Juventud Rebelde 77
Lesbians and Assisted Reproduction in Cuba
Human Freedom Doesn’t Come Through the Gutter
When will lesbians be able to access assisted reproduction or exercise motherhood without their erotic orientation generating conflicts with the father of the child? Can they share maternity leave?
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A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann.
In unconventional couples there is room for children based on love, responsibility and respect Author: Juventud Rebelde Published: 05/11/2018 | 06:58 pm
The pursuit of human freedom can never be complete without freedom for women, Betty Ford.
“I have two wonderful mothers.” That’s how the poster that a girl carried around La Rampa in Havana during the Cuban Day Against Homophobia in 2013 reads. The controversy reached the social networks and since then hundreds of questions have been raised… and very few answers given.
When will lesbians be able to access assisted reproduction or exercise motherhood without their erotic orientation generating conflicts with the father of the child? Can they share maternity leave? Why is it still believed that daughters will “imitate” them, when the overwhelming majority of homosexual people come from heterosexual, machista and homophobic homes?
According to Dr. Rosa Campoalegre, the vision of the family as an institution continues to be very traditionalist, although it no longer corresponds to a diverse reality in [Cuba’s] structures and ways of functioning, and this slows down the design of more comprehensive and unbiased public policies.
This expert from the Center for Psychological and Sociological Investigations knows that many women find themselves in the dilemma of hiding their status in order not to lose family harmony or to assume it as a life project and face discredit in the social and family sphere.
There is especially little understanding by the male ex-partner. Reactions can range from denying parental rights and duties to demanding full custody and guardianship, arguing that the new “environment” is harmful.
“This is an injustice that is not compatible with our revolutionary project and its goal of eliminating inequality gaps,” insists Dr. Mariela Castro, director of the Sex Education Center (Cenesex). “Ignorance and prejudice should not be used to justify actions of discrimination,” he said.
The law or life
Most of these women do not demand legal protection from acts harmful to their dignity or the rights of their children because they are ashamed or do not know how to do so. For example, if the biological mother is absent from the country or dies, it must be clear who assumes custody of the child, and in the event of a breakdown of the relationship, how to protect property rights.
Beyond macho atavism [backwardness], there are serious concerns about legal coverage for the diverse family configurations that [today] proliferate in the country. Manuel Vázquez Seijido, founder of Cenesex’s Legal Advice Services and deputy director of the center, says there are proposals to update the laws with a less discriminatory approach, looking after the interests of minors in particular.
Responsibility and respect
One of the biggest problems lies in the effect that living with an unconventional partner can have on psychological development. In this regard, Dr. Mariela Castro emphasizes: “Being a mother or father is not a gift of nature, you have to learn to be one in every society. Same-sex couples have shown that they can do well and seek help to take on that responsibility, just as heterosexual couples seek guidance because they are afraid of failing.
This is how the psychologist Roxanne Castellanos saw it in her consultation at the Alfonso Bernal del Riego Center for Attention to Psychological Attention: “These unions can be as functional as a typical nuclear family. The emotional consequences that impact self-esteem occur when the little person becomes aware of how different his or her life is and worries about being the target of criticism.
“The antidote,” insists Mariela Castro, “is to cultivate communication within the family and to demand that in other socializing spaces, such as the schools, the extended family or the neighborhood, they help the child to grow without humiliation or violence, and without depriving the child of her or his rights and opportunities.
It is absurd to believe that the child will end up adopting his or her mothers’ erotic model. Behaviors are learned by imitation, but not so much guidance as everyday behavior. An adequate example of love and mutual respect helps to build a healthy psychosexual identity, centeredd on the responsible enjoyment of the body and the exercise of sexual rights, rather than on the orientation of desire.
If the child is male, male role models can be provided outside the home, just as when the father figure is missing due to widowhood, abandonment or divorce. In addition, sexual orientation is a process that does not finish maturing until late adolescence or youth and by then there are other patterns when it comes to shaping the erotic taste: friendships, teachers, artists, sportsmen…
If the home is functioning well, there is no need for external psychological support, because it will be a space of contention and development where they will always find love, trust and material support, agree the interviewees.
