From: ez000281@hamlet.ucdavis.edu
Newsgroups: soc.culture.latin-america
Subject: Re: Human Rights in Cuba
Date: 4 Jan 93 16:59:37 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Computing Services, UC Davis

Kevin Chambers writes:

>In article <20687@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> ez000281@hamlet.ucdavis.edu writes:
[...]
>>Well, Adolfo, one thing is to support Marxism, another is to believe in
>>Marxism, particularly the tenets related to the non existence of god.

>I'm left speechless.
>I'd sure like to hear some Jews speak on this; ignorance is an oft-
>forgotten form of anti-Semitism.

Kevin,

If Alberto's claim in favor of the existence of Jews who are atheist is true  
then he is either 1) promulgating the existence of Jewish culture INDEPENDENTLY 
from religion, in which case we could also find Jews who are Christian (a very 
neat contradiction for some), or 2) Believing that to be a Jew it is simply a 
matter of being semitic (i.e., belonging to a specific race of mankind), which 
would disallow semites from believing in other religious creeds. As I state 
before, I believe there is no such Jewish race, and that Judaism is 
fundamentally a religion which brings with it a culture of its own.  As far as 
my "anti-semitism" is concerned, would you please quote any of my statements 
which reveal hatred towards Semites, or if you prefer, Jews.  You see, I'm 
getting sick and tired of having the holocaust slaped in my face every time I 
get into a discussion about Judaism, Zionism, Israel and the Palestinias, or 
related topics. It seems that the quickest way to avoid any serious discussion 
on these topics is to tag the oponent as an anti-semite or a Jew hater, in the 
same fashion that Castro supporters tag their enemies as "gusanos", "CIA 
agents", all sorts of epithets which serve the purpose of throwing smoke over 
the discussion.  This discussion was originally about Human Rights in Cuba, it 
spilled over into Marxism, and now into anti-semitism, while avoiding to 
mention the CORE argument:  human rights abuses abound in totalitarian Cuba, 
and standards of living (in the case they are as wonderful as the promised 
land) reflect nothing about the protection of human rights in Cuba,.since there 
have been countries which have historically created fairly good and 
"socialized" health systems while at the same time systematically violate Human 
Rights.

>
>>Sure, but these movements represented no working class.  They represented the
>>radicalized middle class. . . .

>the middle class is a subset of the working class, since they obviously
>work to support themselves.  Your generalization is absurd.


The middle class is no subset of the working class, the middle class has 
capital, and workers have no capital.  Having a salary is not indicative of 
being a worker.  You can have a salary in the six digits and at the same time 
have plenty of it invested.  Furtheromore the middle class has non of the 
cultural attributes of the working class.  They are impulsive entrepeneurs who 
want to climb the ladder of capital as fast as they can, and when they see they 
can't do it sa fast, some opt for manipulating the working class and the 
peseants in the name of "socialism" in order to gain power. Communist parities 
are middle class parties.  Marx was a Doctor in Philosophy, Lenin was a laywer, 
Mao and Stalin were exceptions which the party later "educated", Camarada 
Gonzalo was a Doctor in Philosophy, Fidel Castro was (and still is) a well to 
do spoiled brat,  Agentinian marxists in the guerrilla movement were mainly 
frustrated intelectuals, Ho Chi Minh was a school teacher, and the Ortega 
brothers....  well lets let someone else speak about the rich and famous.


>Ignorance is an oft-forgotten form of the oppression of Gays and Lesbians.
>Didn't you just mention the value of a peice of paper in a previous
>writing? Oh, that was in regards to CUBA, and your generalization perhaps
>is restricted to nations that you don't like.  

No, you are absoulute right that the new legislation our Republican Governor 
just signed in California is but that, a piece of paper.  But it so happens to 
be that the leaders of the Gay movement were fighting for years to be treated 
as and ethinic minorities in terms of legal protection from discrimination and 
now they got it.   What is now needed is the succesful implementation of the 
law, and the gay movement in California has sufficient power and money to get 
it done.  Imagine, they can even lead a powerful boycott against Colorado for 
not granting them the same legislation (if blacks had that same power the would 
be in the White House).  Now, in Cuba (and the rest of homophobic Latin 
America) you can't even imagine such law being passed, especially when the 
state considers homosexuality a "deviation" and "moral depravation", and what 
is worse, homosexuals can't even come out of the closet at the risk of loosing 
what little they have left.

>There is NO dependable
>source available in the United States saying how much money Gays and Lesbians
>make.  Since the oppression of homosexuals is so strong, those who
>are financially secure are usually the ones to "come out".  When arguments
>are built on faulty information like this, everything that comes after is
>to be taken with a grain of salt....

Well it seems that many are financially secure and have come out of the 
closet.  Places like SF and NY have become granola cities.  You just can't find 
a single city in Latin America where fruits and nuts live out of the closet 
without being socially considered as low class "queers".  In fact, in Latin 
America anybody who would come out in defense of fair treatement for 
homosexuals (as I have) would immediately arouse suspicion and be treated as a 
potential "marica", even if he is straight..  Interstingly enough, in Puerto 
Rico, thanks to our long standing democratic tratidition, a "gay" movement 
(there is no translation for "gay" in Spanish, we simply say "maricon" or 
"homosexual", the new Puerto Rican movement has introduced "guei" into the 
vernacular) has sprouted on the island.  Previous to that movement, homosexuals 
in Puerto Rico, as in all of Latin America, were left in the closet or treated 
as "fags".  Nevertheless Puerto Ricans never reached the extremes of Cuban 
homophobes, who, in one occasion, summoned all homosexuals to a square in 
Havanna, where they were to be informed of the new liberal policy of the 
government.  The unfornunate ones who showed up at the meeting were faced with 
baton weilding thugs who clobbered them so that nobody would dare come out of 
the closet again in Castro's Cuba.  So, if comparisons is becoming the rule of 
the thumb in terms of human rights,  Cuba has hit rock bottom on this one.

Edelmiro Salas