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Poppell, Have you considered also working with other agents in the area to promote your rental? The local workers would not typically choose your type of rental, it would probably be too expensive for their means. Tourist typically look for rentals during the dry season only and any rentals during the rainy season should probably be considered gravy rather than income you come to count on or expect–no matter what any developer says…
Perrogrande, Did you see this? Apparently there has been some turning of events regarding the poaching of turtle eggs and that’s what you have also witnessed. Did you contact MINAE yet? Let me know how that goes….Thanks, Pura Vida!
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POACHING OF TURTLE EGGS ON PACIFIC COAST SHOWS INCREASE
Turtle egg poaching at Playa Junquillal in Guanacaste has taken a sharp rise — just a couple of months after conservationists said the practice had been almost wiped out.Roark, I have a personal value I hold dear and that’s that I do NOT hate anyone and that includes Mr. Bush. I DO hate what he has done and continues to stubbornly proceed with without any regard for human life, ours or theirs! That is NOT perseverance that’s BLIND devotion to a cause NO MATTER what the consequences are for others. He is not just any person, according to Jefferson and public policy, “When a man assumes a public trust he should consider himself a public property.” He no longer belongs to himself, but rather belongs to the people he’s supposed to represent. He has shown NO respect for that. I’m not saying he should sway to every change of public opinion (which in the beginning he created thru lies and inculcating fear in the American public); I’m saying he should stand firm on principle and truth not on pride or any other objective. And considering how this war was begun and how it’s still being run without regard for human life—there’s not one ounce of decent principle in it!!! There’s nothing wrong with changing your mind once you have realized you were on a path that was not the appropriate one. Ben Franklin, who was a genius said, “For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.” Unfortunately, he also said, “few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them…Wise men don’t need advice. Fools won’t take it.”
If we are to believe that this administration is just being “perseverant,” then one must admit that this administration has worked INCREDIBLY HARD at this other observation which Ben Franklin also made so many years ago—(now remember Mr. Franklin is considered a hero of US Colonial times, an accomplished scientist, a great scholar, a co-signer of the Declaration of Independence among MANY other accomplishments which I don’t have the time to mention), “WE ARE ALL BORN IGNORANT, BUT ONE MUST WORK HARD TO REMAIN STUPID.” But I wouldn’t be so quick to consider this option as tempting as it may be, I believe that what on the surface may seem as PERSERVERANCE to some and UNADULTURATED STUPIDITY to others might have other deep rooted personal and political causes, NONE of which should be allowed to force our continued deployment in Iraq because this is not about you and me having this little disagreement, this is about real people’s blood being shed on both sides and though you many not care, I am disgusted at the thought that we have been part of a GENOCIDE or what else can you call killing over half a million civilians in Iraq when the supposed reasons for the war are ALL NULL AND VOID?? What do you expect those people to feel about Americans after the harm we have freely bestowed upon them? Stop to consider what the Jews and the rest of the world thought of the Germans after WWII? After WWII we called the process of systematically killing a group of people GENOCIDE when the Nazis did it. What will we and the world call THIS when this war is over? A rose by any other name is still a rose, Mr. Roark!!!
I agree UpeCity…..I hope your daughter’s fiancee is recovering, gets the best medical treatment and general support he deserves. I know no stronger support to give anyone and certainly to give to a soldier than to get them out of harms way…They are courageous young men and women that are fighting in Iraq on someone’s whim and baseless accusations that have LONG been proven false. They are treated as disposable human beings and will be paying the “price” of war long after any administration finally calls them home. I also know that anyone that is against the war is NOT against the troops, they ARE part of the reason why many of us never supported this illegitimate war or later came that conclusion. The whole thing is incredibly sad and infuriating at the same time…
Alfred, you’re too funny with that passport stuff…Anyway, there has been everything from non-warring to extremely belligerent cultures throughout time. Social exclusion was an incredibly effective way many non-violent societies used to punish someone that was not complying with accepted social norms. Societies have found diverse ways to come to agreements within and between groups. Every once in a blue moon there may be no other alternative, but in the last few thousand years we have been increasing quick to jump to this option–some people actually seem to salivate at the thought of shedding their opponents blood!
