Documentos

Page 2575 of 2675

« Anterior 1 … 2.573 2.574 2.575 2.576 2.577 … 2.675 Siguiente »

SOLILOQUIO: Reflexión sobre la coyuntura política actual

mayo 8, 2016mayo 8, 2016Mario Sanoja Obediente

Mario Sanoja Obediente

Tratar de prevenir el futuro es una manera de conjurar las hades del pasado y del presente. Soliloqueando sobre lo que devendría nuestra sufrida Venezuela en el futuro inmediato, hallamos la influencia fatal del imperio que, como en cada oportunidad que nuestro pueblo ha tratado de emanciparse de su mefítica tutela, aparecen sus manos tenebrosas moviendo los todavía más tenebrosos políticos venezolanos que no tienen reparos en vender a la patria (que no es de ellos) por un plato de lentejas piches, por un puñado de devaluados dólares. Los que propiciaron con su falta de conciencia el triunfo de aquellos “malos hijos de la Patria”, no calcularon y quizás ni siquiera todavía están conscientes del daño que han hecho a nuestro pueblo (del cual ellos forman también parte) al permitir que llegue a controlar una porción del poder republicano la peor manada de políticos, corruptos e incapaces de la cual se tenga memoria en la historia contemporánea de Venezuela. Otra parte importante del pueblo venezolano, felizmente, ha logrado alcanzar un buen nivel de conciencia histórica y política gracias a las enseñanzas de nuestro Comandante Chávez; esa presencia es ignorada por la estulticia de la derecha parlamentaria y empresarial que concibe la historia como un proceso mecánico donde basta jugar sibilinamente con la palabra “cambio” para que mágicamente éste se produzca de la manera deseada.

La Revolución Bolivariana, pese a los errores cometidos por parte de su dirigencia, ha logrado crear un nuevo contexto sociopolítico que constituye la verdadera amenaza contra la seguridad del establishment de los Estados Unidos: el hecho de que tengamos una democracia participativa y protagónica, la posibilidad de construir una nación donde los derechos sociales se cumplen y se respetan, donde se reduce al mínimo la desigualdad social, se vence la pobreza y la ignorancia y se logran las metas del milenio. Este logro alcanzado por una sociedad que los gringos consideran inferior, arroja un manto de oprobio sobre la faz de aquellos oligarcas estadounidenses que se consideran líderes de un pueblo escogido por la providencia para gobernar la humanidad. Como diría nuestro Libertador, en verdad han sido escogidos por Lucifer para llenar de muerte, destrucción y miseria a los pueblos del mundo, incluido el suyo propio.

Con base en lo anterior, objetivo del golpe electoral neoadeco del 6D es contar con una cabeza de playa para lanzar la ofensiva final contra el Presidente Maduro. Hemos resaltado en muchas notas anteriores los que consideramos han sido sus inconsistencias a la hora de tomar decisiones cruciales para derrotar las amenazas de la derecha. Pero de la misma manera apoyamos sus políticas socioeconómicas y culturales que constituyen la única manera de resolver definitivamente esta crisis histórica, mundial y nacional del capitalismo que agobia a la nación venezolana. Consciente de ello el Imperio yankee y sus secuaces en la OEA, y la derecha venezolana se revuelven como fieras rabiosas contra el Presidente Maduro y la Revolución Bolivariana; desgraciadamente- también hay muchos camaradas que parecieran jugar con cartas marcadas el póker de la contrarevolución, y empeñan rabiosamente, cual un Henry Ramos cualquiera, en desacreditar los esfuerzos de la Revolución Bolivariana.

Que el imperio recurra al espantajo de la llamada Carta Democrática de la OEA significa que sus cómplices de la derecha venezolana no tienen mucha posibilidad de victoria en el corto plazo. Tanto la vía constitucional como la violenta para derrocar a Maduro, por ahora, parecen estar bloqueadas. La vía de la guerrilla bachaquera binacional tampoco tendría mucha opción… si el gobieno bolivariano se decidiese a reprimirla. La inflación inducida por Fedecámaras y la especulación voraz de los comerciantes podrían ser combatidas legalmente mediante un decreto presidencial que permitiese pechar las ganancias excesivas y eventualmente, como hace el régimen capitalista en Francia, cancelar a los culpables la patente de trabajo-

El objeto de la ofensiva imperial contra los gobiernos (y los pueblos) progresistas de Suramérica es derrocarlos en este año electoral y presentar como trofeos de guerra al Congreso y al electorado de USA, como hacían los césares romanos, las banderas y los despojos de los gobernantes vencidos por el ejército imperial, presentando a los procónsules Macri, Temer y Ramos Allup como glorias imperiales. Pero no se dan cuenta que las revoluciones sociales no son gobiernos que se puedan derrocar, son procesos de cambio que ocurren cuando son históricamente necesarios. Las revoluciones son los pueblos. Por eso vemos que en cada caso a su manera los pueblos de Argentina, Brasil y Venezuela, tal como en otras escalas sucede en Grecia, España, Francia y Portugal, comienzan a tomar el pulso de sus movimientos revolucionarios, con o sin el acompañamiento del liderazgo político.

Algunos camaradas y amigos ven el futuro con pesimismo. Los procesos revolucionarios aunque son lineales en cuanto al logro de sus objetivos, en cuanto a su estrategia adoptan diversos mecanismos, tiempos históricos de lucha. La estrategia de la derecha es provocar el caos, desarticular el proceso revolucionario utilizando el miedo, utilizando la exaltación de los valores más egoístas del capitalismo para corromper los procesos de solidaridad social propios del socialismo.

El futuro pertenece a quienes tenemos fe en el triunfo final. Pero esa victoria solo será posible si sabemos bien lo que queremos lograr. La revolución socialista es ideología practicada; el pragmatismo y el oportunismo burgués solo conducen al logro de éxitos coyunturales. Sin haber creado el pueblo sujeto, la subjetividad revolucionaria a través de una verdadera politica educativa y cultural que ponga todos los medios de formación de conciencia (educación formal e informal, museos de historia y geografía nacionales y locales, medios de comunicación, música, literatura, teatro, cine, pintura, escultura, ciencia, etc….) al servicio de la lucha revolucionaria y la consolidación del pueblo como sujeto del cambio histórico venezolano, la derecha nos seguirá sorprendiendo. Ellos no tienen que cambiar nada, su tarea es lograr que gente quiera seguir viviendo bajo el antiguo régimen capitalista, impedir que lo nuevo se desarrolle, estimular la inercia social. Nosotros tenemos la tarea de preparar la nueva humanidad, la nueva sociedad justa y socialista. Y en la búsqueda de esa meta no podemos equivocarnos ni ser temerosos del futuro. Pensemos siempre en el comandante Chávez y en el sacrificio de su vida por la victoria revolucionaria. Ese es su legado principal.

Comparte este contenido:

A tu salud

mayo 8, 2016mayo 8, 2016Luis Britto García

Luis Britto García

1.Amenazó en 2002 el director de PDVSA Luis Giusti que Venezuela no sobreviviría una semana sin petróleo: cuando lanzó el sabotaje petrolero los venezolanos resistimos tres meses y fue Giusti quien no sobrevivió. Ahora juran los estrategas de botiquín que no aguantamos un día sin caña. Motivo por el cual el Estado debe dedicar los dólares preferenciales que le quedan para financiarle importaciones de cebada al grupo empresarial que más divisas ha recibido para importar lo que debería estar produciendo. Veamos.

2. Una encuesta realizada en 9 países latinoamericanos por la Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO) bajo la dirección de Carlos Sojo revela que Venezuela tiene una prevalencia regional de bebedores de alcohol del 83%, con un promedio de consumo de 8,9 litros de alcohol puro per cápita anuales. Este consumo es superior al promedio de América Latina, que se sitúa en 5,5 litros, pero inferior al de Estados Unidos, que promedia 9,8 libros al año, y al de Europa que se sitúa en 13 litros. En la región latinoamericana, el 75% de la población no bebe nada, o lo hace por debajo del nivel de riesgo fijado por la Organización Mundial de la salud en 40 gramos de alcohol puro para las mujeres y 60 para los varones. El 25% de la población restante supera estas dosis en forma ocasional o muy frecuente; de ella el 20% está en riesgo de sobrepasarlo y el 5% restante en un riesgo alto a largo plazo (“Venezuela lidera consumo de alcohol en Latinoamérica” Últimas Noticias/EFE, 24-05-2012).

