Archive for the ‘Cuba’ Category
Pointing the Racism Finger at Latin America (And Ourselves)
10:55 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Cuba|Latin America|Peru|race · 8 Comments
4 Dec 2009Every few months the debate starts up again about racism in Latin America. Is it worse than in the United States or just different because of the very specific way colonialism played itself out and continues to play out in the region? Many Latin Americans and Latinos will swear up and down that there is no racism in their countries of origin and in their families, which often times are multi-racial. But what passes for “non-racism” actually includes thinly veiled language and action that reveals centuries old internalized issues around genetic purity and colorism.
Last week Peru’s government apologized to it’s Afro-Peruvian community for centuries of “abuse, exclusion and discrimination”.
The government said racially-motivated harassment still hindered the social and professional development of many African-Peruvians.
A public ceremony will be held to apologise to African-Peruvians, who make up 5-10% of the population.
And earlier this week, at least 60 prominent African-Americans, including Cornel West, actress Ruby Dee Davis, film director Melvin Van Peebles, former South Florida congresswoman Carrie Meek, Dr. Jeremiah Wright, former pastor of President Barack Obama’s church in Chicago, and Susan Taylor, former editor in chief of Essence magazine, released a statement condemning racism in Cuba.
What About Latinos in Other Parts of the Americas : UN Calls for End of Cuban Embargo, Again
30 Oct 2009
There’s has been a ton of attention on Latinos in (The United States of) America, with little acknowledgment that the Americas go beyond the borders of the U.S. and that current U.S. policy towards Latin America isn’t any better than internal policy. Just the other day the United Nations’ General Assembly voted 187-3, coming down on the U.S.’s continued embargo on Cuba. This is the 18th consecutive U.N. vote of its kind.
Award Winning Cuban Blogger Banned from Leaving to Recieve Award
11:21 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Blogs|Cuba|Media|media justice · 2 Comments
18 Oct 2009Cubana blogger Yoani Sánchez was awarded the oldest prize in journalism, the Maria Moors Cabot Prize. Problem is, she wasn’t allowed the leave Cuba to accept the award. The awards were announced in the middle of the summer but according to her, she somehow held out a tiny bit of hope that she would be allowed to leave. She posted a video of her visit to the Cuban immigration office where she was told she couldn’t leave the country but not why. Could it be because she has been an unapologetic critic of the Cuban government whose voice, via the internet, has global reach?
Tonite in NYC : Support Political Prisoners and the Cuban 5
7:59 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Activism|Cuba|Events|Justice|Linking Latinos|New York City|Politics|Puerto Rico · Comments Off
12 Sep 2009Happy 65th Birthday Leonard Peltier!
FREE THE CUBAN 5: 11 YEARS OF UNJUST INCARCERATION!
VIVA PUERTO RICO LIBRE: 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE RELEASE OF THE PUERTO RICAN PPS/POWS!
Saturday, September 12, 2009 • 7 to 9 p.m.
Judson Memorial Church Assembly Hall
239 Thompson St., NY, NY (Wheelchair Accessible)
$5-10 DONATION (no one will be turned away due to lack of funds)
LIGHT REFRESHMENTS
Program:
Representative from the Cuban Mission to the U.N.
Mahina Movement
GhostHorse
Attorney Mike Kuzma
Dylcia Pagan, former Puerto Rican Political Prisoner
Lynne Stewart
For more information: nyclpsg@gmail.com • nycjericho@gmail.com • 718-853-0893
Co-Sponsored by: NYC Leonard Peltier Support Group, NYC Jericho Movement, Iglesia San Romero de las Américas, The ProLibertad Freedom Campaign, The Popular Education Project to Free the Cuban 5
Fidel Lives (And Changes His Clothes)
6:27 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Cuba|Ecuador · Comments Off
24 Aug 2009
Apparently Fidel Castro met with the President of Ecuador, Rafeal Correa last Friday and if I may say, he looks pretty good.
Via / Inca Kola News
Castro Praises Obama’s Speaking Skills, but Not his Truthtelling
12:34 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Controversia|Cuba|Egypt|Obama|Politics|World · Comments Off
9 Jun 2009
Cuban leader Fidel Castro doesn’t have all that much to say these days about the U.S., but he did have some reflections to make on Obama’s now famous speech in Cairo. On the one hand, he admits that Obama isn’t the babbling idiot that former president George W. Bush was with regard to speechmaking, but when it comes to the content of said speech, he differs in opinion. In his weekly column “Reflexiones”, Castro says:
“If you take into account how long the speech was, without even using notes, the number of pauses isn’t important if compared to his predecessor (George Bush), who made mistakes at every paragraph. He has a great ability to communicate. However, the policies that the U.S. has followed for the past 7 decades is “in contradiction” with his words, since it was a history of “interventions” and “wars”, said Castro.He expressed that although Obama started his speech saying that no nation has the right to impose its system or its form of governance on any other, he quickly contradicted himself “with a declaration of faith that makes the United States the supreme judge of democratic values and human rights.”
This doesn’t sound familiar to me. Does anyone know statement Castro is referring to here?
The fact is Castro does have a point. America has a way of wandering into countries or regions and telling people how to run their societies when the U.S. has a history of not following its own rhetoric…to say the very least.
Via / La Voz de Houston
Torture Sqads in Gitmo
8:18 am By la Macha · Controversia|Cuba|military|military interventions|Myanmar|Obama|Uncategorized|Violence|Washington DC · Comments Off
21 May 2009Several things have amused me (in a horribly ironic way) in the recent discussions about “Where will the Gitmo Detainees Stay? Not in My Back Yard!“–not the least of which includes the assumption that Cubans really want a bunch of detainees that hate the U.S. in *their* backyards.