We humans are not alone in this socially learned difference regarding aggression and warring behavior. The same goes for animals. It’s not just about biology…This is even evident in animals that are 98% similar to us in DNA. Chimpanzees actually formulate warring groups and are very aggressive, even abusive to one another; however, the Bonobos (which you may have confused for chimps, but are somewhat smaller and weren’t even differentiated from Chimps until 1929) do not promote or participate in warlike behavior. The females use organizational strategies so that social pressure and mostly the threat of violence can stop any member (usually a male) of the group that is attacking a juvenile, another female and even another male. The differences are more than biological, they are socially promoted by the group because that is how they adapted to an environment that has easily met their basic needs. Bonobos are the ultimate “make love not war” of the animal kingdom–I love them. There’s a lot of food for thought there— Once an animals basic needs are met, then other less violent options become more viable. For humans, it’s a choice.. Charles Darwin who recognized Natural Selection also marveled at how humans were not totally under the control of their biology. Our biological tendencies do not have to become our inevitable destinies due to our ability to think, consider ethical constructs and make decisions that are based on the latter and not merely react based on our biology (hence our psychology). I believe Darwin was correct…
I choose to love LIFE, that includes human beings (and other life forms) from all parts of this planet and I will NEVER love a country more than I try to love and honour ALL LIFE, the latter is not given by me, but is my responsibility not only for myself, but for others. The former, as wonderful as any nation may be, it is constructed and played out by human beings; therefore, could inevitably be mistaken which is EXACTLY why it MUST BE QUESTIONED and subjected to another great concept, THE TRUTH.
Alfred, History has proven that this has been the prevailing human pattern, but I refuse to believe that it can’t be any other way. I also understand that there have been times that war became inevitable, NOT because war is, but because the issues leading up to the war do not get addressed until the whole thing becomes a literal bloody mess….
I feel that there should be no bigger regret than to have caused the loss of life having had another option….Which is why I agree with Franklin & Jefferson, even when they might have had the need to resort to violence on occasion as we’re all SO tempted to do in our personal and political lives when we’re faced with people and gov’ts displaying unmovable stupidity….
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN:
Even peace may be purchased at too high a price.There was never a good war, or a bad peace.
Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.
Do good to your friends to keep them, to your enemies to win them.
It is a grand mistake to think of being great without goodness and I pronounce it as certain that there was never a truly great man that was not at the same time truly virtuous.
Wars are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.
All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.
Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
THOMAS JEFFERSON:
Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of mankind.
Scottbenson, Two things: First, Liberals where not in charge when 9/11 happened, the information was there and it was an extremely conservative administration that swept it under the rug or were just plain blithering idiots about it–NOT LIBERALS! Second, I don’t know where you’re from, but you really need to read up on the basics of how and under what concepts the United States was created. If people that live, work are born or naturalized US citizens question the unjust and dishonest acts of an administration engaging in a ruthless and unsupported war (by facts and the people of this country), it’s because we fully understand the rights and responsibilities entrusted on us by the Founding Fathers of the US——Something that you just can’t seem to get a grasp on. Have you ever questioned any authority besides when you were an adolescent and it was just an issue of being contrary? If you haven’t, I submit to you that ALL should be questioned and when put thru not only reason, but the burden of proof, then you can make an informed judgment and not before–Patriotism for the sake of patriotism is blind and the only thing I want blind is JUSTICE! As far as the expats that might not live, work or be US citizens, well, we all share the same planet so US aggression directly or indirectly affects them too. Besides, they also happen to be endowed with intelligence and can & should express views about injustices they have observed and perceive. This is in NO way done to negates the good things (under whatever pretext they were done…) that many nations have benefited from US cooperation regarding infrastructure, etc. I have included quotes from 3 of the US Founding Fathers so that you can understand that NONE of them would have been asking us for our passports, but they may be questioning YOU as to why the HECK you are NOT living up to your duties as a US citizen (if your are a US citizen??) and as a general human being of good conscience in any case. (BTW, there are other threads that have other wonderful Jeffersonian quotes you might want to read and ponder. There is so much more I could add, but I need to get other work done. In case you were not aware, these men are considered some of this countrY’s greatest minds and Ben Franklin was a wonderful and prodigious scientist who had great perseverance, but little patience for people that refused to listen with an open mind…):
THOMAS JEFFERSON:
All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.
Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.
Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories.
I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.
Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.
He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.GEORGE WASHINGTON:
Arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of liberty abused to licentiousness.Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.
If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.
Laws made by common consent must not be trampled on by individuals.