3. En encuesta Enjuve, realizada en 2013 entre 10.000 jóvenes, 15% de las y los consultados admitió consumir cigarrillos y 46% alcohol, sin embargo, no se conoció el uso de otras sustancias ilícitas. En ambos casos, llama la atención en cuanto a la frecuencia del consumo, que 31% de los y las jóvenes dice que normalmente consume cigarros cuando consume alcohol y 56% que consume bebidas alcohólicas en eventos sociales. (ENJUVE 2013).

4. Tenemos allí las claves de uno de los más profundos misterios de nuestra sicología social. Así como el borrachín es el ser más encomiado en barras y poemas botiquineros, el más despreciado es quien bebe solo: el encapillado. Un borracho serio no necesita compañía, pero quien requiere compañía necesita estar borracho. Más que de ebrios presumimos de extrovertidos. Pero somos un pueblo de tímidos que se embriaga para atreverse a convivir. Más fácil es exaltarse con caña que con inspiración o con amor o con gloria. La embriaguez es un estado sagrado, que no debe banalizarse. A tu salud.

Comparte este contenido:

El experimento

mayo 8, 2016mayo 8, 2016Hugo Aboites

Hugo Aboites

Qué ocurre cuando en una institución de educación superior el máximo órgano de conducción y gran parte de la estructura institucional queda en manos de estudiantes y profesores? El caos, dirán quienes defienden la importancia de una junta directiva o de gobierno que elija rector y todos los directores académicos; un Consejo Universitario integrado en parte importante por funcionarios; una rectoría fuerte; una determinación vertical de los criterios de ingreso de estudiantes y de las colegiaturas. Sin embargo, paradójicamente, esta manera de estructurar el ejercicio del poder ha propiciado fuertes conflictos (caos): en 1986-87, 1996 y 1999-2000 en la UNAM; en 1998 y 2002 en la UAM; en 2012-2013 en la UACM; en 2014 en el IPN (y, muestra de que ese esquema produce caos también en otros ámbitos), desde 2013 el incesante conflicto en torno a la reforma educativa. En todos estos conflictos una estructura vertical genera decisiones unilaterales en temas claves (aumento de cuotas, evaluación-ingreso, evaluación-despido, expedición de reglamentos, nombramiento de funcionarios). Es decir, en la educación, el esquema en que se ejercita el poder es fundamental para entender la conflictividad y para plantear la necesidad de buscar una alternativa.

Un ejemplo de alternativa es la Universidad Autónoma de la Ciudad de México (UACM). Ahí no existe junta directiva o de gobierno; al rector y algunos otros funcionarios los nombra un consejo, integrado básicamente por decenas de estudiantes y profesores, más el rector, sin veto, y tres representantes del sector administrativo y, por ley, es el máximo órgano de gobierno. Las comisiones de consejo ejercen una supervisión constante sobre la administración y preparan iniciativas de reglamentos, normas o acuerdos sobre prácticamente cualquier aspecto de la vida universitaria. La organización académica descansa en tres grandes colegios o áreas de conocimiento, cuyos coordinadores e integrantes de los consejos respectivos deben ser electos por profesores y, en su caso, estudiantes. Cada plantel tiene su propio coordinador, electo también por la comunidad correspondiente e, igual, el consejo de plantel. Todo esto significa que la autonomía entendida como autogestión se expresa en prácticamente todos los ámbitos y cada esfera se relaciona con otras en formas de coordinación. La administración central no establece una relación vertical con las demás, salvo las dependencias del ámbito central. Todo esto da lugar a una tupida red de relaciones y conexiones, como las neuronales, que se activan de distinta manera según el tema. Y esto obliga a establecer constantes relaciones de coordinación y, se puede agregar, obliga a hacerlo con cautela, pues un tema puede hacer concurrir distintas áreas normativas, disciplinares o de competencias. La tendencia entonces es a una horizontalidad que alcanza también el aula y las relaciones con los estudiantes y sus organizaciones. Las tendencias centrífugas que genera este modelo se acotan con la ley interna de la UACM, los estatutos, normas, acuerdos que aprueba el CU para toda la institución y, por supuesto, con el paquete de leyes y normas nacionales y locales que aplican

Efectivamente, frente a una institución neuronal, la perspectiva vertical vería sólo un pantano sin reglas, y extrañaría el terso fluir de instrucciones desde la cúspide hasta la base de la pirámide. Por otra parte, es un tejido institucional que puede dar lugar a redundancias, y a gasto de energía para construir acuerdos, pero por ser una red que tiende a lo horizontal y difuso tiene escasos focos de conflicto. De hecho, en uno de ellos (el laboral) ni siquiera se ha dado alguna vez una huelga. La única confrontación intensa y larga que sufrió la institución (2012-2013) surgió precisamente a partir del intento de crear una rectoría fuerte, con relección y manipulación de la elección del consejo.

Este esquema ofrece ventajas adicionales. La primera es que se trata de una estructura que impone menores trabas a la creatividad y que genera, por tanto, un dinamismo que emerge desde abajo, y que le da mayor solidez a las decisiones (aunque se requiere mayor representatividad de los órganos colegiados). La segunda es un más acendrado sentido de comunidad, porque el otro aparece continuamente como una presencia con la que se debe interactuar, confrontando así el aislamiento de todavía no pocos estudiantes y profesores. La tercera ventaja es que esta malla de instancias y decisiones constituye, para un buen número, un ejercicio cotidiano de ciudadanía y democracia. Algo sistemáticamente ausente en la trayectoria de un sistema educativo, característicamente vertical.

Finalmente, este modelo genera una enorme vitalidad: una matrícula y número de titulados creciente, programas de licenciatura en cinco planteles y cinco reclusorios, profesores de tiempo completo, proyectos estudiantiles, cientos de investigaciones y actos culturales, reconocimientos, absoluta gratuidad y ausencia de examen de selección. La UACM es hoy una propuesta al mundo de la educación superior y, ante el desolador panorama creado por la autoritaria reforma en la materia, también al sistema vigente. En la educación hay otro mundo posible que desde el autoritarismo es difícil percibir. Felicidades, comunidad UACM, porque al cumplir este mes quince años, es claro que el experimento se ha transformado en una dinámica y sólida institución.

Rector de la UACM

Comparte este contenido:

Pedagogía de la punición

mayo 8, 2016mayo 7, 2016Gabriel Brener

Gabriel Brener

«No es nada papá, está bien, es la Poli que los agarra de bien pibes y los pone en fila, los ordena. Es eso nomá!!…no mandés cualquiera sino ahí están ya los progres, esos pedagogos creo asi los llaman, que están denunciando. Tabién!!, la poli los junta y les mete de bien pibes ideas «buenas», disciplina, higiene, los cansas bien , los hacés correr, y le enchufás»valores» de los buenos, y así de buena manera evitas tener que meter garrote más adelante…entonces si los agarras de bien pibes después no se te tuercen, me entendés?’ Esos que critican son como ese juez, cosellama? ese garantista… Mira hay que terminar con el garantismo eso después es populismo. Mira, quizás hasta te sirva para no tener que hacer una colimba educativa cuando crezcan…»

Salgo de esta conversa para tomar distancia, no de la distancia de la fila disciplinada o de color verde oliva, sino la distancia que necesitamos para fijar posición: el mejor lugar para formar a los chicos y las chicas es la escuela, ámbito clave de construcción de ciudadanía democrática. Y si hay que lograr más escuela, entonces profundicemos la extensión de la jornada, que se ha iniciado y debe completarse como desafío de un Estado presente, de política pública en educación y cumplimiento de las leyes.

Pero más distancia prefiero tomar de una pedagogía de la punición, que se monta en buena parte del sentido común que confunde justicia con venganza, agitada por la obsesión mediática del espectáculo, esa maquinaria cotidiana de linchamiento verbal sin importar nada ni nadie. Una Pedagogía Punitiva de larga data, que aprende a mutar y en estas horas se viste con tecnología, neurociencias y empowerment, habla y entona sobre el futuro, con un especial hartazgo del pasado, o sea, del pasado como ejercicio de una memoria colectiva y conciencia de la propia identidad. Porque en cambio ensalza una versión idealizada de un pasado al que hay que regresar como salvación, conjuntando un marketing de seducción para que tú logres ser el mejor emprendedor con la idea de autoridad como restauración. Obsesión con una idea de un pasado limpio y controlado, especialmente ordenador, masculino por definición, de apariencias claras, de gente «normal» y familias “bien constituidas». Reivindicación del pasado que suele omitir (o niega) cualquier miseria humana ligada a injusticias, dictaduras, patriarcados, persecuciones, discriminación, exclusión, y demás maneras de estar y vivir propias de gran parte de nuestra historia.

