children

Documentary shows children of a paradise lost
Published October 18, 2001
Why don't people rise up against abusive governments?

The Cuba quagmire begs that question. If things really are so bad on the island, then people should fight for their rights and kick the rascals out!

If only it were that easy. Anyone who has lived in a totalitarian regime knows the mind games that are played from a very early age. Fear and hatred intertwine into a complex paralysis of mind and body. Government-imposed groupthink seeks to quash individual creativity.
NOTES BY ME IN CAPITALS : (POSEIDON55)
NOT ONLY THE OBLIGED INDOCTRINATION IS A METHOD OF TWISTING THE REALITIES BUT A MEAN TO INTIMIDATE AND BLACKMAIL. THOSE WHO REJECT,OPPOSE OR RESIST TO THESE MEANS ARE , BY ALL MEANS AND SOONER OR LATER MADE TO KNOW WHAT THE CONSEQUENCES ARE. THIS IS ALMOST DONE AUTOMATICALLY AND IN SUBTLE WAYS, BUT THE RETALIATION IS OFTEN ON THE OPEN.

Witness what's happening right now in parts of the Middle East. Young children are taught to hate America. They are not born with hatred -- it's a learned response that adults teach them. It reminds me of the indoctrination that Cuban children face in schools just 90 miles from U.S. shores.

In Cuba, kids must report any family member or classmate who questions the revolution's goals. It's hard for most Americans to relate to that sort of "education," which explains why so many saw the plight of little shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez through a made-in-America prism. In this country, parental rights are sacrosanct. In Cuba, those rights do not exist.

If you really want to see what drives desperate people to throw themselves into the sea on flimsy rafts or boats, as Elian's mother did AND DIED IN THE ATTEMPT -- and why they choose to do so to save their children instead of "rising up" -- watch Made in Cuba: Children of Paradise.

The documentary interviews dozens of young people and adults who grew up in Cuba after Fidel Castro's 1959 communist revolution. Among them is Castro's daughter, Alina Fernandez, who escaped in the 1990s to save her own daughter from indoctrination. Others include the daughter of a popular Cuban military man in Castro's regime who the government executed, and the son of a man whose father fought alongside the left's lovable icon Che Guevara. But it is the voices of the average Cubans who talk about being sent at age 12 to toil in the fields of "forced labor camps" to earn their so-called free education -- the fear and loathing they felt mixed with the obligation to be good citizens -- that touch us.

THE WORK OF STUDENTS, AND ALSO OF ADULTS IN ZILLIONS OF TASKS ARE CALLED BY THE REGIME : << VOLUNTARY WORK >> FOR 42 YEARS THIS HAS BEEN GOING ON. MILLIONS OF MAN-HOUR OF WORK HAVE BEEN GIVEN TO THE <> IN A WAY THAT CAN'T BE CALLED VOLUNTARY.FOR THOSE WHO DO NOT PARTICIPATE ARE LABELLED SOONER OR LATER AS SUSPICIOUS OF BEING AGAINST THE << REVOLUTION>> OR IN ITS EQUIVALENT : AGAINST KASTRO.

The documentary is the brainchild of Lydia M. Usategui, president of the South Florida chapter of the Florida Psychiatric Society. A child psychiatrist, Usategui was appalled when she read an article in a 1999 journal about American psychiatrists' experiences in Cuba. The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry painted a "grossly inaccurate" picture of the Cuban reality, Alfredo Manrara told me Wednesday. Manrara, a Cuban-American businessman, helped Usategui, his wife, raise money to produce the documentary, which was filmed in Cuba, the United States and Europe.

The project, produced by the Committee for the Human Rights of Children, a small group composed mostly of physicians and academics, was shown in Geneva this year during United Nations Human Rights Commission meetings. Producers hope to get a network, such as PBS, Fox or the History Channel, to show the film to American audiences.

But you don't have to wait until that happens. There will be a free viewing at Rollins College's Bush auditorium Saturday at 7 p.m. Watch what the children of Castro's revolution say about growing up in Cuba. Hear them out and make up your own minds. Unlike the children of paradise, you're free to say what you think.

Myriam Marquez can be reached at mmarquez@orlandosentinel.com
Copyright 2001, Orlando Sentinel

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