The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.
The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon.
Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light.
War – An act of violence whose object is to constrain the enemy, to accomplish our will.
When we assumed the Soldier, we did not lay aside the Citizen.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN:
All mankind is divided into three classes: those that are immovable, those that are movable, and those that move.Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Where liberty is, there is my country.
Wise men don’t need advice. Fools won’t take it.
Who is wise? He that learns from everyone. Who is powerful? He that governs his passions. Who is rich? He that is content. Who is that? Nobody.
Observe all men, thyself most.
Distrust and caution are the parents of security.
Rebellion against tyrants is obedience to God.
Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.
Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.
We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.
For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.
How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.
Tricks and treachery are the practice of fools, that don’t have brains enough to be honest.
Half a truth is often a great lie.
Sad, but true Alfred…Yesterday I had lunch with Natasha, a Serbian refugee from the war in Bosnia, and the stories are so excruciatingly similar. Real people being tortured, killed and incarcerated. Real families being torn apart. Real ethnic and cultural groups extracted from their ancestral homes because some lunatics thought they had the RIGHT to oppress groups of people they had labeled the OTHERS and everyday human beings from both sides were caught up in the process. Hateful things we rationalize doing to those “OTHERS,” especially when you have the military capacity to do it and get away with it…
Hey Aaronbz, You know how much I love CR so you will know that I also hated seeing plenty of US planes, CIA operatives and all sorts of shenanigans (remember the Iran-Contra Scandal?) going on in 1982 and beyond in the CR-Nicaraguan border because in spite of CR’s supposed declared “neutrality”, the US and the Contras used CR as a military base for their incursions and attacks on the Sandinistas. You might want to look into how the NOW Guanacaste Int’l Airport started out, hmmmm????? Of course, you can imagine that CR was pretty well pressured to comply and since they are a small country, well…the rest is history. However, their lack of army DOES mean that they will NOT be the ones attacking Panama, Nicaragua or any other place for their own self interests–which is a mighty temptation for any country with an army at its disposal…Pura Vida!
UpeCity, I loved it…there is so much sensitivity, profound thought and talent on this Forum that it never ceases to be amaze me…. 🙂
Just wanted to share Castro’s explicit views on religion which are contradictory to Sprite’s and Castro’s contradictory actions (based on his own implicit beliefs) regarding religion on the island which are “dead on” with Sprite’s explicit views. Humans are very complex and like I said before our most explicit ideals might not be what our true (implicit) ideals are–those you can only know by watching someone’s actions:
What we do know is that the US has been incredibly lucky to have had Founding Fathers that recognized the importance of religious freedom and if Ron Paul’s promise to restore the Constitution of the US along with its Bill of Rights is an honest one, then he will NOT be promoting the DEATH of religious believes in America, but once again supporting the right for every person in the US to be able to practice their faith in whatever manner they choose as long as that doesn’t infringe on the rights of another to practice theirs…
When the Pope was coming to Cuba:
http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y98/jan98/17ex2.htmHAVANA, Jan 16 (Reuters) – When Cuba’s President Fidel Castro emerged from his historic first meeting with Pope John Paul at the Vatican in November 1996, the veteran Communist leader sounded like an awed schoolboy.
“For me it’s a miracle I have been able to meet the Pope,’ Castro said, speaking in an unusually humble tone. He said he never would have dreamed of meeting the Pontiff, calling himself a modest fighter and politician who did not deserve such an honour.
…
In his December speech, he announced he would grant Cubans a Christmas Day holiday for the first time in 28 years. He seemed almost sentimental as he recalled eating “apple, grapes and nougat’ at Christmas in his childhood and insisted Cuba had not dumped the holiday for anti-religious reasons…
….(THIS ONE REALLY KILLS ME, A MAN THAT SAYS HE’S A NON-BELIEVER SAYING THAT A MAN THAT ENJOYED EXECUTING PEOPLE EVEN WHEN THEY WERE INNOCENT (AS PHYSICALLY DEMONTRATED BY HIS LAUGHTER AND PARTICULAR SMILE) LIKE CHE WOULD HAVE BEEN MADE A SAINT—–HA!!!!)