Pedagogía punitiva que suele asociarse con la obsesión por la evaluación como única solución a todos los males de la educación. En realidad no es evaluación sino su simple reducción a estandarización, lógicas de control y clasificación para disciplinar y descalificar. Una evaluación que solo reconoce como aprendizajes a enlatados que se denominan competencias, siempre más a tono de un producto de mercado que como efectos de una decisión pública de Estado. Un gerenciamiento del saber escolar que puede preferir un copy paste disciplinado que acumule buen puntaje y resultado que una relación de un sujeto con múltiples significados. Porque los aprendizajes son sujeto y predicado, regla de tres simple pero también son las tantas formas de ser mujer y varón, las drogas el consumo y su prevención, aprender una canción, sobre genocidios y el juego como forma de convivencia y expresión, entre tantos otros.

Pedagogía punitiva para disciplinar docentes que se adapten con elasticidad a las demandas del mercado y la tradición, como meros intérpretes más que como autores, despojándolos de su condición de sujeto político de la enseñanza, que se valida tanto por reconocer el valor de su autoría pedagógica como el de trabajador/a y asalariada/o. Ambas cuestiones , claves en la constitución de la identidad profesional y laboral de los docentes como arte y parte de una escuela que se mejore a si misma y no como meros reproductores de modelos pedagógico tercerizados.

Pedagogía punitiva que al mismo tiempo que disemina una idea del otro como amenaza instala todo un proceso de “judicialización pedagógica”, que ha ido consolidándose en los últimos años y que los medios de comunicación alientan y potencian con la espectacularidad de la violencia escolar y el bullying como mercancía. Proceso que contribuye a desdibujar y empobrecer el lugar del docente, emparentándolo más con un fiscal o abogado en busca de pruebas para des-cubrir al culpable que con un educador que transforma cualquier situación escolar en una oportunidad educativa, enseñando, acompañando, poniendo limites, con la convicción de quien confía en el otro y no con la sentencia anticipada de que ese otro es su propio culpable.

Pedagogía punitiva que contribuye a naturalizar que los hay de primera y de segunda, legitimando la sentencia mediática que cuando titula distingue entre niño como sujeto de derecho y menor como objeto a sujetar o sujeto de desecho. Con la violencia de estigmatizar a la mayoría de chicos y chicas, condenándolos al fracaso y la impotencia, y aún más violencia cuando intenta convencerlos que son responsables de dicha condena.

La escuela es el lugar para que los más pibes se constituyan como sujetos del derecho y la democracia y el poliladron para jugar en el patio de la escuela no en las comisarías.

Artículo tomado de: http://www.alainet.org/es/articulo/176871

Fuente de la imagen: http://www.alainet.org/sites/default/files/styles/articulo-ampliada/public/ninos_polis.jpg?itok=33HbofwH

Comparte este contenido:

¿Hacia dónde se encamina la reforma educacional?

mayo 8, 2016mayo 7, 2016José Joaquín Brunner

José Joaquín Brunner

Es un hecho que en torno a la reforma educacional impulsada por el Gobierno hay confusión. No se entienden sus propósitos, el orden y la secuencia con que ha ido desenvolviéndose, el gasto que representa para el fisco y, sobre todo, qué efectos producirán las diversas medidas adoptadas. El desconcierto es aún mayor en el caso de la enseñanza superior. La opinión pública encuestada muestra escaso entusiasmo. No percibe cómo esta reforma mejorará la calidad de las oportunidades educacionales.

En realidad, los proyectos hasta ahora aprobados, en tramitación y anunciados no tienen que ver directamente con la calidad. Su eje se orienta a ampliar la esfera de provisión, coordinación, regulación, financiamiento, fiscalización e intervención del Estado. Dicho en lenguaje antiguo, busca recrear las bases de un Estado Docente en las condiciones presentes.

La consecuencia de tal propósito es evidente. En un régimen mixto de provisión, con fuerte presencia privada subsidiada como existe en Chile, implica necesariamente disminuir el rol de los proveedores privados subvencionados. Tarde o temprano deberá trasladarse matrícula privada a los establecimientos fiscales y sustituirse el gasto de los hogares por gasto público. Aquel quedaría limitado únicamente a instituciones particulares pagadas.

Discursivamente se sostiene que esta transformación representa el paso desde una educación concebida como un bien de consumo a una educación reconocida como un derecho social garantizado. En la práctica, en tanto, significaría el paso desde un régimen mixto a un régimen de provisión administrado estatalmente con un pequeño circuito adicional de colegios particulares pagados que atenderían a los hijos herederos del capital económico, social y cultural.

Para realizar ese desplazamiento, el Gobierno impulsa un abigarrado conjunto de leyes en los niveles de la educación temprana, escolar y superior. Así avanza el proceso reformista: desde La Moneda al Mineduc y al Congreso. De ahí en adelante hay poco más, pues la implementación de las leyes promulgadas recién comienza y otras leyes ni siquiera han iniciado su tramitación.

Con todo, se sostiene que las medidas aprobadas son históricas y ofrecerían desde ya un nuevo paradigma educativo y la promesa de una mayor igualdad e inclusión.

Un balance más realista indica algo muy diferente, sin embargo.

Por lo pronto, la teoría del cambio esgrimida por el Gobierno es candorosa y equivocada. Las transformaciones apenas se hallan en papel. La real prueba de su efectividad vendrá al descender desde los aparatos centrales hacia las instituciones educativas, sus aulas, profesores y estudiantes.

También la planificación del cambio es débil: ha faltado una agenda clara, prioridades coherentes, carta de navegación y sólidas previsiones presupuestarias. La comunicación oficial de la reforma y sus medidas es confusa. Al punto que la opinión pública encuestada muestra consistentemente un alto nivel de desaprobación y los actores del sistema se hallan desconcertados.

En cuanto a la vital fase de la implementación, resulta claro que será lenta y engorrosa. Dependerá de nuevas y más detalladas prescripciones de papel (reglamentos, dictámenes, preceptos, fórmulas y resoluciones administrativas); de burocracias intermedias, interpretaciones contradictorias, dificultades operativas, insuficiencia de recursos humanos y materiales, resistencia frente al cambio de hábitos y rutinas, efectos imprevistos y fallas de gestión.

Por último, los efectos e impactos de la reforma son hasta ahora escasos. Decir que hay oportunidades de mejor calidad, mayor igualdad, menor segmentación, un clima diferente en los colegios, una nueva visión de las cosas educativas o una educación superior más organizada, todo eso es poco serio. Pertenece al mundo de los ídolos de Bacon, que no dejan razonar con claridad y confunden la realidad con los deseos.

Más bien puede anticiparse que los efectos esperados estarán definitivamente por debajo de las expectativas creadas por el discurso oficial. Comienza a reconocerse que las medidas son difíciles de implementar. Y que su orden de aprobación fue inadecuado. Existe temor de que contribuirán poco a cambiar la calidad de las oportunidades de aprendizaje y su distribución social.

Por otra parte, se aprecian desde ya algunos efectos negativos. La institucionalidad de la educación superior ha sido tensionada al máximo sin que exista siquiera un plan de reforma. La gratuidad prometida ha creado más desorden que beneficios. Hay una competencia cada vez más intensa por recursos. El crucial sector de la enseñanza técnico-profesional media y superior se halla completamente ausente del foco de atención gubernamental. Las instituciones privadas en general se sienten hostilizadas, no reconocidas por la autoridad y marginadas de los caminos de futuro de la educación chilena.

En suma, la reforma educativa del Gobierno crea confusión porque es confusa. Carece de una adecuada teoría del cambio. Su retórica va más allá de las posibilidades reales. No moviliza el apoyo de la opinión pública. Causa enfrentamientos ideológicos innecesarios. Su diseño es equivocado. Busca subsumir el espacio educacional de la sociedad dentro del espacio estatal. Por el contrario, lo que Chile necesita es un espacio educacional tan diverso y plural como su sociedad, organizado por proveedores subvencionados de diverso tipo, con igualdad de trato y sujetos todos a reglas comunes que garanticen acceso, calidad, equidad y efectividad.

Comparte este contenido:

Maestro: educarse en la autonomía o desaparecer con la reforma educativa

mayo 8, 2016mayo 7, 2016Lev Moujahid Velázquez Barriga

Lev Moujahid Velázquez Barriga

Las instituciones formadoras de docentes y las encargadas de la profesionalización, así como actualización del magisterio, han sido ocupadas por el discurso economicista de los órganos financieros, éstos imponen, por medio de la violencia física, laboral y judicial a través del Estado, una visión alejada de la escuela, las preocupaciones sociales y del desarrollo humano.

