No one has the right to question the courage of the Cuban people, for it is not in doubt. Those who would question the testicular fortitude of the Cuban people, specifically, its men, are wrong on two points.
First, the doubters of Cuban manhood ignore the bravery it takes to just survive the daily tortures — the economic deprivation, the political repression, etc. — of life during dictatorship. I know I cannot imagine it, and I expect the same holds true for most of the people reading this. I sometimes share the frustration of those waiting for a mass uprising, for ultimately, it is the Cuban people's fight. But it borders on the immoral to suggest that they are not deserving of liberty because they choose not to carry out an uprising or other suicide mission. Honestly, if I lived in a police state as brutal and effective as Cuba's, I might stay at home, too.
And secondly, the doubters of Cuban manhood ignore that there are plenty of Cubans who have chosen not to stay at home. They work as journalists and librarians and human rights and democracy activists, battling against tremendous odds to challenge the dictatorship and to testify to its brutality. Their spirit is strong, and their courage is unmatched. The respect they are due is not lessened just because they choose to fight and live.
In fact, it is their responsibility to live for it is they who one day will lead a free Cuba.
Few Cubans on the island are braver than those prisoners of conscience and other political prisoners locked away in the Castro gulag. They fight with courage and dignity against the worst of a dictatorship committed to extinguishing the light of good that each one of them represents.
Tonight, please remember political prisoners Alfredo Rodolfo Domínguez Batista ,Orlando Zapata Tamayo, Luis Mariano Delís Utria and Juan Carlos Herrera Acosta who are on hunger strike at the Holguín Provincial Prison to demand better living conditions and greater respect for human rights in Cuban prisons. Herrera has even sewn his mouth shut to demonstrate his resolve.
Without question, they are Cuban men with balls.
(Cross-posted at Babalú.)
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