Grandparents’ Tales
Grandparents’ Tales
By Lázaro Fariñas
Posted: Monday 07 May 2018 | 07:06:53 PM
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
I don’t think it’s elegant or attractive to make up personal stories. I think that everyone’s life is their own and private, and if it is ever told, it should be told by others. I don’t know, then, why I’m writing this commentary. Am I getting old? Is it nostalgia for another time? Or do I feel very satisfied with what I did during one stage of my life and I want to talk about it?
At the end of the 1980s, I wrote articles for various publications in Latin America. The Prensa Libre of Costa Rica and the Nuevo Diario of the Dominican Republic were my favorites, and I sent my weekly comments to those media outlets. I never suffered any censorship. It was published just as I sent it, not one comma would be changed. It was not easy to write from abroad to be read in other countries, considering that it was for different idiosyncrasies, ways of thinking and points of view that I sent my opinions. I have to confess, without fear of being pedantic, that I was very well-received by those readers who had few interests in common with me.
Already in 1989, and due to the beginning of the collapse of the socialist camp in Europe, the media in Miami began to open up to me. I began writing articles frequently in El Nuevo Herald of Miami, and was a frequent guest on local television and radio talk shows.
Since the troglodytes of the anti-Cuban right in this city were sure that the fall of the revolutionary government of Cuba was imminent, they dared to give a voice to people who thought differently. At that time, I became an integral part of a daily television program called Debate, where I shared space with two journalists who thought differently from me and always, in addition, with the participation of guests from the far right, who wanted to measure strength with me. Once again, without wanting to be pedantic again, they would come for wool and come out shorn.
In that program, I debated with the cream of the Miami right: heads of counterrevolutionary organizations, “vertical fighters” and coffee and milk leaders were my different opponents. Of course, the two journalists who accompanied me on the show were also my opponents.
When the USSR collapsed, I stopped participating in the program. The real reason was because I got tired of having to wear a necktie every day to go argue with idiots.
Although I was invited regularly to different spaces like this throughout that decade and half of the next, the atmosphere was no longer pleasant. I was increasingly tense and hostile, the more the threats, the more violent the attacks, not only from the directors of those programs but also from the public to whom they opened the phone lines to insult me. Actually, I had enough intelligence, cunning and patience to get around the insults, which, as the saying goes, came in one ear and came out the other; that is, they slipped out the other, for, as is commonly said, to foolish words, deaf ears.
But to continue participating in those media brought with it an enormous sacrifice. In order to defend myself correctly from those verbal attacks, I had to pay attention to what they said on the other programs. I had to hear them every day. I didn’t care about personal offenses, but having to tune in to them was a different matter. The time came when it was like self-flagellating or digesting vomit just for the sake of vomiting.
I remember that when the leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, resigned as President of the Council of State due to health problems, I sent a note to Cubadebate wishing the Commander a speedy recovery. A few days later I was invited to a TV show and they read the note I had sent as if I were being caught in the crowd. I remember telling the director of that program and the journalist who was with her that she not only wanted Fidel to recover from his illness, but also wanted him to return to his post soon.
I have always said, written and done what I believed, I have always been consistent with what I thought.
I was a teenager during Batista’s time, not ten years old when Fulgencio entered Camp Columbia with his gorillas. I did everything I could against him. When after, 1959 I disagreed with some revolutionary measures, I opposed them and left Cuba.
When my homeland was left alone due to the disappearance of the Soviet Union, I began to travel to the island regularly and had the opportunity to meet three or four times with Fidel, a man I always respected and of whom I always publicly affirmed in Miami that he was the island’s best and most faithful defender.
Five Million Cell Phone Lines
Five million cell phone lines already active in Cuba
This figure confirms the growing evolution of mobile telephony on the island in recent years
By Juventud Rebelde digital@juventudrebelde.cu
Published: Thursday 12 April 2018 | 02:08:31 AM
A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann.
Five Million mobile lines Already active in Cuba Author: Internet Published: 12/04/2018 | 01:50 am
At press time, it was announced that a customer had signed a contract with a commercial unit of the Cuban Telecommunications Company (Etecsa) in Guanabacoa, in the eastern part of Havana, with whom the country has five million active mobile line services. According to information provided by Etecsa’s Institutional Communication Department, this figure confirms the growing evolution of mobile telephony on the island in recent years. Keep in mind that in December 2003 there were only 43,000 active mobile lines, by April 2008 the number of these had risen to 223 000, by March 2014 it had reached 2 million, by December 2016 it had reached 4 million, and 2017 closed with 4.22 million of these services.
