggle (the “good”) against capitalism (the “bad”), where humankind — the workers, the “masses” — will achieve their due prosperity once the former triumphs over the latter. It doesn’t matter that we are already moving through the second decade of a new century, where knowledge, technological revolution, information and communications are essential, indispensable conditions for seeking global solutions for the present and the future of humankind; where political borders are increasingly blurring, and where the narrow concept of “capitalism” and “socialism”, “rights and lefts”, are not enough to define the complexities of an era that is giving birth — not without labor pains — to new relations and principles of global coexistence, including political ones.

But the infantile left (which, fortunately, is not the whole so-called “left”) is so caught up in flashbacks and in the contemplation of their virtuous navels that they have no clue.

Maybe that’s why they use trite phrases (as that kitsch one with an aura reminiscent of Guevara: “socialism cannot be built with the dull weapons of capitalism”) and, at the same time, they dusted off old and dull slogans and historical figures that were the authors or founders of the thought trends of which they are the self-proclaimed heirs, perhaps due to a congenital disability to establish some new paradigm of thought, better suited to the times. None of them has bothered to define what those “dull weapons of capitalism” might be which have allowed its continuation for over a millennium.

And it is not about denying true claims. I share, in principle, the critical attitude of those leftist sectors before the issue of foreign investments, be it at Mariel, in the field of tourism (hotels, golf courses, marinas, etc.) in various industries, in the field of agriculture or in other economic areas that this regime has systematically destroyed for 55 years. But, for the sake of the presence of the “transnationals” or because that “places us in the flux of capital and the global capitalist economy” — by the way, the only global economy is the capitalist economy, the “socialist” one is village economy, of whores and sugar mills — for, after all, I am definitively in favor of all that means prosperity, development and wealth, but Cubans on the Island are excluded from partaking in it, because such investments will only enrich the autocracy and its elite, and because workers will not even have the right to enter into contracts directly with those companies; on the contrary, they will be doubly dispossessed by the Government-State-Party through its employment agencies and by an abusive wage system.

At any rate, it is not seeking equality or in defense of socialism that thousands of Cubans leave the country each year, nor are those who risk their investments in a private enterprise inspired by Che or the USSR. It is well-known that true freedom lays in the full exercise of the capabilities of individuals, in their chances of success, not in the hypnotic miasma of ideologies. Let’s not blame capital for our own failures, because in Cuba there has not been any deadlier poison than that of the political discourse.  The Cuban Nation was forged on the desire for prosperity of her children, on the work and the talent of millions of them, not on the primacy of one ideology over another: such are the dull weapons that History has bequeathed to us.

Translator’s note: A milonga is an Argentine dance… as (in)appropriate in Cuba as another famous Argentine import.

Cubanet, 27 May 2014 | Miriam Celaya

Translated by Norma Whiting

Cubans in their seventies or older may remember May 20th as a national holiday when people celebrated the birth of the Republic with spontaneous joy each year. All of Cuba would dress up in flags, and there was celebration throughout towns and cities, because on May 20th, 1902, the American flag was taken down from the official poles, and, for the first time in history, our banner waved on its own.

The Witch’s Curse

But, just as in the fairy tale, our Princess-Republic also received a curse. The Witch-Revolution that took over power in 1959 was determined to rewrite the Island’s history under a new paradigm, to be followed by all Cubans henceforth. The olive green dogma, dictated from the military power oligarchy, devoted itself to mock the Republican past with unequivocal viciousness.

Since then, the autocracy indoctrinated us in denial: before January 1959, we had not had a Republic, instead –by Revolutionary-Sacred Word inflation- the period between 1902 and 1959 had been a pseudo-Republic or, preferably, a “mediated republic”, subordinated to the US and to the interest of foreign capital that embezzled the national treasure and stripped Cubans of their legitimate sovereign rights. A discourse that, paradoxically, sounds ever more like the current reality.

After half a century of “Republic” indoctrination and “revolutionary” plunder, Cuba retains just the name, which only appears in certain documents with official seals and the awful bills of a paper currency which -unlike those that circulated during the brief Republican democracy in the first half of the Twentieth Century- have no value. Thanks to the “mediated revolution” which was only a means for a military caste to assume absolute power, that buries all vestiges of Republican advances and snatches citizens’ rights, most Cubans on the Island have forgotten that the date for the celebration of democracy is May 20th and not January 1st .