La reforma educativa carece de una propuesta de formación para los maestros. Lo que oferta es un “estatuto laboral” llamado servicio profesional docente, que pobremente incita a la capacitación técnica para uso de las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación (TIC), a la memorización de leyes y reglamentos laborales y administrativos para la funcionalidad de la escuela. Eso fue lo que priorizaron sus falsas “evaluaciones” que a falta de legitimidad y fundamentos pedagógicos, impusieron a sangre y fuego contra los docentes.

En este marco de acontecimientos, propios de un régimen fascista, no podemos ya pensar en que la formación de docentes con altos compromisos éticos y sociales pueda ser un acto dirigido en la verticalidad y el autoritarismo. Es necesaria una ruptura que recupere la capacidad autónoma de los maestros para constituirse como verdaderos educadores con autonomía para definir desde su condición social el tipo de sociedad y el modelo educativo que se requiere construir para detener el avance de un Estado antidemocrático.

No es posible que la sociedad siga confiando a los organismos de la globalización económica, a la iniciativa privada o empresarial, la formación de los docentes, porque sencillamente los proyectos son opuestos al desarrollo colectivo, a los intereses plurales de la nación, pero una alternativa sólo adquiere sentido en tanto se materializa, es decir, se llevan a cabo las prácticas de empoderamiento de los subalternos. En este caso hablamos de los educadores que alienadamente han transitado sobre caminos hechos para que otros logren sus intereses particulares y hegemónicos.

Esta alternativa para la formación docente sólo puede venir de los educadores mismos, y tendrá que desinstalar los sistemas meritocráticos de profesionalización que se han configurado con base en escalas de trabajo gerencial al estilo McDonald’s y el fetichismo por la medición de resultados a través de la “evaluación”; tendrá que evidenciar la propuesta oficial para reformar las normales, por su carácter “minimalista” en la reducción de saberes, cuyo objetivo central es el desarme cultural de la formación didáctica, ética, pedagógica, filosófica, histórica y política, incluso, hasta desaparecer la profesión docente.

El gran reto es descolonizarse, desaprender, no formarse más como docentes para repetir las mismas tesis de la educación empresarial, porque el resultado será igual al que se necesita cambiar. Estamos frente al desafío de proclamarse en la independencia educativa, en la autonomía y descolonización cultural de la clase en el poder; esta perspectiva obliga al reconocimiento de las raíces latinoamericanas de nuestras formas propias de entender lo pedagógico como un proceso de educación popular para la emancipación social y la afirmación de una identidad arraigada en los excluidos, desde sus diferentes formas de opresión racial, sexual, económica o política, pero identificando una sola raíz de la dominación, el sistema-mundo capitalista.

La herramienta principal de los docentes en el terreno ideológico para empezar a ser educadores populares, sin renunciar a la resistencia de las movilizaciones pacíficas, debe ser precisamente la “razón crítica”, con base en ella tendrán que enfocar el análisis educativo. Se trata de hacer visibles las relaciones de poder, control y dominación en el ámbito microsocial de la escuela y el aula; de someter a juicio reflexivo los planes y programas de los sistemas educativos, enfoques y didácticas, políticas y marcos jurídicos reproductores del poder, este es un paso fundamental para la elaboración de propuestas alternativas.

La crítica al currículo es, sin embargo, sólo el parteaguas para la deconstrucción de la escuela como aparato de reproducción ideológica, material y cultural de los dueños del dinero, lo que sigue es hacer de ella un campo de disputa de lo que ahí se enseña y se aprende, de cómo se organiza y para qué fines, de otro modo sólo habrá protesta y no propuesta, la resistencia será negación sin un proyecto educativo viable que haga posible un mundo mejor; en otras palabras, la invitación es a no sólo ocupar las calles y plazas públicas, sino también las escuelas, las bibliotecas escolares, las instituciones de formación docente, los libros de texto, las reuniones de consejos técnicos escolares, los planes y programas de estudio, con un proyecto que materialice lo que se escribe en cada manta o pancarta como demanda educativa, lo que se repite en cada consigna recomo aspiración colectiva de lo que debe ser la educación pública, científica y popular.

El nuevo educador que demanda este proceso de ocupación ideológica y empoderamiento pedagógico no debe ser lineal, ni enarbolar el pensamiento único, mecanicista y productivista de la reforma educativa. Los maestros que en ella se forman para educar en competencias, medir los conocimientos con instrumentos de estandarización y organizar la escuela como empresa para lograr la “calidad”, están totalmente limitados, son incapaces de explicar el mundo en su complejidad y fomentar el desarrollo integral de los alumnos.

Los docentes tendrán que formarse en la comprensión de una realidad natural y social que tiene muchas facetas y dimensiones con relaciones estrechas entre sí, en la atención de alumnos también diversos, irreductibles al individualismo competitivo, a números estadísticos o a su sola capacidad laboral; por el contrario, los alumnos se definen en múltiples facultades éticas, estéticas, políticas, económicas, sociales, culturales, creativas, emocionales, racionales, existenciales y demás que tenemos los seres humanos y que jamás podrían desarrollarse en la cuadratura de las competencias o medirse con exámenes estandarizados.

Junto a los tiempos y espacios de movilización y protesta social, deberán crearse otros en los que los educadores se formen en la conciencia crítica, en el conocimiento de las pedagogías liberadoras, en los principios de la educación popular; pero de manera sistemática, práctica, teórica, académica, rigurosa, estratégica y consciente, para saldar los vacíos y compromisos de la educación neoliberal con el pueblo, pero sobre todo para formar educadores que sean constructores de sueños, de sociedades libres, de hombres y mujeres críticos.

A esta instrumentación violenta de la reforma para despojar a los maestros de su identidad histórica como forjadores de la patria y convertirlos en reproductores de la escuela-fábrica, proponemos la conceptualización que Paulo Freire elaboró para referirse al maestro como “educador”, es decir, como un sujeto que enseña y aprende a su vez, revestido de conciencia crítica, sentido ético y compromiso colectivo; pero que es también “popular” porque se reconoce como pueblo, como parte de una clase social que no es opresora y por tanto su papel liberador es inherente al de su profesión educativa.

Está claro que los nuevos educadores populares no se harán en la espontaneidad, no existe una conciencia social que surja de la nada, adquirida de modo automático en la experiencia o preconstituida, y que pueda simplemente trasmitirse, tampoco instalarse como un dispositivo desde fuera de cada persona, esto se hace en el diálogo, en el intercambio de experiencias, en la lectura crítica de los textos y contextos, en la reflexión y la práctica. La gran tarea de las maestras y maestros de México es abrir esos canales de diálogo, materializar cada propuesta y desmantelar las bases que dan sustento a la reforma educativa de los empresarios.

Comparte este contenido:

Sexual Self-determination in Cuba and the Decolonial Epistemic Turn

mayo 8, 2016mayo 7, 2016Antonio Carmona Báez

Antonio Carmona Baéz

Globally, the concept of self-determination in sexuality is used in legal theorywith reference to the rights of individuals to be free of rape, coercion, forcedprostitution and abuse; it implies reproductive rights in some societies, while inothers it is the right to exercise free will over one’s sexual functions (Jansen, 2007;Munro, 2008; Smith, 2007; Walsh and Foshee, 1998). In Cuba, the term ‘sexual self-determination’ (autodeterminacio´ n sexual )1

is associated with the process of emancipation that is linked to the construction of socialist society, and the useof sex education as established by the country’s feminist movement, in order totranslate the political discourse on gender and sexuality, speciﬁcally Lesbian, Gay,Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) sexuality, into social policy (Figueroa, 2009). Morerecently the concept has been used as a counter discourse to the pathologicalapproach to transgender experiences and identities and it is recognized as a fun-damental human right.

In this article, we suggest that the use of ‘decolonial’ and ‘border thinking/epistemologies’ as developed by Walter Mignolo (2000, 2007) and ‘epistemicturn’ as elaborated by Ramon Grosfoguel (2007), based on the critique of the‘geo-politics of knowledge’ (Dussel, 1977; Fanon, 1963, 1967), can help us under-stand the changes associated with sexuality, ethics and public policy that sprangout of Cuban feminism and its emphasis on sex education.