Between rebellion and brazenness
Between rebellion and brazenness
Posted: Saturday 17th March 2018 | 10:52:43 PM
Author: Alina Perera Robbio
This reflection begins with a true story: in a certain pharmacy in the capital, a patient asks for the medicine that will take him out of the crisis in which his digestive system has fallen and out of an almost unbearable pain that has caused him to go out into the street despite the fact that the doctor has ordered absolute rest.
The needy person, who has to update his or her home address papers, carries a certificate with him or her where the word “transit”, written by the doctor, can be read, but the pharmacy technique explains that the term is only applicable to transfers between provinces.
The dialogue between the needy and those who can help becomes a dead end. At some point the technique says vaguely: “Let’s see if we understand each other, let’s see if we can “solve…”. The patient gets confused and just asks, “Will they give me the medicine or not? Suddenly someone remembers that there is only one box left with the pills that they are urging and that are destined for a very critical case in the community. The patient feels almost guilty, and without having solved his problem he leaves with a bitter and surprising memory of the phrase in which he had hinted at the possibility of a solution.
Among Cubans there are terms that allude to our incessant effort to make our way through multiple difficulties: the “battle” or “struggle”, for example, serves to remind us of the enterprising eagerness, often positive, of the children of this island. But there are words that speak to us of less clean attitudes – such as the “search” – or of invitations to “solve”, to mediate in circumstances that, so humanly delicate, do not allow the inclusion of intentions of sale and purchase.
This last word is often disconcerting to the listener, who does not know the language of “help me, I will help you”: No one who has in his soul an ethical protocol in which cheating and pillaging add to the list of anti-values will be able to comfortably assume that complicity in which “aid” has a price and in the end the feeling remains that, to the right, solutions either arrive late or never arrive, unless there is a commercial option.
To tell the truth, the desire to “seek” (i.e. to find monetary or material advantages where there are resources), or this desire to “solve” – whether from the person who charges or from the one who pays – could find multiple explanations in reality: In three decades of increased economic and social difficulties, we have seen a lot of weeds grow in the shadow of emergencies and needs; life, like water seeking to run its course, has become for many a long-distance race in which almost everything is done against the clock, desperately, in a context marked by a lack of resources, bureaucracy and inefficiency in providing services, in a country that for much more than three decades has suffered the handshake of the empire through a commercial and financial blockade.
To these known and accumulated problems we must add the new challenges arising from the reconfiguration of the country in the economic and social spheres – a stage that, as a friend told me, is reminiscent of the movement of the bowels of the Earth, that rearrangement in which many customs and moral compasses seem to be dislocated while the scenarios, like the flakes of the planet, are being rearranged.
The fact that “resolving” lives among us as a style places us as a society, since it reminds us of the importance of the right-wing paths – that is, the entities that are responsible for the well-being of all – working together and doing so with agility. The other thing is that everything we design in terms of the necessary control must implicitly bring about the natural flexibility of life: rigidity and excessive restrictions are overwhelming and lead many to wonder what to do to “resolve” problems, and how to do it.
There is another inescapable aspect to this: even the ugliest attitudes can find an explanation, which does not mean that they deserve to be justified. Therefore, even if the most diverse distortions fuel the search for shortcuts, it would not be good for the dream country to wait for everything to go well in the target world to start looking inside. To rebel against brazenness and unscrupulousness at this moment seems to me to be an act of responsibility insofar as it limits the denial of virtue; it even seems to me to be an act of faith in the best possibilities for our fellow beings.
MLK: When a Dream Doesn’t Die
MLK, Jr.: When a Dream Doesn’t Die
Fifty years after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., the United States is still convulsed by racial inequality, but hope also remains.
By Marylín Luis Grillo
digital@juventudrebelde.cu
Posted: Wednesday 04 April 2018 | 09:35:06 PM
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
It was a single shot from a Remington-Peters rifle. Martin Luther King Jr. had fallen in Memphis, Tennessee.
Hours earlier, in a sermon, as if in anticipation of the bullet that tried to quell his throat, he had said to the congregation of the city: “We have difficult days ahead of us […] Like everyone else, I would like to have a long life. […] But that doesn’t worry me now. I just want to do God’s will. And he has allowed me to climb to the top of the mountain. And from there I saw the promised land. I may not get to her with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will reach the Promised Land. And I’m happy about it. Nothing worries me.