A Judas for a false kiss

But, behold! the new reality that the regime is trying to build, in virtue of which the paradigm is, once again, foreign capital, requires a different image, more like prosperous societies which today are being summoned to the Island’s piñata. For that purpose, it is not enough to have the pseudo-legal deployment of a handful of “reforms” that confer doubtful rights to the plantation’s slaves and retain the droit de seigneur of the Castrocacy. It is necessary that the crew believes the discourse of the changes, the promises of a prosperity that (finally!) is just around the corner.

It is also important to stifle any scruples on the part of potential investors-saviors of the regime, so now we need to awaken the Princess-Republic, even if it is by force. In the first place, we need to start redrawing the past and reviewing History in order to prepare (repair) a discourse that, more than obsolete, is now uncomfortable. I’ll bet the Republic was not so bad after all, who knows that, after all is said and done, it was not all that mediated, but only a little.

Only thus can we explain how such a loyal herald to the Castros as the famous singer Silvio Rodríguez has brought us the novelty to propose in his blog “Segunda Cita” to recapture the May 20th celebration since -with all its flaws and virtues- The Republic of Cuba was born on that day. Obviously, the former rebel maverick troubadour turned bourgeois gentleman, because of his close links to power, has glimpsed from his vantage point the return of the Princess, and he wants her back, probably not covered in the tricolor banner, but in the trappings of the olive green of her masters. We will have to admit to Silvio that this ballad is indeed new, because to recover the celebration would be great in principle, but it is necessary to rescue the Republic first, which is not really Silvio’s intention, or that of the Castros.

I hope that the Princess does not confuse this Judas kiss in her slumber and stays asleep. Contrary to my own desires, which are those of many of my compatriots on all shores, I prefer she continues to sleep and wakes only with the caress that will bring with it the realization of a Republic that, so far, is a chimera: the cult of all Cubans to complete freedom.

Translated by Norma Whiting

In order to understand how the author of the article arrived at such a brilliant conclusion — going forward I will refer to him by his initials, AV — it is necessary to undertake a scholarly effort not as entertaining as the song I remember, that is, we have to read and analyze the article so we can understand how AV’s stretched his imagination so he can have an ending like that of the cat and the horns.

AV recounts the events, following with the logic that Cubans must take as the only and unquestionable truth. He doesn’t need to offer any proof, the official lies are enough. No trial is necessary, the “confession” of guilt and the official testimony are more than enough. It doesn’t matter if they do it in a more crudely and in an increasingly worse way.

As stated, the four captured terrorists came “with a dangerous plan that had been brewing for over a year” and “slipped into the country” with the intention to attack military installations”. They intended to “provoke violent actions and sow chaos” to create “social unrest”.

It would seem that the offenders’ entry must have been illegal, given that no one can “slip in” by way of an airport gate, with all the controls at customs, borders and all the other security measures that exist. It is also unclear what danger could result from a terrorist plot against military installations, since in Cuba, according to the General-President himself, we enjoy military invulnerability. In any case, it would be a suicide attack, right? Finally, it is not clear how four wretched terrorists could possibly be able to provoke violent actions, chaos or subversion against millions of “revolutionary” Cubans. Undoubtedly, this time the creators of the myth have gone a bit far.

Following AV’s saga, the four bad guys were caught under the coaching of three other terrorists, also Miami residents with a long pedigree of actions against Cuba, who are — in turn — friends of the worst one of them, Posada Carriles (one of the subjects who has offered the most in practice towards the ideology and strategies of the power of the Castros for decades).

From that point, AV starts a long narration of Posada Carriles’ long terrorist sheet and all his avatars between 1973 and the present, and he also takes a tour of Magriñá’s actions. They — we are told– were the ones who “encouraged and financed” these four dunces who were just captured here.

And how does all this relate to Zunzuneo and Piramideo? Because, as AV states, “It’s too coincidental that the idea of perpetrating terrorist attacks that result in violent actions are precisely the plans that have been orchestrated in other regions of the world”. As if Cuba had the same geo-political, economic or strategic importance as that of Syria, the Ukraine and Venezuela.

AV also notes that, “It is very curious that these terrorist plans have been organized when there already existed, along the same lines, other secret plans which have already been uncovered, such as USAID and various U.S. agencies, to use modern technologies like the internet, e-mail, and cellular phone text messages, which would be used to organize supposed support networks to be mobilized in case of social upheaval.” The “empire” is an essential ingredient in the Castro’s sour soup.