Considering that literature on the intersections of race, class and gender is his-torically rooted in radical feminist and latterly queer critiques of Western capitalistsociety, the political nature of the use of emancipatory discourse in Cuban socialinstitutions comes as no surprise (Glenn, 1985; Lugones, 2007; Namaste, 1994;Wolf, 2009: 19–20). In a similar vein this discourse and recent changes in Cubansocial policy pose a challenge to global conceptions of sexual health in the medicalsciences, the idea of emancipation of sexual identities, and a dissonance in theformation of ethics and human rights discourse internationally. What is particu-larly novel is the institutionalization of such critique and discourse at the statelevel. In addition, the autochthonous Cuban critique of homophobic society andself-evaluation promoted by militants and leaders of the Communist Party of Cuba(PCC), have exposed a narrative that is bent on the decolonisation of politics,policies and practices. The Cuban experience regarding social policy on sexualdiversity is in no way free of contradictions. Sexual self-determination is not anaccomplished project but part of a continuous process.

We do not intend to place a value judgement on these processes, but instead tomap debates and controversies. We will do this by brieﬂy presenting the concept of epistemic decolonial turn, by reviewing the genealogy of Cuban homophobia andthe history of sexual emancipation, and by showing how policies concerning sexu-ality that are assumed by the Cuban state and applauded by broad sectors of itscivil society is based on a discourse that embraces the epistemic turn presented inthis article. The implications of this turn for ethics in medicine and science inter-nationally will be elaborated.We have found that the decolonial project of sexual emancipation in Cuba ismanifested in three essential aspects: (1) Sex education as envisaged by the feministmovement of subalterns; (2) Depathologization of non-heteronormative genderidentities and (3) Sexual self-determination presented as a human right.Ultimately, the Cuban experience presents a dual dynamic: ﬁrst, decolonizingCuban post-revolutionary politics through the changes in sexual codes, publicpolicy and health ethics on the one hand, and on the other, a displacement of medical-scientiﬁc authority over gender and sexuality. Alongside this last issue, theestablishment of new centres of knowledge production in both science and socialtheory will be identiﬁed as a challenge to conventional bodies of authority.

Decoloniality and the epistemic turn

There is a growing body of literature in the humanities and social sciences thatlooks at the production of knowledge and its institutionalization as part and parcelof the modern world system of hierarchies (Walsh, 2012). Starting with the premisethat colonialism or coloniality is the ﬂipside of modernity, those who challenge thecentres of power in knowledge production by recognizing other epistemologies,attempt to decolonize knowledge and call their perspective decoloniality .Mignolo (2003), Maldonado Torres (2004) and Grosfoguel (2008) for instance,have concentrated their eﬀorts on, ﬁrst, recognizing the epistemological violencecommitted by dominant power structures in suppressing or excluding other narra-tives and, secondly, uplifting and taking into consideration the excluded/subalternnarratives, giving them equal if not more value when it comes to socio-politicalphenomena. Decolonial thinkers challenge the universality of modern knowledge,describing it as a ‘provincial pretense’ or largely Eurocentric, and introduce theconcept of the geo-politics of knowledge (Mignolo, 2007: 493). Mignolo, followingLatin American liberation philosopher Dussel (1977), refers to geo-politics in orderto argue for the importance of locating the construction/production of knowledgeand its dissemination. Starting from the premise that all geographies and historiesare local, these recognize that some – speciﬁcally those of modernity – have a globaldesign, albeit controlled by certain types of local histories (Mignolo, 2000: 66). Thecontrol of both the local and universal can be found in academia, what Grosfoguel(2012: 9) refers to as Westernized universities – as well as in law, political institu-tions of the state, social movements and political projects for transforming society. Additionally, the decolonial school of thought foregrounds border thinking, whichis an attempt to rescue and employ narratives and histories that have been inten-tionally supressed precisely because they challenge the universal project of euro-centric modernity/coloniality (Mignolo, 2000: 739–45).

Decoloniality looks speciﬁcally to the place where knowledge is produced.In order to decolonize knowledge, the geo-political location of theology,European secular philosophies, and later scientiﬁc reason (including scientiﬁcsocialism which is dependent on European epistemologies exclusively) must beunveiled, and the principles and modes of knowledge that have been ignored byChristianity, Western – i.e. subaltern epistemic perspectives (ethnic/racial/sexual/territorial), must be uplifted along with the epistemic decolonial turn (Mignolo,2007: 463; Grosfoguel, 2007: 212).

For the purpose of this article, we should emphasize that it is not so muchEurocentrism that needs to be underscored in understanding coloniality. Rather,it is the unequal structure of governing bodies of knowledge that have determinedthe course in which ethics have been developed. Cuban social policy has not shed itself completely of colonial epistemologies. At the same time, the striking resem-blances between the trajectory by which Cuban social policy regarding sexualityhas developed and the epistemic decolonial turn, as suggested by Dussel,Grosfoguel, Maldonado Torres, Mignolo and others, merits attention.

To analyse the changes being made in Cuba regarding social policy towardssexual diversity, health and ethics, it is worth looking at where knowledge has beenproduced prior to and under the current political regime. In order to accomplishthis, the genealogy of trans/homophobia can be reviewed from both local andglobal historical frameworks, the transformation of social policies and sexual pol-itics can be considered, and the conceptualization of sexual self-determination examined. Since education throughout the process of social transformation iskey to this study, it is appropriate to identify the inﬂuence of Paulo Freire(1970) in understanding popular education and the

pedagogy of the oppressed ,whereby the teacher–student relationship is broken down in order to facilitate adialectics of emancipation (liberation), and to recognize this Latin American heri-tage as an essential tool in the process of decolonizing sexuality, science, humanrights and health.

For Freire, those who are in a position of power must constantly go through aprocess of self-examination (Freire, 1970/1996: 64), contemplating their own role ina world of inequality. Parallel to this is the issue of building an ethically soundrelationship between those who are ‘treated’ by state institutions and the scientiﬁccommunity, including health professionals working with those identiﬁed as trans-gender or intersex. While commenting on the question of good treatment of transpersons in the age of de-pathology, Judith Butler concludes: ‘the question is notsimply would you, the authority, permit and recognize my change; rather, wouldmy request produce radical changes in your practice and in your ethical self-under-standing as a professional or practitioner’ (Butler, 2010: 12). Today, as will beargued, the re-education of Cuban society was an essential breakthrough in thatcountry’s experience of depathologization. We identify an epistemic decolonialturn within science, ethics and the Marxist-Leninist-Martiano 2 discourse of egali-tarian socialism. This turn is presented as a challenge to what we call the

religious-modern-socio-scientiﬁc bloc that until recently has dominated Cuban society and itsmanagement of sexuality.

Human rights is also a ﬁeld of study that has undergone critical review from thedecolonial perspective. Mignolo (2009) notes that the notion of human rights fol-lows a modern/colonial trajectory in both theoretical and practical applications.Human rights, reserved for white men of privilege ﬁrst, and later extended to therest of the world’s population, continues to be shaped by discourses and epistemol-ogies based on the Western experience. The socialist experiment in Cuba, as inmany other places, has challenged universal conceptions of human rights, payingmore attention to socio-economic rights as access to food, housing, health services,education and employment. In 2008, the government of Cuba hosted an inter-national conference of intellectuals, politicians, lawyers, artists and activists,entitled ‘The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: 60 years later’, where in a ﬁnal statement participants recognized the incompatibility of what they called‘predatory, exclusive, exploiting, racist and patriarchal capitalism’ with the repro-duction of life and the meeting of human needs. In this context, participants upheldcivil, cultural, economic, political, social and sexual rights (MINREX, 2008). Aswill be demonstrated further on, this re-framing of human rights requires a deco-lonial reading of the institutional treatment of non-heteronormative genders andsexualities.

A genealogy of homo- and transphobia

The critique of homophobic society in Cuba stems from two distinct groups of narratives, that are similar only in that they are both politicized. On the one hand,there is the critique of ‘communist state-homophobia’, originating in the politicaldiscourse of Western liberal democracy in opposition to Cuban experiments of radical social change. The reading largely depends on anecdotal documents, vari-ous forms of journalism found in Western media, the writing of biographies andﬁction (Epps, 1995; Young, 1981; Sanchez, 2011), and sometimes Western, radicalsocialist discourse which dedicates a considerable amount of attention to the hor-rors of Stalinism and other authoritarian experiments (Farber, 2011: 184–221).Reference is made to ‘concentration camps’ for gays, the maltreatment andforced hospitalization of persons infected with HIV, and the deportation of homo-sexuals and transgendered people, together with the mentally ill or handicappedand individuals prosecuted for anti-social behaviour, petty crimes and religiousfundamentalism (Bejel, 2001; Capo´, 2010; Negro´n-Muntaner, 2008).