Luther King, who at the age of 39 had won the Nobel Peace Prize, had led a non-violent struggle for the civil rights of the African-American community, which had become the banner of hope… King did not die, because dreams do not die, they only come true.
The results of their struggle are not yet complete. Fifty years after his murder, the United States is still convulsed by inequality. The latest statistics illustrate that African-Americans suffer three times as many expulsions and school dropouts, their average household income is half that of white families, and with only 13 percent of the population, El País reported, they account for 40 percent of drug arrests.
A study by the Inequality of Opportunity Project also concluded that racial income disparities are one of the most persistent issues in American society, and that the racial identity to which one belongs marks the opportunities for study, work, salary levels, and social advancement from generation to generation.
Black people are also three times more likely than whites to be victims of police in the United States, and in 2015 alone, for example, with Barack Obama in the White House, law enforcement officers killed more unarmed blacks than armed whites. Faced with an Afro-descendant, the trigger is pulled without much attention.
Police repression, increasing inequality, debates in society about the role of identity groups, and Trump’s racist rhetoric are some of the factors that have led to the resurgence of movements like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the birth of others like Black Lives Matter.
“No Justice, No Peace” said one of the posters that flooded the streets of Sacramento a week ago protesting the death of another black man by police, 22-year-old Stephon Clark, who was shot down in the Californian capital on suspicion of breaking car windows and running around with a cell phone in his hand, which officers said they mistook for a gun.
Police opened fire up to 20 times on Clark and eight bullets hit him, seven from behind. The video of the arrest hardly shows whether the young man was approaching the officers or not. They do not order him to freez, or to lie on the ground, after the first order to show his hands, they immediately shout “gun” and shoot. The city has been shaken up again, but it is not enough.
This is a good time to remember Luther King. Less than two weeks ago, her nine-year-old granddaughter, Yolanda Renee, was repeating the mythical words “I have a dream. She called for “a world without weapons”. His father, Martin Luther King III, son of the pastor, announced Friday the launch of a global initiative to encourage young people to focus on non-violence to resolve their conflicts.
The struggle continues, but it must be carried to its end; “from the mountain of despair, a stone of hope,” Dr. King would say. He was the same one who never stopped spreading faith because he had died: no bullet can kill dreams.
Of the Dream and the Nightmare
Of the Dream and the Nightmare
Fifty years after Martin Luther King’s momentous visionary speech, African Americans continue to struggle to find the path to true equality.
By Juana Carrasco Martin
juana@juventudrebelde.cu
Published August 37, 2013 21:39:36 CDT
Updated: Thursday, September 21, 2017 | 10:25:08 PM
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
Martin Luther King greets the crowd at the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963. Author: AP Published: 21/09/2017 | 05:38 pm
It was a blast, revalidating the struggle of many, raising the awareness of others and forming ranks in a social movement involving blacks and whites because it was for the civil rights of all. It also awakened those who were still lethargic after hundreds of years of outrage and submission.
On August 28, 1963, the 100th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation for black people in the United States, the end of slavery, was observed when a crowd, led by the Rev. Martin Luther King and other leaders of the black people’s struggle and social and labor movements, marched on Washington and gathered at the National Mall at the foot of the imposing statue of Abraham Lincoln.
“I have a dream,” he said in his speech to what he called the greatest demonstration of freedom in the history of the nation, and he called out with utter crudeness that a century later “we must face the tragic fact that the black man is not yet free. He was chained by segregation and discrimination, “living on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity,” he was “an exile in his own land.
The dream? that the words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence will apply to each and every American as a guarantee of the inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These were denied to “citizens of color” who had been given a bounced check from a bankrupt justice. But this marginalized, humiliated, separated people, who were denied every opportunity, even the most basic, knew of their right to open the doors of justice, to cast aside racial injustice and to build “the solid rock of brotherhood.”
The time was urgent, warned Martin Luther King, and also alerted his people and the rest of the United States: “1963 is not the end, but the beginning” (…) “There will be no rest or tranquility in America until the black man establishes his citizens’ rights. The winds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
Three national television networks, for the first time, covered the march for jobs and freedom in together. The message reached the entire nation that a melting pot was being said, the pot that had mixed all the peoples who had come to its shores and built a powerful country, but that was one of the great lies. The Black ingredient, even the original peoples, the “red skins”, had been taken out of society. That media coverage was proof that it was time for change.