AV concludes that the actions that the detainees planned against Cuban military facilities “are very similar” to the objectives pursued by the Zunzuneo and Piramideo networks, thus creating “a false statement of opinion about the Cuban reality”. With this, AV considered as “proven” the “progression of the plans orchestrated against Cuba”. In both cases, ultimately aimed at justifying “foreign military action” in our country (??!!). Pure terrorism.

And for this complicated concoction to be complete, AV’s exorcism could not lack the mention of the “violent opposition” in Venezuela, like Leopoldo López and María Corina Machado, as well as “the irrelevant mercenaries advocating panic and death in Cuba”. Mission accomplished, AV. You took pains, and you sure earned a week’s bonus at the People’s Camping.

In conclusion, the matter does not have, not even close, the joke of the cat I mentioned at the beginning of this posting. It really isn’t funny at all. It is clear that the government, through its mouthpieces, has started a phase to “soften” public opinion, which usually precedes raids against dissident sectors and general worsening of the repression within the Island.

Because, as conspiracy theories go, we have to remember that the Castro regime and its sympathizers work the same as old marriages, and after such a prolonged coexistence many things are predictable. So it is a suspicious coincidence that, with such a difficult stretch that the Cuban economy is undergoing, with the growing social discontent and disillusionment, with the increasing exodus, deteriorating social services, lack of liquidity, the regime’s desperate need for foreign exchange and other clouds that darken the environment, a new “saving enemy aggression” has appeared on the Castro’s political horizon, useful to justify nationalist entrenchments and repression.

Neither does the worsening of mobile services seem to be a coincidence, despite the excuses offered by the (military) state enterprise in charge of those markets, or the fact that this pidgin article gets published in the official press just after the recent announcement made by blogger Yoani Sánchez of the impending debut of her digital newspaper. It must be uncomfortable for the olive green hosts that a new means of digital independent media is surfacing on the Island, just as more Cubans are getting access to mobile phone service with text messages and e-mail. It is a good idea to keep alert; the Castro-dogs must already be plotting what would be the most expeditious way to silence the criticizing voices within Cuba.

In any case, there are too many theories and guesses about the advocates of this old, outdated system, but nothing is going to save a system that has proved its inefficiency. Imaginary or real terrorists might not be the ones that will spoil the Castros’ rule, and their loyal servants will be surprised in the new Cuba, which we will have one day, who will truly be their masters.

But, as with cheating in a marriage, it is better that the cuckold himself learns of the deception, so I take the opportunity to send a personal message to the writer at Juventud (young?) Rebelde (rebel?) Amaury, you are a real cat!

Translated by Norma Whiting

9 May 2014

And it really is amazing to see how much weight this land can sustain! The Cuban reality is increasingly incoherent. Only in Cuba is it possible to celebrate a trade union congress without any unions or syndicates, or to reward leaders of an organization whose most important contributions in recent times have been to announce and support–as if it were a preview–the government’s plan for the layoffs of 25% of the country’s labor force; to approve, undauntedly and without blushing, the Labor Code proposed by the supreme exploiter of the work force this past December 20th, unpublished as of yet, and to convene a parade of workers to support the same political system that strips them of such basic rights as the free participation in economic reforms that are being forged at the offices of the olive green caste, that is, on the back of those same workers.

But Mr. Luis Manuel Castañedo, secretary general of the CTC, made an announcement this week in the capital that “this year’s march will be combative, massive, disciplined and compact, to uphold socialism, unity about the historical direction of the revolution, implementation of Guidelines and the support for the liberation of the antiterrorist Heroes, who remain unjustly imprisoned in the US.”

Thus, all mixed like in a Cuban stew, he rattled off his handful of stale and empty phrases, absolutely devoid of the least meaning for most of the people marching in the parade, and probably for himself.

Thus, for the short time it will take around the Plaza Cívica, Cuban marchers will postpone all illegal activities, such as robbing the State, smuggling, dealing in stolen goods, administrative corruption, etc., in order to march as obediently as frauds before the “crispy rice” monument, just before the statue of that foremost Cuban, who was never unionized and who, in addition, rejected socialism for considering it “future slavery”. One cannot conceive greater absurdity and hypocrisy.
Just in case, and taking into account that the layoffs, “desertions” and constant emigration have decimated the ranks of the ever heroic Cuban workers , the CTC will make sure that the CDR (Committee for the Defense of the Revolution), the FMC (Federation of Cuban Women), the Combatants Association, students and the UJC (Young Communist Union) will be in attendance. We need to fill in, whenever possible, the obvious blanks that have been appearing of late among the ranks of the faithful in the processions.