But finding out about the torture thug group, The Immediate Reaction Force, has really topped everything. Democracy Now! has an excellent report up about the IRF’s–including descriptions of how these forces have gang beaten men for infractions like having two Styrofoam cups in their cells instead of one.
And while much of the focus has been on the tactical use of torture at Guantanamo, almost no attention had been paid to a parallel force that was torturing prisoners in a variety of ways, including waterboarding them, and that is this riot squad of sorts that you referred to called the Immediate Reaction Force. The prisoners and their lawyers at Guantanamo call it the “Extreme Repression Force.” Read more…
Fidel Castro Accuses Mexico of Lying About Swine Flu
4:26 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Controversia|Cuba|Health|Latin America|mexico · Comments Off
13 May 2009
We don’t hear a lot from good old Fidel Castro, but when we do, it’s always something interesting. Take this piece of new: the Mexican government is angry because the Cuban leader is accusing them of keeping the 411 about the swine flu epidemic under wraps so as not to mess up Obama’s visit to Mexico. In a piece published in Cuba’s Granma newspaper, Fidel says that because of this deception, Cubans are now paying the price as citizens there were infected:
Today the presence of the H1N1 flu virus was detected in Cuba. The carrier is a young Mexican citizen who studies medicine in our country. The only thing that can be confirmed is that it didn’t come from the CIA, it came from Mexico [...]
The Mexican authorities did not inform the world of the presence of the virus while awaiting Obama’s visit, and now they are threatening us with suspending that of President Calderón, previously suspended for other, understandable reasons unconnected to the epidemic.
Mexico is emphatically denying this accusation, and Mexican president Felipe Calderon shot back yesterday that he “acted with determination, with promptness and with one single priority, which is and will always be to protect the health and the life of Mexicans.”
On the other hand, the Mexican Secretary for Foreign Relations (SRE) says that Castro’s accusations are making things a bit, well, weird for the relations between the two countries. Patricia Espinosa Cantellano, SRE, says that the declarations “make bilateral relations awkward”.
Via / Granma and Times of India
Cuban Music Legend Lashes Out at U.S. Government
2:44 pm By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Cuba|Immigration|Music|Obama|Politics · 2 Comments
4 May 2009
Legendary singer-songwriter Silvio Rodríguez — arguably Cuba’s most celebrated musician — is lashing out at the United States government because they have allegedly denied him a visa to travel to the country. Rodríguez was set to perform at a tribute concert for U.S. folk musician Pete Seeger on his 90th birthday, but ICE seems to have impeded that. In a letter sent from Paris and published in Cuba’s Granma newspaper, Rodríguez states:
“It’s Friday, May 1st, 8:40 pm in Paris and I just visited the U.S. Embassy’s website for France where information about visa appications is published [...] mine is still pending, the same state it has been in since I first applied. Since today was the day I was to fly to New York and the visa hasn’t materialized, tomorrow I am going back to Havana.”
Rodríguez says that his visa limbo is “contradictory” to U.S. President Barack Obama’s promises of a closer relationship with Cuba. Granma reports that Rodríguez stated: “As a worker for Cuban culture, I still feel as blockaded and discriminated against as I do by other administrations [...] and I truly hope that changes someday.”
We do too, Silvio!
Via / El País
April is Poetry Month : Jose Marti
11:34 am By Maegan la Mamita Mala · Cuba|literature · Comments Off
23 Apr 2009
Today here’s a short verse from Cuban political activist and poet Jose Marti’s Versos Sencillos.
Poema 23
Yo quiero salir del mundo
por la puerta natural;
en un carro de hojas verdes
a morir me han de llevar.
No me pongan en lo oscuro a morir como un traidor
yo soy bueno, y como bueno
moriré de cara al sol.”I wish to leave the world
By its natural door;
In my tomb of green leaves
They are to carry me to die.
Do not put me in the dark
To die like a traitor;
I am good, and like a good thing
I will die with my face to the sun
Hola!
VivirLatino is a daily publication published by Mamita Mala Media, dedicated to featuring all the latest politics, culture, entertainment of interest to the diverse Latin@ diaspora.
About | Advertise with us | Contact | Twitter
blog advertising is good for you
blog advertising is good for you
- Scrying Nicki Minaj, Stupid Hoe, and #Afrofutures | Nuñez Daughter: [...] forest of things that seem to matter a lot–like fingers waving in presidential faces [...]
- Karen: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/01/09/120109fa_fact_auletta [...]
- Karen: I just read this about Rubio. Let's see the GOP make him a VP nominee. LOL http://www.democraticu [...]
- Martes Media Minute : Roe v. Wade Anniversary, Medicaid Mama y Midwife Victory, Cervical Cancer Awareness month, & Mala’s Mami Closeup, | VivirLatino: [...] last week’s liveblog of a conversation on cervical cancer and Latin@s, Bianca Laureano s [...]
- Emiliano: thanks for your reviews. i feel like you tell it like you really feel. [...]
- Sexy Singing and Scary Primetime TV Latino Stereotypes : Glee & The River
- Explaining the Sudden Hiatus
- Eye on the Florida Primary : Mirror on the Wall, Who is the Most Anti-Immigrant of All?
- Live Blog/Tweet of Obama’s SOTU Address Tonight 8:45 EST
- Martes Media Minute : Roe v. Wade Anniversary, Medicaid Mama y Midwife Victory, Cervical Cancer Awareness month, & Mala’s Mami Closeup,
- VL Pelicula Giveaway!
- Today at 1 pm EST : Conversation on Latinas and Cervical Cancer
- Today in Latin@ History : Birthday of Martha P. Cotera
- Mistaking Immigration Proposals for Policy in an Election Year
- Casa Blanca Camino 2012: DREAMing of Hypocrisy in Iowa