There Joan Baez and Bob Dylan sang, as did the gospel performer, Mahalia Jackson, who carried the feeling of the crowd with I’ve Been ‘Buked and I’ve Been Scorned. Many spoke, including Joachim Prinz, president of the American Jewish Congress, recalling his years as a rabbi in Berlin under Hitler, who said – according to The Guardian – that his great people, who had created a great civilization, had then become a nation of silent spectators to hatred, brutality and mass crimes and cried out: “America cannot become a nation of spectators. America must not remain silent.”
On August 28, 1963, and Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech, a door was opened. It was hardly mentioned in the 64,000 pages of debate and congressional hearings that gave way to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which put on paper what it should be and yet was not; but it was a touch of the target.
Enemies took it into account. Cointelpro, the program of espionage and infiltration into the social movements of the time, made him its target. William Sullivan, the FBI’s assistant director of domestic intelligence, recommended: “We must mark him now, if we have not done so before, as the most dangerous black man in the future of the nation.”
Hot summers came and their street uprisings, many more marches and actions, unity with the anti-war movement, and rejection of the Vietnam War, which they also used as their favorite cannon fodder for blacks and Latinos. Martin Luther King was in that fight for all.
Little by little there were achievements, even a middle class of “coloured” men and women emerged, their numbers increased in universities, they became professionals, their faces already appeared as leading figures in Hollywood films, they showed, even more, their value in the sports world, where the image of a black fist is vivid as a symbol of Black Power, the power of black people.
Blood flowed – that of Martin Luther King himself in April 1968, that of Malcolm X, that of George Jackson, that of many others – Mumia Abu Jamal is still in prison and those who chose more radical methods of struggle are being persecuted. Other leaders in an ongoing struggle were highlighted, as the Lincoln Memorial speaker said as the summer of 1963 ended: it was only the beginning…
And 50 years later, what?
Present at the rally at the National Mall on Saturday, August 24, 2013, which brought together no less than 100,000 Americans of all colors, generations and ideologies to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s oratory piece, were the parents of Trayvon Martin. He was the 17-year-old boy shot dead in the chest by a white vigilante in Florida on February 26, 2012. It took protest marches in many American cities and a lot of work to have the perpetrator arrested and put on trial, and almost now, in July, a jury of five white women and a Latina declared him “Innocent.” Not a few posters in front of Lincoln’s statue again called for justice for what is perceived as a hate crime.
Police in New York and other U.S. cities are accused of practicing stopping and frisking bystanders, most of whom are black or Latino, and preferably young, for no reason. They are stopped because of racial profiling. African-Americans make up seven times more than whites among the prison population, which is already the highest in the world. In the United States, it is known and recognized that they invest more in prisons than in schools….
Only 21 percent of their youth reach high school or college, compared to 37 percent of whites. Budget cuts in major cities declared bankrupt and in federal spending itself, that of the entire nation, affect the public school system and, of course, scholarships or university credits. It goes without saying that communities and neighborhoods where poor or low-income minorities live are among the hardest hit by teacher layoffs. During Barack Obama’s tenure alone, more than 300,000 school jobs have been lost – with a high proportion of these being African-American teachers and staff. Public education will be of even poorer quality, which means that there is no future sown there.
The unemployment rate in 2012 was 13.6 percent for the African-American work force, while the white unemployed made up 8.1 percent. Of the 45 million Americans who receive food aid because they are poor, more than 25 percent are black.
Barack Obama, the first black president of the United States will speak today, August 28, in honor of Martin Luther King. But it is well-known that the president is only an image in a House that is still white and protective of the interests of the powerful 1% against the 99% who – without distinction of race – have declared themselves in struggle and have also begun a path to close the gaps of class inequality, as the Occupy [Wall Street movement] which has been marginalized.
Now, in the southern states, even in other regions, electoral districts are being reconfigured and the black population is once again segregated from the vote, even having to pay to register. It also is the population with the lowest income, thereby discouraging voting. There is only one black senator among the top 100 in Congress, and 43 representatives in the House of Representatives, among 435…
Therefore, the validity of the thought of the civil and pacifist leader: “I have a dream: that one day this nation will rise up and live the true meaning of its creed. We hold this truth to be self-evident: All men are created equal.
Martin Luther King will continue: “Even though we face difficulties today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.”