The other trajectory of critique of Cuban homophobia is grounded in anautochthonous re-evaluation of social policies and public culture concerning sexu-ality and hegemonic masculinities3 throughout that nation’s history. 4

This readingis closely faithful to the methodology of decolonial thinking, linking historic-colo-nial (modern) constructions of dehumanizing exclusion and compartmentalizationson sexual identities with prejudices, attitudes, and popular and state positionstowards sexual diversities. Here, the story begins with the European, speciﬁcallySpanish-Catholic, colonization that brought to Cuba a series of codes, norms,typographies and ideas concerning sexuality that generally prevail throughoutmodern times: ideas about the family, masculinity and exclusive male–femalegender identities. Otherness in sexuality was often racialized and attributed to‘inferior’ cultures, ethnic groups and civilizations.5 Thereafter, with the replace-ment of religion by secular science and its reach to the Americas (Grosfoguel,2008), some of these norms were reinforced by academia and medical science. 6

Marxism-Leninism, as an imported ideology of European origin (albeit with Martiano adjustments made in Cuba), in its ‘anti-reactionary’, anti-religiousstance depended heavily on medical science which was evident at the time inEurope, the United States and the Soviet Union, to create an ideological andsocietal-normative response to sexualities.7 These are found in the pathologizationand treatment of homosexuality, transexuality, and the biomedical treatment of cases of intersexuality. Below, we expose a narrative that takes into considerationthe role of the feminist movement, its emphasis on education and the evolution of astate policy to combat trans/homophobia.

Revolution and emancipation

When it comes to understanding social policy on sexuality, it is important to con-textualize the Cuban revolution within the framework of the Cold War, wherebythe socio-economic, domestic and foreign policies adopted by revolutionary forcessituated the country and its post-revolutionary development trajectory within whatwas called the Soviet bloc. The composition of the Communist Party of Cuba(PCC) and the formation of civil society groups, the Constitution of 1976 and allthe laws and political structures that shaped public policy, education and everydaylife, were largely inﬂuenced by the Soviet experience (Carmona Ba ´ez, 2004: 72–9).Although some elements of Soviet-styled public policy proved to be progressive,especially in the advancement of women’s rights, other areas of concern, such asthe pathologization of non-heterosexual practices continued to reinforce the colo-nial and scientiﬁc reasoning that perpetuated trans/homophobic postures.Nevertheless, the 1959 Cuban revolution unleashed a complex process of socio-economic and cultural change that provided the basis for dialogue and(violent) confrontation between generations and social classes. During andthroughout that process a reconﬁguration of gender relations also, questionedhegemonic masculinities (Castro Espı ´n, 2011a).

In 1960, the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), an organized mass movementof women participating in the national political process, became the vehicle thatarticulated a project of women’s empowerment as subjects entitled to rights andparticipation in the process of socialist construction. The incorporation of womeninto the ﬁeld of work outside the home had an impact upon both sexuality andreproductive patterns. Women took on a new public role, including participation innational defence during times of US aggression (Nun ˜ez, 2011; Sa ´nchez Parodi,2011; Waters, 2012).

By 1965, abortion had been legalized and institutionalized as a service providedby the national healthcare system free of charge and, on demand performed byspecialist medical personnel in hospitals with the women’s consent. This measurenot only contributed to the reduction of maternal deaths but also ensured women’srights over their bodies. (Espı ´n Guillois; Sosa, 2008) The initiatives taken up duringthe 1960s were institutionalized in the Family Code of 1975, which advocated equalresponsibilities for the education of children and for household tasks (Stone, 1981:182–200).

This repositioning of women in Cuban society cannot be divorced from otherrelated processes of emancipation, including the partial repositioning of Blackpeople and, the uplift of social sectors such as the unemployed, provincial migrantsand prostitutes (Garcı ´a, 2009). All of these claimed a stake in the revolutionaryprocess and were able to situate themselves in the context of building a radically new society. But it was the new position of women that enabled the questioning of hegemonic masculinities and practices. What it meant to be a ‘man’, a ‘woman’ anda ‘revolutionary’ were topics that enjoyed or suﬀered decades of public debate.

It was also the country’s feminist movement that brought about changes inattitudes towards sexuality both in the public sphere and in state institutions. Aparticularly remarkable breakthrough was the FMC initiative of facilitating thepublication of numerous scientiﬁc books by foreign authors, including El hombre y la mujer en la intimidad (Mann und Frau intim) and En Defensa del Amor (Pla ¨ doyer fu ¨ r die Liebe) by German sexologist Siegfried Schnabl, in 1979. For the ﬁrst time inCuba, it was possible to read the uncensored opinion of a scientist asserting thathomosexuality was not an illness. It was not until Cuban scientists had access tothese foreign documents that a thorough re-evaluation of state positions on homo-sexuality began, and it was not until after the de-penalization of homosexuality inCuba in 1979, that these documents were made available to the general public.

Sex education

One of the principal actors in organizing feminist demands was chemical engineerand MIT student Vilma Espı ´n Guillois, who headed the FMC from its foundationuntil her death. In 1972, Espı ´n Guillois set up a multidisciplinary National SexualEducation Group (GNTES) to establish the National Programme of SexualEducation, which was recognized as state policy by the ﬁrst Congress of theCuban Communist Party in 1975 under two resolutions: ‘On the formation of children and youth’ and ‘On the full exercise of the equality of women’ (Rojas,1978: 529–610). These emphazised the eradication of all forms of discriminationagainst women and included sex education in school curricula.Despite great resistance by the Ministry of Education, subjects related to repro-ductive function were formally introduced in school textbooks during the 1970sand 1980s. Still, it was not until 1996 that the Sexual Education Programme inSchool was established under the name of For a Responsible and Happy SexEducation

, with state support for research and publication (Castro Espı ´n, 2002:4–9).

In 1989, GNTES established the National Centre for Sexual Education(CENESEX), a state-ﬁnanced institution under the Ministry of Public Health,whose mission was to coordinate a permanent but dynamic national programmeof sex education involving both central state administration and civil society organ-izations. The agenda and projects of the national programme were established bythe ministries of Public Health, Education and Culture and by the FMC and theUnion of Communist Youth (UJC). Since then, CENESEX has established a net-work of provincial and municipal working committees to carry out and monitor itsgoals and impact. As will be elaborated later on, its activities are focused ondeveloping sex education strategies in schools and more publicly, promotingsocial research and therapy, the provision of care for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexualand Transgender (LGBT) community, as well as victims of violence and sexual abuse, and the production of educational materials. Cuba’s national sex educationpolicy evolved from an emphasis on women and their reproductive rights to a morecomprehensive outlook including gender diversity and the rights of individuals todecide over their bodies and identities (Castro Espı ´n, 2011a).

Combatting homophobia

Cuba continues to be a country where male chauvinism and homophobia is dom-inant in popular culture. These characteristics have been endorsed by RomanCatholic doctrine, the legacy of the Spanish Code of Social Defence – later theRepublic of Cuba’s 1938 Code of Social Defence (Roque Guerra, 2011: 218–26)and by modern scientiﬁc knowledge that stigmatized homosexuality, and otherbehaviour deviating from the heterosexual norm.

Literature produced in Cuba throughout the 20th century, including post–revolutionary literature concerning sexuality, only enforced homophobic ideas inpsychology, medicine, sociology, ethics and law. A notable exception was Sexologı´ a I, by Angel Arce Ferna ´ndez (1965) (Horta Sa ´nchez et al., 2011) aBlack revolutionary communist and physician who was later recognized as thefounder of Cuban sexology. Fernandez promoted the idea that homosexualitynot be considered an aberration or illness. According to a recent reﬂection writtenby his daughter, he was harshly criticized and censured (Arce Henderson, 2012).His work and experience provides evidence of debate and confrontation aboutsexual diversity, within medical and political communities of the time.

