Cuba: Gay Expression

Diaspora blogger Uncommon Sense says of the arrest of the President of the Cuban Lesbian, Gay, Transexual and Bisexual Foundation: “After 50 years, the Castro dictatorship has yet to get over its hang-ups over Cubans – gay or straight – expressing themselves.”

2 comments

  • I urge Global Voices to be more selective in their postings, particularly with regards to their oft-cited sources Uncommon Sense and Cuba Encuentro. Both are one-sided liers and make no bones about their disregard for the truth. Simply following Uncommon’s own link (to a US funded website called Cuba Encuentro), we can see errors in his post. The blogger says that the anti-Government activist was “arrested.” This is simply not true. No arrest warrants were issued. He says the whereabouts of the activist were unknown. Again, his own link says he was questioned by authorites and back at his house “in a few hours.” Why the lies? Cuba Encuentro is a well known anti-Cuba propoganda operation paid for directly by the US Government. Don’t your readers deserve some disclosure of this essential fact? I won’t get into who this “gay activist” really is and his history of working with counter-revolutionary groups in Miami.

    Meanwhile, the real LBGT news out of Cuba today is that transexuals will be allowed to have a sex change surgery completey for free. This is a right that LBGT will never have in a capitalist paradise like the US, where many are forced to pay 20 thousand dollars to “express themselves.”

    Despite loads of propoganda to the contrary, Cuba has no problem with the LBGT community and the Government has been on the vanguard of trying to change long-held conservative values amongst the population. Cuba forces LBGT themes into TV shows, movies and onto the nightly news. When I was there, I noticed gays congregating in large numbers in public, partying into the night. Maybe someone can tell me where gays in the US have the right to gather in large numbers and party into the night in a public place?

    • vicente valverde

      With all due respect. You seem to be speaking in behalf of all the gay and lesbians who live in Cuba. Are you some sort of ambassador to their cause?
      It appears to you that gay and lesbians do not have problems in Cuba today; however, many gays and lesbians had to suffer under the Communist regime decades ago. Many were sent to concentration-camps like, where they were tortured, insulted, forced to work in the fields, just to name a few.
      I, myself, was stopped by the political police in Havana many times in the 70’s and 80’s just because I chose to stop at the same corner you mentioned, and practically forced to declare that I was gay. Of course, I refused to do this and for that I was sent to a prison cell for 2 days. Is this the paradise you are so proud of?
      Gay and lesbians in the US could gather anywhere they choose to, simply because this is a free country. The police wouldn’t dare to ask any gay person for an ID just for being openly gay.
      All in all, one can say that you are not a spokesperson for the GLTC, but for the Communist regime that oppressed Cubans (gay or not) in our nation.

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