Are Men Stronger Than Women?
Are Men Stronger Than Women?
The machismo superimposed on honesty where health is concerned, puts Latin American men, who believe that they do not need to go to the doctor, at risk of suffering serious illnesses and thus put their lives in danger.
By Juventud Rebelde
digital@juventudrebelde.cu
Posted: Saturday, March 3. 2018 | 06:54:26 PM
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
The machismo superimposed on honesty in health is concerned, makes Latin American men believe that they do not need to go to the doctor at risk of suffering serious illnesses and that they put their lives in danger.
Compared to other regions of the world, the health of Latin American men is more exposed to male chauvinism, believing that they are stronger than women and that they do not need to go to the doctor, puts them at risk of suffering serious and life-threatening illnesses.
This was recently announced by a study prepared by Panamanian specialists and reviewed by the Xinhua news agency.
The research explains that the decline in men’s health compared to women’s health is a global problem with great impact in our geographical area, although there is also a gap in the matter in Africa and Europe.
According to statistics, men in Latin American countries live between eight and 12 years less than women, mainly because the social stigma that considers them to be the head of the household weighs heavily on the lack of accurate reporting on men’s health.
In this region, the prevalence of certain metabolic, cardiovascular and sexual dysfunction diseases affecting men is increasingly noted.
It is common for men in this area of the planet to live less and less, and not only that, but to arrive much more deteriorated in their old age, because they never go to the doctor or have a follow-up visit.
The opposite is true of women, who, because of their preparation, are closely linked to a doctor, a pediatrician or a gynaecologist. Hence, it is the man who most often goes to the doctor with chronic illnesses.
Teachers Demand Raises and Funding
Thousands of teachers in the U.S. demand better salaries and more funding for public schools
Several hundred public schools remained closed this Monday, either because of spring break, or because many teachers decided to leave and their districts allowed them to participate in the mobilization.
Published: Tuesday 03 April 2018 | 09:36:27 AM
By Juventud Rebelde
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
Teachers march in the United States Author: Internet Published: 03/04/2018 | 09:35 am
WASHINGTON, April 3. Tens of thousands of teachers in Kentucky and Oklahoma came together yesterday in their state capitals to demand more funding for education, salary and pension improvements.
According to USA Today, 120 public schools in the first of those territories remained closed on Monday, either because of spring break, because many teachers decided to leave or because their districts allowed them to participate in the mobilization.
“Stop the war on public education!” and “Enough is enough,” the Kentucky teachers shouted outside the state capitol in Frankfort, where they protested against a change to their pension system and cuts to education funding.
Teachers oppose a bill passed by the state legislature last Thursday and demand that Governor Matt Bevin veto it.
If the Republican politician signs the legislation, it will phase out defined benefit teacher pensions and replace them with hybrid retirement plans that combine the characteristics of a traditional pension with the 401(k) accounts used in the private sector.
In addition, retired teachers in Kentucky do not receive Social Security benefits, so any freezing of their pensions affects their total retirement income.
State teachers also demand the necessary funding for the public school system.
“Today we notify you that if you don’t pass a budget that protects Kentucky’s public services, provides adequate funding for schools, then we will vote to remove them from office,” Stephanie Winkler, president of the Kentucky Education Association, told the crowd.
According to ABC News, members of other public employee unions, including those representing firefighters, police, plumbers and pipe fitters, joined the teachers in a show of solidarity.
In Oklahoma, meanwhile, protesters demanded a higher wage increase for teachers and support staff and an increase in funding for education, which plummeted 28 percent in the last decade, according to the state teachers’ union.
The Oklahoma protest comes despite Republican Gov. Mary Fallin signed a law last Thursday that gives educators – currently at $45,000 a year – an average wage increase of $6,100.
Even with that increase, Oklahoma’s teachers would earn below the national average for public school teachers, which is $58,950 a year, and only surpasses those in Mississippi and South Dakota.
“Finance education”, “They are starving our schools” and “Mourning for public schools”, was read on the posters carried by those attending the protest.
Parkland Survivors on TIME magazine cover
Parkland Survivors on TIME magazine cover
In a recent issue of Time magazine, five Parkland high school students look at the reader cry of ENOUGH to demand that their legislators take action to make schools and streets safe across the country.