When the tumultuous pantomime finally ends next Thursday, nobody will know for sure what the working class might really be celebrating, so many industry and job shutdowns, the tax increases, the insufficiency of wages, the breaches of the sugar harvest and agricultural plans, market price increases, the denial of the right of free contract or any other of many similar achievements that have come hand-in-hand from the Guidelines, the apex of the late-Castro fruit. Whatever. This is about a matter of pure form and not content, not necessarily of being, but of pretending. Not standing out.

If it were not so sad it would be laughable. Chances are that even Karl Marx himself would be surprised if he could witness the parade of workers held in slavery. And, on the record, all without the need for lashes or overseers. Some rascals, those who are always joking around, say that the General President has a hidden card to ensure attendance: whoever completes the parade’s circuit will be stimulated with a glass of milk. Now they tell us!

Translated by Norma Whiting

1 May 2014

R soaked us with “having tried to be the voice of ordinary Cubans,” of “the man on the street” through his blog. He says this with such conviction that there are even those who, besides himself, have believed it. And, since this man is not afraid and has taken his messianic mission very seriously, he is proposing that, “from now on, whoever has an interest in continuing to debate on the reality of the Island, will be able to do so through my personal page”. Very humble, R, seriously, and we should be thankful… where else could we do it otherwise?

I must confess that my stomach is not that strong, so I read R’s work only every now and then, and afterwards, I spend some time detoxing. For example, phrases like this sicken me: “We tried to decipher the keys to the psychiatric hospital crime, where some thirty patients died from hunger and cold”. In Cuban lingo R was really “discovering” warm water because that monstrous crime was in no way encrypted.

For most Cubans, and to every independent journalist who covered the story extensively and published serious review articles about the case, the essence of the events lies in the corrupt nature of the system, its officials and, in particular, the impunity of its practitioners and those who are foremost responsible: the dictatorial gerontocracy of over half a century, that is, the same one R awards great credit for the universal health care for Cubans.

In any moderately democratic country, more than one high official would have been blown out of the water over a similar scandal. OK, then, the events of the psychiatric hospital are just the sample button of the quality of health service offered to ordinary Cubans, common Cubans who have no access to hard currency clinics, or to the CIMEQ*, where the anointed and the leaders are cared for. Needless to say, mental patients are the most fragile and defenseless.

If R knew a tad more about the history of Cuba, he would know that, though as inadequate as it is today, Cuba had public health care since colonial times; therefore, it is not a Castro-innovation. And there were health care institutions that were eliminated by the revolution: I, as the daughter of a qualified laborer and a housewife, was born at Acción Médica (Coco and Rabí Streets, Santos Suárez, Havana) a clinic all the members of my family belonged to. Their service and their attentive care were both very good.

As for “low infant mortality” so highly advertised, many specialists question the accuracy of Cuban statistics. In fact, they are so fickle that they do not reflect the number of neonates who die before being entered in the records, because there is an official policy that guides registration of births when newborns are healthy and have at least some basic guarantees for survival.

I know testimonials from parents whose children were born with certain defects or conditions incompatible with life and remained hospitalized until their death, several days later, without ever being registered. Officially, these children are never born, so they go from the womb to their eternal sleep without the required red tape. Thus, officials prevent them from being a negative number in the fabulous statistics displayed to the world, but what does it matter, if even the World Health Organization recognizes the overwhelming success of revolutionary medicine and applauds it excitedly.

As for “universal education” comments are not needed. Every Cuban born in this process who has attended school in previous decades, and whose children and grandchildren have also been students in Cuba know only too well about the deteriorating quality of education, teachers and teaching facilities, more manifest in the last two decades, to say nothing of the indoctrination and the segregation of those who think differently than the official line.

If R considers this an achievement, he should also know that public and private education existed since colonial times on the Island, and that, since the eighteenth century, academic tradition was established in our country and lasted until the totalitarianism of this government turned it into a hostage to ideology and monopolized, generalized, and uniformed, to its detriment, all education.

