IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 9 ENGLISH | Page 19

Domestic violence and mistreatment of
school children by teachers without any
vocation add up to lives full of
problems and the demonization of good
manners, which are maliciously related
to weakness or homosexuality since the
early ages. A false notion of manhood
or manliness has contributed to bad
behavior among children and young
people, as well as its ultimate
expression: violence. The causes have
been conditioned or permitted for
political convenience.
At the pre-university schools in the
country field, violence is evident. These
schools are truly juvenile prisons with
high levels of bloodshed and anger
among the students. Over them the
authorities imposed faithfully copies of
the prisons’ hierarchies and it gives rise
to most of the bickering. Much more
when it comes to athletic scholarships,
in which combat athletes are mingled
with the rest of the students. All this
generates deficits in basic education that
later break badly out in the streets.
Another bad example are the armed
mobs, including students of different
levels, used by the State Security and
the Police for both offending peaceful
opponents with obscenities and stoning
their homes. Thusly, the young people
are left to their free will and they end up
behaving badly.
Also
the
own
prison
system
accomplishes its mission. It sounds
weird, but it's the real Cuba: the human
life is simply worthless. After having
committed a homicide, the culprit
receives a sentence that does not
correspond to the crime. Shortly
thereafter, the inmate goes out to work
and finally gets probation, if he or she
cooperates with the jailers. A crime
without
rightful
punishment
is
nonsense, but for Castroism being
offender is better than being opponent.
Everyone knows who calls the shots in
Guantánamo’s streets. Good people can
hardly have fun. In the few recreation
centers, gangs of armed teenagers are

boasting of their preeminence. Girls
forming pickets carry the arms for the
boys with the purpose to evade the
police. The latter abstains from
controlling them and, after high
consumption
of
alcohol
and
psychotropic drugs, these young people
lash out against anyone or engage in a
full territorial fight against a rival gang.
People ask why so many minors are
wandering around late at night, and why
they can consume alcohol in public
spaces. The authorities do nothing.
Why? The answer is simple: because
they are chasing street vendors and
opponents. They patrol the streets in
search of an unhappy dude trying to
honorably support his family or of
another one shouting against the
government or holding up a placard.
That´s the real threat to the Cuban
revolution: to work or to express
opinion outside the State.
The human rights activist Yobel Sevilla
Martinez was sentenced to four years
under charges of attack against the
police. Actually, he called the attention
of law enforcement officers about a
scuffle just on the corner, but they
refrained from intervening. As soon as
he questioned such attitude, the police
agents turned against him and brutally
beat him. He ended up being arrested.
We
cannot
evade
the
social
responsibility and justify the repression
that supposedly would solve the
problem by putting the entire blame on
the parents. The authorities themselves
have created the edge of lawlessness
that pervades our society, which has
been devalued by almost six decades of
misrule.
We must face the situation with
intelligent measures away from the
extremes. We cannot treat the scourge
as mere contingency, following the
customary guidance of temporary
solution for long-lasting problems.
Instead, we should implement strong
and sustainable programs to dissolve the
root causes of violence.

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