The existing medical sciences in Cuba acted at the time of the revolution as abloc against practices that were considered as signs of illness, the prelude to insan-ity and a mark of social moral decay. This religious-modern-socio-scientiﬁc bloc inhibited the process of shedding the colonial legacy of homophobia. The Cubanvariant of socialism, in which Che Guevara’s ‘new man’ became the central subject,was impotent in resolving this colonial legacy (Roque Guerra, 2011: 218–25). Therevolutionary project of breaking down social structures remained trapped in ahomophobia that was sustained by universal science. Arguelles and Rich (1984:691) attribute this, in part, to the inﬂuence that the pre-revolutionary, Stalinist,Popular Socialist Party had on the formation of political discourse regardinghomosexuality. They place responsibility on the ‘lesbian and homosexual intelli-gentsia’ concentrated in the National Union of Cuban Writers and Artists(UNEAC), which provided no public counter critique. However this displacementof blame masks essential structural aspects of homophobia in Cuban society,ignoring the colonial continuities that are to be found in state socialist positionsand social policies concerning sexual diversities.

The religious-modern-socio-scientiﬁc bloc favoured discriminatory towards les-bians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people for years. It gave rise to the estab-lishment of the Military Units for Production Support (UMAP) in 1965. Acompulsory civil-military service of forced agricultural labour for idle youth, religious dissidents and homosexuals in a context of continuous aggressions by theUS government, the UMAP was known for its reproduction of homophobia.UMAPs were closed three years later in 1968, as a result of an in-depth militaryinvestigation starting in the province of Camaguey and protests launched by asso-ciates of the UNEAC (Ramonet, 2006: 225).

Recently, Maria Isabel Alfonso, writing on racial dynamics in state policies of the 1960s, noted that the closing down of publishing houses and the censorship of certain authors by institutions like the UNEAC, aided the silencing of homosexu-ality in public culture (Alfonso, 2012). This can be seen as a form of epistemicviolence committed by the revolutionary state against Afro-centric writers, as wellas those belonging to non-heterosexual communities. It is only now, in criticalspaces like the journals Temas (on Culture Ideology and Society), Casa (onLetters and Ideas from Casa de las Americas) and Sexologı´ a y Sociedad (onSexuality and Society, produced by CENESEX) that the extent of the injusticescommitted are being exposed and debated.

The elimination of groups like the UMAP three years after its inception exem-pliﬁes the huge contradictions prevailing during that period. It testiﬁes to the factthat homophobia was contested by some of the progressive sectors of the revolu-tionary leadership. Nevertheless, discrimination resurfaced in other spaces such asthe First National Congress of Education and Culture in 1971. The ﬁnal declar-ation of this meeting called for depriving homosexuals of the possibility of workingin the areas of education, culture and the media given their substantial inﬂuence onchildren and youth (MINED, 1971: 203). This was at a time when medical sciencesconsidered homosexuality to be a mental disorder, and the reinforcement of thismeasure was later called the ‘ parameterization’ (Fornet, 2006: 16). The Ministry of Education’s resolution was annulled in 1975 by the Supreme Court, which con-sidered it unconstitutional, and in 1976, the policy was changed on the initiative of the Ministry of Culture. It was not until 1979, however, that Decree-Law 175 liftedthe penalization of homosexuality in private, although public display of homosex-ual acts was still punishable until 1987 (Fornet, 2006: 19).

Throughout the 1990s, CENESEX carried out public education campaigns, thescreening of queer ﬁlms and rallies against homophobia. In 2007, CENESEX ledthe ﬁrst national International Day Against Homophobia, which has become anannual week-long campaign ﬁlled with activities and commemorative acts thatpublicize the state’s intention to eradicate homophobia. Central to their educa-tional campaign is the participation of non-heterosexual and transgender personstrained at CENESEX to carry out workshops on discrimination and HIV preven-tion at workplaces and schools. Following methods inspired by Brazilian Marxistpedagogue Paolo Freire, the activities are based on a needs-assessment deﬁned bythose sectors of society most aﬀected by discrimination. What has become veryvisible through these campaigns is the intersection of discrimination from gender,class, racial and territorial (provincial) perspectives, and a recognition that indi-viduals from poorer areas of the country and places where there is less care and support of LGBT people, are more disadvantaged and have greater complexitiesto deal with in their personal development and integration into society. 8 Throughout the provinces, participants in the workshops have identiﬁed theneed to work closely with families, especially in the case of transgender individuals,in order to create a support base in the immediate geographical community(Rodriguez et al., 2008: 105–48). Focus groups composed of transgender personsin urban areas have identiﬁed problems related to transphobic attitudes exhibitedby the police force (Castro Espin, 2011). Cuba has begun a process of pathologiz-ing sexist and trans/homophobic society. Including the voices of those traditionallypathologized, along with their communities and families, has constituted a shift inthe geo-politics of knowledge. This is where we can identify striking resemblancesbetween the reconstitution of Cuban social policy regarding the LGBT communityon the one hand, and decolonial thought and practice on the other.

Since 2008, the FCW has advocated for a bill modifying the Family Code,including new articles concerning respect for a free sexual orientation and genderidentity, as well as the legal recognition of same-sex couples. (Castro Espı ´n, 2011a)Cuba also signed the UN Declaration on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identityin 2008, an initiative made by the Republic of France (Worsnip, 2008).

Another institution that has been essential in the work to eradicate trans/homo-phobia has been the Cuban Multidisciplinary Society for the Study of Sexuality(SOCUMES), a professional association that through its working commissionsprovides a scientiﬁc framework for national public policy. The Commission forSexual Diversity is an associate organization of the International Lesbian, Gay,Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) and like CENESEX adheres tothe Yogyakarta Principles9 for the application of International Human Rights inrelation to sexual orientation and gender identity (O’Flaherty and Fisher, 2008).

In January 2012, the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) held a ﬁrst-time nationalconference as a follow up to the sixth PCC Congress held in April 2011. In the ﬁnaldocument which was approved at this conference, the Party adopted a policy forthe active confrontation of racial, gender, religious, sexual orientation and other prejudices that may give rise toany form of discrimination or limit the exercise of people’s rights, among them publicpositions and those who participate in the political and mass organizations and in thedefence of the country. (PCC, 2012: 6)

This was the ﬁrst time that a PCC document made an explicit statement concerningdiscrimination as regards to sexual orientation. Paragraph 69 of the same docu-ment speaks explicitly to public policy, encouraging the production of audio-visualmaterials and the orientation of the media, to reﬂect Cuban reality in all its diver-sity, speciﬁcally including sexual diversity the and diversity of sexual orientation(Garcı ´a, 2012). The inclusion of gender and sexual orientation in this clause reﬂectsthe government’s intention of implementing a social policy favouring the rights of LGBT people within the framework of Cuban socialism.

Contradictions and inconsistencies

The evolution of Cuba’s social policy regarding sexual diversity and self-determi-nation has taken an uneven course throughout its national institutionalpractices. This became evident in November 2010 when the UN GeneralAssembly’s Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Aﬀairs Committee held its biennialvote on a resolution condemning extrajudicial, arbitrary or summary executionsbased upon discrimination. The resolution was amended by a number of Africancountries and supported by Caribbean, Asian and Arab States, alongside theRussian Federation. It sought to eliminate the term ‘sexual orientation’from the document and replace it with ‘discriminatory reasons on any basis’(Acosta, 2010). The Cuban delegation voted in favour of the amendment, contra-dicting Cuba’s vote in 2008 for the same resolution. Outraged by this act,a host of Cuban LGBT activists expressed their disenchantment with theMinistry of Foreign Aﬀairs.

SOCUMES, headed by Dr Alberto Roque, together with LGBT activists andrepresentatives from diﬀerent organizations10 successfully secured a meeting withForeign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla, who had to explain Cuba’s vote andlisten to grievances. Communist militant and blogger, Francisco Rodriguez Cruz(2010a), pointed out the contradictions between Cuba’s domestic policy and itscompromizing postition in diplomatic manoeuvres. Taking it a step further,Rodriguez Cruz (2010b) stated that professionals and activists had to workharder within Cuba to ensure that all national laws explicitly prohibit andpunish acts of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation so that the countrycould maintain ‘a leading, coherent and steadfast position at the internationallevel’. One month later, at the 65th UN General Assembly meeting, where theresolution was ﬁnally approved, the Cuban delegation read an explanatory notereiterating Cuba’s interpretation of ‘discriminatory reasons on any basis’, whichexplicitly included discrimination against people according to their sexual orienta-tion (Republic of Cuba, 2010).

Scenarios such as the 2010 UN vote and the subsequent debate provideevidence to suggest that sectors of civil society composed of self-identiﬁedLesbian, Gays, Bisexuals, Transsexuals and Transgender persons are engagedat diﬀerent levels of the state bureaucracy, combatting the marginalization of these groups in Cuban society and internationally. At the same time, the inter-pretation of oﬃcial social policy continues to be an arena that presents a chal-lenge to the concept of sexual self-determination and emancipation in thisCaribbean country.

