IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 8 ENGLISH | Page 27

Analysis of race and gender
discrimination within social
classes
Luis Machado Oleydis Reinosa
Antilla, Holguin, Cuba

T

he history of social struggles in
our country, which I would call
the death row from the aborigines, passing through the African slaves
to the mulattos in the nineteenth century
to the black people in the first half of
the twentieth century, and so on until
"the revolutionary triumph" (1959),
shows how the prejudices against race
and gender equality prevail along with
hatred towards the idea that people of
non-white skin can stand out in society.
Cuba is signatory of the Declaration on
the Elimination of All Forms of Racial
Discrimination (1963), the Convention
on the Political Rights of Women
(1952) and other international treaties
that are not fulfilled to the letter. The
struggle to fully realize these rights is
still insufficient, as several surveys
reveal in the municipality of Antilla.
They clearly demonstrate the lack of
concrete action by the government to
cure the ills of society, which are a bit
more acute in this region. The surveys
were part of a study centered on women
(70% of the sample) because of their
condition as the weaker gender with
fewer employment options and more
violence against them, among other

issues. More than 75% of them were
from 20 to 35 years old and the race
correlation was 55% blacks, 30% whites
and 15% mestizos. The response on
violence against women was 100%
affirmative and covered a broad spectrum from domestic violence (being
abused by husband, brother, father,
child or other household member) to
violence in the workplace (being mistreated by bosses, fellow workers or any
other person in the work environment).
Another qualitative feature was the
discrimination based on sexual orientation, which has been dragging a
longstanding controversy after the witch
hunt in the early years of the Castro era,
when a campaign was proposed to
eradicate homosexuality and because of
that, a lot of pain was brought to the
Cuban people. In this regard the positive responses reached 90%, since there
are still women who are stigmatized in
their workplace or neighborhood because they are not heterosexual. Not
less important is the very color of the
skin among the factors of discrimination. It generated more than 95% of
positive responses on the topic of racism on the work place and even promo-

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