Posted: Monday 02 April 2018 | 10:34:06 PM
Author: juana@juventudrebelde.cu
By Juana Carrasco Martin
juana@juventudrebelde.cu
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
A recent issue of Time magazine, one of the most important American publications, has a very special cover: five teenagers – students at Parkland High School, where 17 of their classmates were shot dead by another young man who was also a student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School – look straight ahead with a word that crosses not only that cover, but also the claim of a majority of the concerned population: Enough, a term that can also be translated as Enough is Enough.
Among the young people are Emma Gonzalez, David Hogg and Cameron Kasky, who have become spokespersons and advocates for control over guns in private hands in the United States. They are activists against armed violence, which is almost an epidemic in the northern nation, and they demand measures from their legislators to make the country’s schools and streets safe.
However, their demand does not have many receptive ears in the political class, where many of its members are tied to the National Rifle Association that thrives on this business. But the young people persist. A month after the shooting, many U.S. schools held 17 minutes of silence in honor of the 17 massacred in Parkland. A march went through Washington, the nation’s capital, with sibling marches in cities and towns across the country. They called for a change in the permissive and enabling rules and laws for these irrational crimes. It was the largest demonstration ever held in the United States for this purpose.
A recent AP-NORC survey emphasizes that national support for arms control is currently at its highest level in five years. About seven out of 10 adults favor stronger laws on the issue, representing 69 percent of respondents, The Hill said.
So, what does the president do? He calls for states in the Union to hand over weapons to teachers and school employees to answer Fire! with Fire!, a simple lesson in insanity….
Marielle Franco, A Victim who died twice
Marielle Franco, A Victim who died twice
The mourning after the murder of the Brazilian councilor is followed by the spread of fake news on social networks
By Caroline Amaral Coutinho digital@juventudrebelde.cu
Posted: Saturday 24 March 2018 | 11:09:24 PM
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
In addition to being a councilor for Rio de Janeiro, Marielle Franco was also an activist for the safety of police and residents of the Favelas. Author: Midia Ninja Published: 24/03/2018 | 10:50 pm
A black, bisexual woman, born in one of the poorest slums in Rio de Janeiro, Marielle Franco became a symbol of the social struggle in the country after her brutal and mysterious murder on March 14.
Her second death – that of her honor, her principles, and her struggles – was caused by the dissemination of news in the social media, which tries to minimize the importance of the crime against the human rights activist.
One of the so-called fake news defamation stories against Marielle alleges that she married a well-known drug trafficker in the country, Marcinho VP. Others claimed that the counselor was using drugs or that she had had her daughter when she was 16 years old – all fake, as evidenced by several Brazilian data-checking websites.
On an even more sinister occasion, a federal judge at the Rio de Janeiro Court of Justice caused controversy by criticizing Marielle based on the false news that the councilor was voted for by members of the Comando Vermelho faction. The judge said in response to a Facebook post: “The point is that Marielle was not just a fighter”; she was engaged to bandits! She was elected by the Vermelho Command and failed to meet “commitments” made to her supporters.
The Free Brazil Movement, a right-wing opposition group known for disseminating sensationalist information, used the news about the judge’s baseless accusation in a web publication entitled “Federal judge breaks with the PSOL (Marielle’s party) narrative and claims that Marielle was involved with bandits and is a “common corpse”,” with more than 40,000 “likes” before she was killed.
Other representatives of the extreme right also mobilized to spread lies about the representative of the PSOL party (Partido Socialismo y Libertad). Among them, Alberto Fraga, deputy of the “Bancada da Bala” (parliamentary front for the right of access of civilians to bear arms), published last Friday on Twitter an image of defamation with false information about Marielle’s alleged relationship with criminals to question the action of the police in crime. As a result of the criticism, the Member had to withdraw the publication.
But the online lying machine could not contain the manifestations of pain and solidarity with Marielle. The day after her murder, tens of thousands of people from different parts of Brazil, as well as from Portugal and New York, took to the streets in repudiation of what had happened, according to G1 data.
In addition, around 50 members of the European Union’s Human Rights Council requested the suspension of negotiations with the Mercosur economic bloc. and 100 UN entities denounced Brazil for violence against social activists in the country.
Marielle Franco received the fifth most votes as a candidate in the city of Rio de Janeiro from the Socialism and Freedom Party (PSOL). She was also a sociologist and political leader in the defense of human rights. The councilor was shot dead on the night of Wednesday, March 14, leaving an event on the role of black women in politics.