We Are All Cuba
By Esther Zoza
HAVANA TIMES – Once again, I am surprised to hear such aggressive language, this time on social media. The attacks name fellow Cubans who exercise their right to have a different opinion. People who dare to have a critical or different perspective on reality are now “annexationists”.
For decades, we became used to not exercising our right to be heard. Maybe that’s why we make the same mistakes over and over again.
In recent months, warmongering language is heard and read in the Cuban government’s media. Line sitters and resellers have received nicknames which range from social disease to heartless public enemies.
All of these aggressive labels have taken me back to the bitter and painful ‘80s. Similar labels were used then for fellow Cubans who decided to leave the country for economic reasons. They were labeled a social scourge, traitors and scum.
We mustn’t forget that such incitement led to extremely violent incidents. These committed by most of society against men, women, children, teenagers and the elderly.
How could we forget?
It’s incredible how forgetting this means it is back in our present. How is it possible that we are still making the same mistakes? The alleged enemies of yesterday are the people supporting many Cuban families. Their money helps to ease the burden on our economy. How can we forget the pain of thousands of families who were torn apart by an imposed ideology?
Cubans aren’t only “the good ones”, the ones that do everything by the book. The ones who turn their eyes, the ones who don’t complain. We are all Cuba and we are all revolutionaries even within this diversity. We love our Homeland and we think about it.
It’s absurd and malicious to get people worked up and pit ourselves against one another. Instead we should all be working together for the best for our country.
Esther Zoza is correct in writing that Fidel Castro described Cubans who sought refuge in the grounds of the Peruvian Embassy as:
“scum”.
Additionally, he described the 125,000 of his fellow Cubans who took advantage of the Mariel boatlift in 1982 as :
“criminals, lumpens, anti-social elements, loafers and parasites.”
His unfavorable view of Cubans was extended in one of his last public statements on February 24th 2013 at the PCC Congress:
“The great battle to be imposed is the need for an energetic struggle without respite against the bad habits and errors being committed daily by many citizens including Party members in the most divisive spheres.”
The prating paragon of perfection, clearly regarded his fellow Cubans with contempt.