In his conversation with Frei Betto, an advocate of liberation theology, Castro firmly declared there was no contradiction between Marxism and Christianity. He added that legendary leftist guerrilla Ernesto “Che’ Guevara probably would have been “made a saint’ if he had been a Catholic since he had “all the virtues.’
http://www1.lanic.utexas.edu/la/cb/cuba/castro/1971/19711205.3
(Castro was answering questions in a press conference in Ecuador, 1971)[Question] What are your views on religion?
[Answer] As a child I was introduced to the teaching of the church but I
never received profound religious instruction. When I talked with priests I
questioned them about the reasons behind a religious crisis. Owing to
instruction I received they made me aware of religious faith. But I cannot
say that I ever had that faith. I do not have it now.[Question] Can religion and Marxism coexist in Cuba?
[Answer] Yes, not only in Cuba.
[Question] Can political ideas also coexist?
[Answer] That depends. Imperialist ideas cannot coexist with revolutionary
ideas. The ideas of millionaires and those of beggars cannot coexist. I
have my concept of different ideas responding to historically different
factual conditions of social classes. The ideas we champion are socialist
ideas. In the future they will be communist, serving the egalitarian
society, the classless society, the true society comprising fraternity and
equality–that is the true human equality and the goal we seek.http://www.fiu.edu/~fcf/clark12298.html
(This is only part of the article, you can view the whole article by using the link…)January 22, 1998
RELIGIOUS REPRESSION IN CUBA
At the Time of the Pope’s Visit to the Island
By: Juan Clark, Ph.D.
What will Pope John Paul II find during his visit to Cuba? It is well known that religion has been severely repressed by Castro, but what has been the nature of said repression and what is its current status? What can be expected as a result of the pope’s visit? Over two decades of experiential study of Cuban social reality allow us to explore this issue. Let us make a brief historical overview.
More than persecution in the traditional sense, religion has been seriously repressed through various direct and indirect means. All religious groups have been seriously affected. The Catholics, as the largest religious group in Cuba, have been the most severely impacted in terms of material losses, while the Jehovah’s Witnesses have been the most directly repressed. All their temples were shut down.
In 1960, after initially supporting the revolution, the Catholic Church valiantly confronted the Castro regime. Indicators of a new dictatorial trend were visible, though shrouded by populist policies. Among these signs were the arbitrary executions and trials that started in 1959, the government’s shrewd takeover of student, labor and professional organizations, along with the increased placement of communists or their sympathizers in government and military positions, the progressive confiscation of private property and, finally, the complete elimination of the free press. The Church alerted the people about the evils that would come from the turn towards Communism. The strong pastoral letter of August 1960 only increased the regime’s antireligious actions.
Many believers, following the Church’s teachings, decided to confront the regime. They fought justly and bravely, trying to implement the ideals of democracy promised by Castro in the Sierra Maestra. Many paid with their lives or long years in prison for this “crime.”
In response to this confrontation, Castro launched a campaign against the Catholic bishops and attempted to create a national Church. By late 1960, mobs organized by the government began to harass church services. The botched Bay of Pigs invasion led to a more open and direct repression, with mass arrests of clergy and desecration of churches. In May, 1961, the government confiscated the vast private school system and many seminaries in an attempt to deeply strike at religion. In September, the traditional procession in Havana honoring Cuba’s patron, the Virgen de la Caridad, in the church of the same name, was violently repressed, resulting in the death of one of the Catholics. Incredibly, the government portrayed the victim as a martyr of the revolution… That incident prompted the immediate expulsion of 131 clergy on board the Spanish ship Covadonga, including an outstanding bishop, Boza Masvidal and Father Goberna, a renown hurricane expert.
Direct repression had its climax at this time. Many religious personnel were forced into exile through coercion, intimidation or the inability to practice their teaching trade. Four priests were sentenced to prison for serving as chaplains to the opposition’s guerrillas. To further hurt the Church, a dynamic young Franciscan priest, Miguel Loredo, was, in 1966, falsely accused and sentenced to fifteen years in prison, –the same amount of time Castro received in 1953 after leading the assault on the Moncada barracks—for harboring a suspect in a failed skyjacking attempt. He served ten of those fifteen years… This opportunity further served to confiscate the Church’s only printing shop as well as the San Francisco convent. Many Evangelical ministers were also imprisoned, some for long periods. It must be pointed out that these actions were always undertaken through a nonreligious pretext, as in the Loredo case.
