[Marxism] Cuba: the specter of censorship (La Jornada)

[Walter Lippmann <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

January 18, 2007
Cuba: the specter of censorship
Intellectuals worried about the public resurfacing of political commissars of 
yesteryear
By Correspondent GERARDO ARREOLA 

A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann.
http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs1095.html

original
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/01/19/index.php?section=mundo&article=056n1mun

Havana, January 18.- The apparent recognition of cultural purges
which prevailed in Cuba three decades ago caused alarm among dozens
of intellectuals who voiced their anger soon after a number of
then-political commissars reappeared on public television and sparked
off a debate for many years unseen in the country.

In an official declaration made on Thursday, the Board of Directors
of the Cuban Union of Writers and Artists (UNEAC) claimed to âshare
the just indignation" of its members and stressed the irreversible
nature of âthe anti-dogmatic cultural, creative and participatory
policy inspired by Martà and followed by Fidel and RaÃl [Castro],
inaugurated with the Words to the Intellectuals speech".

Thus the text referred to Fidel Castroâs address to an audience of
creators on June 30, 1961, widely publicized again in the last few
years and conventionally remembered for this passage: "...within the
revolution everything; against the revolution nothing. Against the
revolution nothing because the revolution also has its rights, and
the foremost right of the revolution is the right to exist, and no
one can oppose the right of the revolution to be and exist. Because
the revolution covers the peopleâs interests, because the revolution
stands for a whole nationâs interests and no one can rightfully argue
anything against it".

The reason that some raw nerves were touched by this debate is that
even though that speech is held to have led Cuban cultural policies
in the last forty years, it is also known to have given rise to
opposing interpretations.

As UNEAC pointed out, to the intellectuals âit was of the utmost
importance to count from the outset on the full support of the
[Communist] Party leaders".

The artists and intellectuals protest came in the wake of a January 5
interview on national TV with Luis PavÃn Tamayo, who as head of the
late National Culture Council (CNC) from 1971 to 1976 âthe so-called
gray quinquenniumâ led a policy of crackdown and civil death
sentences on artists and writers not toeing the party line, its
provisions aimed at discriminating against homosexuals, rejecting any
sign of decadent capitalist culture, disclaiming the works of ÃmigrÃs
or censoring critical views of the countryâs realities.   

PavÃn, former director of military journal Verde Olivo (Olive Green),
was featured presented as a valuable contributor to national culture.
Not one word was mentioned about his repressive role.

However, another former censor had resurfaced on December 13: Jorge
Serguera, at the time the head of ICRT (Cuban Radio and Television
Broadcasting Institute) and before that the general auditor of the
armed forces, chief of the revolutionary tribunals, leader of
military detachments and ambassador to Algeria and Congo.

In putting both appearances together, the outraged artists recalled
another one early in 2006: that of CNC Deputy for the theater
movement, whose TV interview followed the same lines as PavÃnâs and
Sergueraâs.

Protests and meetings

An avalanche of irate e-mails began to circulate, and a dossier was
put together which some of the dissenters presented to Political
Bureau member and Minister of Culture Abel Prieto in the first of at
least three meetings between the official and intellectuals connected
to the case.

Playwright, poet and storyteller AntÃn Arrufat, winner of the
National Literacy Award in the year 2000 and previously a victim of
repression, told La Jornada that the appointment had been âpurely
informativeâ and "rather preliminary" to the second meeting, attended
by current ICRT president Ernesto LÃpez, also a former member of the
armed forces, and some of the people responsible for the programs at
issue.

In Arrufatâs view, âno one seems to be responsible for anythingâ,
judging by the things these TV officials said about how the programs
were made. âIt was a sham, nothing but talk about bureaucratic
mechanisms only to conclude that they have to continue the inquiry".

According to some of those present in the third meeting last Tuesday,
the matter is in the hands of Esteban Lazo, the Political Bureau
member in charge of the media, who allegedly asked the ICRT to offer
an apology to the intellectual community.

As remarked in the declaration submitted by UNEACâs Secretariat, the
broadcasting authorities said that the programs in question "respond
to none of our policiesâ and that âserious mistakes were made in
their design and making".

In addition to the meetings and UNEACâs communiquÃ, the wave of
protests had other effects: cultural policies came to the fore, plans
were made to publish a book with the facts of this case, and the
debate made it to provincial level.

The kickoff of a discussion process this month will be a conference
called "The gray quinquennium: revisiting the term" by Ambrosio
Fornet, the writer who so baptized that period of Stalinist-type
purges in Cuban culture.

This week the debate was taken to other provinces in the hands of
Reynaldo GonzÃlez and CÃsar LÃpez, two writers who were banned in the
1970s and have now joined the fray, and two of UNEAC board members:
president Carlos Martà and the Writers Association chairman Francisco
LÃpez Sacha.

In its declaration, UNEAC remarks that the meetings with the artists
âprovided evidence of the need" for creators to work âtogetherâ with
the TV broadcasting authorities to promote programs that âexpress
Cuban cultureâs true intellectual and artistic hierarchies".

Exiled writers such as Eliseo Alberto and Abilio EstÃvez joined the
cause of their outraged colleagues in the island, while others like
Amir Valle believe the debate must be pursued to even further levels
in order to define whoâs accountable.

Without going into details, UNEAC observed that âsome people from
overseas gave their honest opinions on this issue; others, obviously
at the service of the enemy (in clear reference to the U.S.
government), have tried to manipulate the situation for their own
benefit", but it ruled out the idea that any âdoubtful attitudes,
divisions or opportunities for [the enemyâs] annexationist purposesâ
may be seen in this âdebate among revolutionaries".

More than just a quinquennium...

The implications of what came to be a dark period for Cuban culture
went beyond a quinquennium. Its most well-known precedent is the case
of Heberto Padilla (1932-2000), whose collection of poems Fuera de
juego (1968) won an award even after it was officially tagged as
âcounterrevolutionaryâ.

Padilla was jailed for 38 days, after which he delivered a
self-critical speech to UNEAC members, and then lived in isolation
until he went into exile in 1980.

His situation prompted a flood of criticism worldwide and stood out
as the first breakup of the intelligentsia with Fidel Castroâs
government.

In 1971, the First Congress of Education and Culture laid down a set
of parameters to be met by those who held public office or jobs, its
effects spreading well into the 1980s. Homosexual authors like JosÃ
Lezama Lima (1910-1976) and Virgilio PiÃera (1912-1979) were
ostracized and died with no official recognition. Arrufat was sent to
work in a library basement for nine years tying parcels of books and
was not allowed to publish for 14 years.

Under the said policy, rock music, the Beatles, wearing blue jeans,
and men with long-hair fell victim to harassment as symptoms of
âideological deviationâ.

Never, at least in the last 20 years, had such a far-reaching debate
taken place in Cuba, Arrufat said, pointing out that the only
antecedent he remembered dated back to the early 1980s when there had
been a âviolentâ argument initially centered on poetry but soon
extended to cover, like in this occasion, the countryâs cultural
policy.

Other authors believe the debate can only compare to the protest that
brought about the closing of the Military Units to Support Production
(UMAP), camps of imprisonment and forced labor for those labeled as
âsocial misfitsâ, namely homosexuals and Jehovahâs Witnesses.

---ooOoo---

Fidel Castro: Words to the Intellectuals (1961)

English:

http://www.walterlippmann.com/fc-06-30-1961.html

EspaÃol

http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/1961/esp/f300661e.html




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