As an example, my grandson Cesar, who is in first grade, learned about “the five heroes”, Che Guevara and F. Castro at school, however, they have never mentioned Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, Ignacio Agramonte or any of the founding fathers of the Cuban nation to him… and even less the great civic figures in the history of this country.

Another issue would be what R calls “the world’s most efficient civil defense”. This already seems a hallucination as a result of an overdose …of something. What exactly is the “civil defense” for this brilliant journalist? The answer is a mystery, so we can only speculate. Could it be that he is referring to the spectral MTT**, whose only “proof” of existence is the work-day that all of this country’s state employees donate annually, but nobody knows where the money goes or how these funds are used?

Or is this what R calls the amorphous mass, grouped under the generic “CDR” whose only purpose is to pay the State a few cents monthly and to light up a bonfire once a year to display the collective hunger by consuming a repulsive (revolutionary) stew? Does R ignore that the CDR’s are today a pipe dream, just shreds of the most formidable organization that Castro I created in order to spy on us and get us to betray each other, which filled people with distrust, envy and hatred?

In criticizing the dissidence and some others of Cuba’s ills, R states he’s seeking a necessary “journalistic balance” (some euphemism!). R is just spewing the first thing that comes to mind or whatever is at hand, be it a stone or something less principled, which–far from achieving some balance–only results in murky half-truths or misrepresentations. It’s what happens whenever a “critic” attacks the effects, carefully avoiding pointing out the causes. Thus, R is playing with the chain, including some high links, but he keeps a very prudent distance from the monkey. That way, anyone can be an acrobat and keep the balance.

He does lash out at “the dissidence”, and how! This is what happens when, from his comfortable seat, R questions the finances that the same dissidence gets, since such an expert analyst of the Cuban reality must know, members of the dissidence are expelled from jobs and school and many lack any other income or livelihood.

At the same time, for R–and for the Cuban regime–it is obvious that any “dissent” is funded by the U.S. government: apparently, they have their proof. However, I don’t know of any dissident jailed for being “in the service of a foreign power”. Who could believe that the olive green satrapy would allow the existence of so many “mercenaries” when the mere act of protesting or making an anti-government poster has resulted in brutal reprisals or landed many Cubans in prison?

But we human beings always have something in common. Here’s where R and I are alike: I’m not “politically correct”. Indeed, some people think I’m not correct at all. Though I suspect we do not have the same concept of what is “political” or what is “correct”. For instance, R says on his blog “we analyzed the dissidence’s weaknesses” (because in his infinite virtue, R humbly overuses the plural and replaces the “I” with an unpretentious “we”, a common vice among speakers of the nomenclature).

At times, I have also criticized the proposal or program of my opponents, stipulating the reasons why I don’t share their views, which doesn’t mean I don’t respect or support them in their struggle against the regime and in favor of democracy, or do not recognize their values. Because, if we are talking about equilibrium, attacking the dissidence–the weakest link of the political chain in Cuba–is the easiest thing in the world; not allowing them a chance to reply is simply indecent.

As in every community or human group, it is true that not all the members of the dissidence are an example of virtue or honesty, but that does not imply that the opposition is a cesspool of detritus. R doesn’t even acknowledge the value of certain groups or individuals that have been performing staid and growing civic work within society and enjoy great prestige in their communities, as well as outside of Cuba.

Manipulating information, distorting and fragmenting reality to suit your fancy and raving against sectors and individuals who do not have the possibility or the means to defend themselves and who are at a total disadvantage against the longest dictatorship in this hemisphere is opportunism and mediocrity, but, above all, it is immoral and unethical.

Finally, if, as R says, “the chief diplomat of the U.S. in Cuba recommended that the State Department” should read his blog “to understand the real situation” in our country, revealed through a “secret cable” filtered through Wikileaks, our sincerest congratulations (to R, of course, because the State Department would just end up with yet another oblique interpretation from a foreigner who is thriving on the Cuban situation).

There is no doubt that R can still extract other advantages from his undeniable ability to sell himself as a specialist of the topics he writes about. Pity those souls who give him credit or pay for his work; it is well known that all spectacles need their public.

It is striking, however, that R considers as beneficial the acknowledgment he gets from the government he often condemns because it maintains the “criminal embargo” against the Island and, in addition, finances us, the sinister mercenary dissidence. Will he make up his mind, already and pick a side? Maybe neither; rather, the incident deeply flatters his ego and serves as a present for his arrogance, hence the gloating.