In this context, many ministers and seminarians, Catholic and Evangelicals were sent to the newly created UMAP labor concentration camps in 1965. Among those confined were the present cardinal Jaime Ortega and the current bishop Alfredo Petit, along with many lay people. Among these in the UMAP were homosexuals and others the regime considered “social scum.” The Jehovah’s Witnesses were especially mistreated at the UMAPs, which closed in 1968. The purpose was to terrorize the religious community.
The 1960s also saw the dawn of a more subtle, but very effective, indirect repression. This less visible form of repression used education and the work place as its main vehicles. It begun as early as grammar school with simple questions posed to schoolchildren practicing their faith, in an attempt to ridicule them in front of their classmates. Students have a Cumulative Academic Record that supervises “ideological integration” and the religious involvement of students and their parents. This involvement would constitute a “demerit” on their record and would be used to deny access to the university or to careers with social impact to those who had that blotch in their record. This indirect repression followed Castro’s religious policy of “making apostates not martyrs,” and thus began the slow process of gradually attempting to choke off the religious community.
Indirect repression has also impacted the individual through the work place. The government’s economic monopoly, whereby the state owns all means of production promoted discrimination against those who practiced religion. “Being religious” has constituted a stain on the worker’s Labor Record preventing occupational advancement, and affecting the person’s standard of living, since the government use to distribute important consumer goods through the work place where “ideological integration” played a role. As with education, the “religious” have been forced give up opportunities for promotion, becoming second class citizens. This has been, in actual practice, an ideological apartheid.
Religious ministers have also suffered strong repression. Defamatory letters, instigation of rumors, and constant spying are routinely employed. Harassing phone calls and blackmail, mostly through sexual entrapments, are used to psychologically destabilize them and promote their departure from Cuba. Foreign clergy have also been repressed. Some have been openly expelled from Cuba, while others have had their visa renewal rejected as was the recent case involving Sister Ligia Palacio, a Colombian nun who dared to write “too harshly” concerning human rights in Cuba in Vitral, a modest (only over 1000 copies are made by photocopy procedure) but outstanding publication of the Pinar del Rio diocese. Other foreigners have suffered an equal fate.
….
After his release from prison in 1976, Fr. Loredo continued to be a persona non grata. He, along with many of his parishioners were constantly harassed. This culminated in a mysterious, near fatal car accident in which he was a pedestrian. The Church finally promoted his “voluntary” exit from the island in 1984. A rather similar case occurred in 1995, when small-town priest Fr. Jose Conrado Rodriguez wrote a letter which courageously but respectfully criticized Castro and his regime. This increasingly popular priest had to leave the country in 1996 “to conduct studies abroad.”
By the end of the 1980s, and after the publication of the book Fidel Castro and Religion (Fidel Castro y la Religion), with Frei Beto, where Castro projected a rather sympathetic view of religion, there was a relaxation of repression for reasons of tactical convenience. People began to attend religious services in greater numbers. Educational as well as labor discrimination for reasons of religious practice have diminished. However, the Cumulative Academic and Labor Records still exist and totalitarian power can demolish any religious effort or individual considered potentially “dangerous.”
Just to clarify the temporal lobe reference I made earlier. This does NOT by any means indicate that our spiritual experiences are merely in our brains. Other parts of the human brain can also be activated and you can actually smell, taste and feel how you felt when you ate your grandma’s apple pie and that certainly doesn’t mean your grandma didn’t exist nor that her apple pies weren’t gloriously delicious. What this does indicate is that you made a significant connection with them that can now be accessed. We ARE wired to believe in something other than ourselves, but remember that nature has NO moral basis (just think how differently a predator and a prey view the same act…). This is why a spiritual practice can be wonderful or it can be horrific, it all depends on how WE choose to practice our beliefs and if they’re tempered with the respect for dissenting views….