I think I’ve already overextended myself. Some might be of the opinion that so much effort was not worth it, as a very wise saying goes: to foolish words, deaf ears. I have decided this time to go with another: silence means consent. These twisted characters can end up doing a lot of harm.

For the rest, my regular readers know that this writer is characterized by the absence of hair follicles on her tongue [she will say whatever she thinks], a trait which will annoy some. What are we gonna do! It’s very hard for me to keep silent in the face of so much effrontery. Chauvinism aside, it especially irks me to see such cheap verbiage from a foreigner who, when it’s all said and done, does not hurt for Cuba, Cubans, or their distresses. As far as I’m concerned, if this man is the voice of Cubans, it would be better for us if he remained discretely silent.

*El Centro de Investigaciones Médico Quirúrgicas (Medical-Surgery Research Center, in Havana)
**The Territorial Troops Militia (Milicias de Tropas Territoriales)

Translated by Norma Whiting
4 April 2014

Meanwhile, the sub-plots complement the storyline, offering the viewer elements that reinforce human situations and character profiles. Nothing is lacking and nothing is superfluous in this moving film, which the public has embraced with unprecedented warmth. The director, Ernesto Daranas, uncovers the marginality, violence, corruption and neglect of the most financially disadvantaged social classes; the indifference of institutions and officials; the strict mechanisms and prejudices of a system not designed for free people but for obedient herds.

The setting, beautiful despite its squalor, is the beautiful crumbling city, the corners that do not appear in tourist postcards, the neighborhoods where common, lesser people live, without whom we would not recognize Havana; everyone living alongside vices – and many living off them — those vices that the official discourse declared as having been exiled by the revolution over five decades ago.

The script points directly to many of the ills of today’s Cuba: corrupt police, political prisons, the absurdity that a Cuban from the provinces is considered an “illegal” in the capital, the emigration which is draining us. But present in every showing is the apotheosis of a public that applauds with emotion, standing in the darkness of the movie houses when Carmela, the character of the teacher, openly refers to the length of time that this government is in power. That is why Conducta is, more than a film, an event one cannot stop talking about.

The movie seems great and sad at the same time, with the sepia tones of slovenliness and decadence in which we may glimpse, despite it all, kindness, love, human solidarity, tenderness, innocence and hope. And, paradoxically, that same hope is the director’s gift to us at the movie’s end, without resolving the conflicts. Daranas does not pursue the complacency of a glib public, but when he rattles the audience, he compromises awareness. Maybe that explains why Conducta does not have an open, shut, tragic, or happy ending. It’s like a ball being thrown from the screen to the audience, just so we can stop being spectators; a smart and complicit way to remind us that we are all part of the same drama, that it’s up to all of us to construct that inconclusive ending. In that sense, the movie could not have come at a better time.

Too bad that so much empathy, so much complicity and so much fused energy will manifest themselves only in the dark cover of the movie theaters. It’s a shame that the vessel of our proverbial patience is so deep that there isn’t a drop capable of making it run over.

Too bad, too, that the opposition sectors have not found a way to capitalize on people’s empathy and use it creatively in favor of democratic changes. For now, it is expected that this sort of referendum –through projections- may continue to be produced as the first showings of Conducta reach all corners of the country, but beyond values and the undeniable success of the movie, one thing is true: we have too many Chalas but not enough Carmelas.

Cubanet, 3 March 2014, Miriam Celaya

Translated by Norma Whiting

Judging by the official Cuban press, external reality does not seem to exist, so the “events” may be a gray “syndicate” congress in a country where no syndicates exist, a few “reforms” that do not reform anything, or whatever is dictated by a government that misgoverns a colony of ants that spends its days striving for sustenance, untouched by the joy of the liberated, ignorant of the will and courage of the opponents of Nicolas Maduro, the civility of Ecuadorians who opted for the polls to control the excessive power ambitions of a thug vested as president, and of everything that happens in the world beyond the reefs of a damned Island.

Venezuela hits us especially close, because of its shameless sponsorship by the Cuban dictatorship, obsolete and ruined, extending its evil shadow over a nation rich in natural and human resources. Fortunately for them and for us, Venezuela is not a country of zombies. Nevertheless, it causes sadness and apprehension all at once to see evidence that other peoples are capable of what we are not.

Pity our country, Cuba, whose children choose silence and flight instead of exercising their rights against the olive green satrapy that condemns them to slavery and poverty.

Translated by Norma Whiting
24 February 2014