Well, I’m glad you “cleared” that up because you obviously don’t mind the killing and incarceration for other differences of opinion practiced by Cuba to this day. Well, you didn’t say you didn’t support the incarceration of little old ladies that wished to continue to practice their faith, you just said you didn’t think they should be killed for it–to be exact…I guess some compassion is better than none….I think that your support of ruling Cuba with an IRON FIST that you’ve so clearly and unabashedly reiterated on the Forum makes it crystal clear how Che could have felt justified in acting as ruthlessly as he did in Cuba–it’s not a long leap from blind ideology (of any kind political, religious, etc) to ruthless dictatorship…I appreciate the show and tell…
As far as religion goes, I do LOVE the fact that this country chose early on NOT to enforce how someone should believe, but rather the RIGHT for everyone to self-determine that belief. The Founding Fathers were NOT nonbelievers by a long stretch of the imagination Sprite, they only knew that it is DANGEROUS when one human being feels he has the right to tell another what faith to practice or that NO faith should be practiced at all. Belief practices are a part of every single culture on the face of the planet and I can actually show you a part of your temporal lobe that when activated will produce an experience similar to a religious experience like those people write about across all religious practices (Eastern, Western and even in less organized or recognized faith based practices). The worst thing about religious beliefs are not the beliefs themselves, it’s the people (mostly men like you) who think the ideology they are certain is the TRUTH gives them the right to oppress others that do not share their “truth.” Now of course, there are our explicit beliefs which is what we tell others and consciously think we in fact believe and then there are our implicit biases that are what we ACTUALLY do believe and ACT out on. If you ask me, that sounds just like the explicit believes you have been proposing all along on this thread. You might want to review what you have stated, ask yourself what you have been capable of doing to support those believes and then take your own advice and stop promoting violence to support ideology–of any kind!
That is a wonderful time to visit CR, I hope you and your family have a wonderful stay. Make sure you make copies of your passports and his birth cert and keep the originals in a safe place–the last thing you want is to have to deal with that situation with a 5 month old baby. You might also carry a copy of the baby’s immunization records just in case. I was startled when I was leaving the country with my 4 yr old one time and people at the airport asked to see the permission papers from PANI (like child welfare services) for my daughter. Once I showed them our US passports, they realized she wasn’t Costa Rican and the issue was resolved. This permission is to protect CR children from being taken out of the country without parental permission, but it doesn’t apply to US citizens unless your baby has a CR parent. You might also check with CR Consulate in your area just to make sure you’re vacation is not burdened by any administrative matters. Have a great time…Pura Vida!
Whether you or anyone else chooses not to acknowledge the lack of freedoms in Cuba doesn’t make them any less there. Freedom of speech is intrinsic to being human since speech not only defines us ideologically, but actually formulates us neurologically and psychologically. No one should be able to curtail the natural physiological development of another human being. Just as we gasp at the thought of people breaking the bones and binding the feet of Asian girls or performing genital mutilation on a child to comply with a cultural guideline set by MEN, we should also gasp at the thought that any ideology should try to bind and mutilate the minds of others…
I hate the fact that Cubans, my family and 11 million other people, cannot experience freedoms I hold dear. You’re incredibly deluded if you think the Cuban people signed up for this. They signed up for a revolution that was more Cuban than the “Cuban Palm trees” and ended up with a Marxist regime (surprise, surprise, surprise).The FOUR FREEDOMS are considered part of the inspiration for the UN Human Rights Declaration and were mentioned in President Roosevelt’s speech:
“ In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is FREEDOM OF SPEECH and expression–everywhere in the world.The second is FREEDOM OF EVERY PERSON TO WORSHIP God in his own way–everywhere in the world. (and that includes the choice NOT to worship)
The third is FREEDOM FROM WANT–which, translated into universal terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants-everywhere in the world.
The fourth is FREEDOM FROM FEAR–which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor–anywhere in the world.
That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation. That kind of world is the very antithesis of the so-called new order of tyranny which the dictators seek to create with the crash of a bomb.
”
— Franklin Delano Roosevelt, excerpted from the Annual Message to the Congress, January 6, 1941By the way, the very nature of “human rights” is that they are intrinsic and not EVER to be considered for some and not for others…You might have left Cuba’s extremists on the island, but you clearly carry them in your heart while living a comfortable life in the US which I find incredibly convenient. You’re also obviously happy to sacrifice any human being by writing them off as “anecdotal” in order to fit your political schema–I guess rationalizing abhorrent behavior is okay with you as long as the behavior comes from people that think like you and that my friend is much more profoundly troubling than any WLCR posts could ever address–I hope your never find yourself on the other end of that stick Sprite–Life has a funny way of turning things around when you least expect it and I know plenty of people IN the island that are hoping for a change–I hope that when that time comes it will be a much more peaceful transition than what the last failed promise gave birth to and actually a TRUE Cuban construct not one developed through convenient ideologies of men without compassion…