Transgender care and the decolonial epistemic turn

If the production placement and institutionalization of knowledge to be consideredpart and parcel of the modern world system of hierarchies, at few moments is thismanifested more than in the pathologizing of sexualities by governing bodies of scientiﬁc/medical authority. Until recently, the hegemonic paradigm for the treat-ment and care of non-conforming sexualities and gender identities was dictatedglobally by institutions vested in the medical sciences. By non-conforming we meanthose sexualities and gender identities that conﬂict with the modern societal normthat adopts the male–female dyad replicated within scientiﬁc literature and clinicalpractices. The most important of these institutions is the American PsychiatricAssociation (APA), which, since 1952 has produced the Diagnostic andStatistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), a text widely used as an authori-tative reference for the diagnosing pathology. Due to debates carried out in themedical communities of Western societies, the DSM has seen the elimination, add-ition and re-articulation of pathologies related to gender and sexuality; amongthese, the pathology and de-patholigization of homosexuality and the separatecategorization of ‘gender disorder’ and gender dysphoria in children and adults(Jorge, 2010).

Within the family of the United Nations, the World Health Organization hassince 1948 endorsed the International Classiﬁcation of Disease (ICD), also a widelyused text, which has likewise gone through various revisions concerning sexualpreferences and gender identities. The ICD, currently the ICD-10, continues touse the term ‘gender identity disorder’ and ‘transexualism’ to classify a variety of psychiatric disorders related to the incongruences between gender identity assignedat birth and identities assumed by children and adults, i.e. gender non-conformity(WHO, 2102). Finally, there is the World Professional Association for TransgenderHealth (WPATH), previously the Harry Benjamin International GenderDysphoria Association, that publishes and updates its non-diagnostic Standardsof Care (SOCs) and Ethical Guidelines for Health professionals but continues todepend on the DSM and ICD for medical reference and WPATH (2012: 4–20).

Throughout the last decade, the ﬁrst two governing bodies, APA and WHO,which prepared the publication of revised versions of the DMS-V in 2013 and ICD-11 in 2015 respectively, have had their authority questioned by trans-activistsgroups and various professional associations worldwide, including associates of WPATH (Misse and Coll-Planas, 2010: 15–16). With much media attention,these institutions became the target of campaigns by those who reject the path-ologization of their sexualities. A crisis, of sorts, in the hegemonic paradigmadopted by most contemporary societies has opened the stage to new actors chal-lenging those authorities, that have often committed epistemic violence against thesubjects of scientiﬁc debate, i.e. those diagnosed, labelled, treated or cared for. 11

In a country where health care is considered to be a human right and thereforecovered completely by the state, all illnesses and perceived threats to health con-sidered by modern Western medicine are to be treated indiscriminately by health-care professionals. This is also the case with what, in Cuba, was previously called‘gender identity disorder’.

In 1979, at the behest of the FMC, the Cuban Ministry of Public Health createda multidisciplinary workgroup coordinated by GNTES – later CENESEX, for thediagnosis and treatment of transsexual persons. After the team conducted an international comparative study in diﬀerent countries, it recommended that theMinistry of Public Health adopt the standards and protocols of care suggestedby the Harry Benjamin International Association of Gender Dysphoria (CastroEspı ´n, 2011c). In 1988, Cuban surgeons performed their ﬁrst (male to female) sexreassignment operation. This action caused uproar at diﬀerent levels of society andmost importantly within the National Health System, which disapproved the med-ical action (Castro Espı ´n, 2008). It was not until 20 years later, in 2004, that asecond sex reassignment surgery was permitted. Between those years, the multidis-ciplinary team took legal initiatives in assisting 13 individuals to change their ﬁrstnames and their identity card photos. It was impossible to change their sex onoﬃcial documents, since during that time legal sex was to be determined accordingto the individual’s genitals (Castro Espı ´n, 2008: 24).

In 2004, CENESEX broadened the composition of the multidisciplinary work-group in charge of diagnosis and care for transgender persons, redeﬁning its object-ives and bringing forth a national care strategy. Initially, this workgroup was calledthe National Commission for Gender Identity Disorder Care. But after havingconducted in-depth research in Cuba and other countries, and leading to the con-struction of a national narrative reﬂecting a Cuban need to depathologize, thegroup changed its name to the National Commission for Integral Care forTranssexual Persons. Mariela Castro (2008) notes:

We can conﬁrm that transsexual people demanded that they be considered healthymen and women, socially responsible and therefore do not accept that they be treatedas people who are ill and much less as a threat to the social order. (2008: 24)

Currently, the Commission is composed of professionals from the various ﬁelds of medicine, psychology and the social sciences. The objectives of this Commissionare to: develop the protocol of care and integral health treatment for transsexualpersons; promote interdisciplinary research on dysphoria; develop educationalcampaigns directed at fostering respect and understanding among the public fortransgender individuals; propose a legal mechanism concerning Transcare; and,implement educational programmes for transgender persons and their families. Anational Strategy for Integral Care has been implemented through dialogue andconsultation with the Supreme Court, the Attorney General’s Oﬃce, and theNational Organization of Law Firms, as well as political and civil society organ-isations, including groups associated with the Trans community (Castro Espı ´n,2008: 15–43).

From 2004 onwards, CENESEX and SOCUMES began working from the per-spective of Human Rights, as they started to document the testimonies of trans-gender persons who had conﬂict been in with the law, police agents and reactionaryelements among the civil population in Havana. Many of those who testiﬁed andsought help from CENESEX were found in precarious situations. With the par-ticipation of transgender volunteers, CENESEX developed a needs assessment thatset the stage for depathologization. These same transgender volunteers, formed focus groups and became agents within the national educational strategy, settingup committees throughout the country.

Second only to France, Cuba became among the ﬁrst in the world to depatho-logize transgender and the ﬁrst in Latin America to incorporate all transgendercare into an equally accessible national healthcare system. Along with this, thepolicies and strategies adopted by the multidisciplinary Commission since 2010reverses pathologization, looking at hetero-normativity, sexist and traditionalhomophobic postures rampantly existing in contemporary society as the rootcause of gender dysphoria. This is what constitutes the decolonial epistemic turnin Cuba regarding social policy on sexual diversity. Both CENESEX and theabove-mentioned host of organs, commissions and civil society organisations con-tinue to work on the complete institutionalisation of depathologization through thelegal recognition of sex and gender change.

The underlying principle, as has been repeatedly recorded in Cuba, is sexual self-determination. It is the subject who should be empowered to decide over his/heridentity as male, female or other, without having any pressure from the medicalcommunity to modify his/her body. The role of professionals is to ‘accompany’ theindividual in his/her process of self-identiﬁcation and possible change (CastroEspı ´n, 2011c). Education, which becomes a shared task between professionalsand those aﬀected by trans/homophobia, is geared towards the transformationof society through laws, codes and shared values concerning gender and identity.

Global relevance

Writing on transgender care in the Netherlands, Kuyper (2012: 129) concludes thattransgender needs are not suﬃciently taken into consideration and that a signiﬁ-cant portion of the transgender population in the Netherlands does not feel suﬃ-ciently understood by the medical-scientiﬁc community and Dutch societygenerally. This is noteworthy, if one considers that the Netherlands is a countryknown for its advances in the treatment and care of transgender persons. Althoughthere is no room here for exhaustive comparisons of countries, assertions such asthat provided by Kuyper make the Cuban experience much more signiﬁcant. Theepistemic turn in Cuba is remarkable in that the decolonial critique of sexual andgender pathology is now being incorporated into political discourses as well as theinstitutional treatment of transgender people. This process signals an acknowledge-ment and acceptance of sexual diversity on behalf of the representatives of theCuban state, its army of health professionals and sectors of society.

The consensus to depathologize non-conﬁrming sexuality and gender in Cuba,especially transgender individuals, has had a signiﬁcant impact upon the debatesthat have occurred worldwide, although this is not always recognized by health careprofessionals or activists in mainstream media. Since 2006, CENESEX andSOCUMES have organized an annual Congress on Sex Education, Orientation andTherapy that is attended regularly by scientists, professionals and activists from over30 countries, including representatives from WPATH, which in 2010 ﬁnally issued a declaration urging de-psychopathologization among the global medical community,and producing the WPATH (2011) Standards of Care for the Health of Transsexual,Transgender, and Gender Nonconforming People. WPATH President Dr Lin Fraser(WPATH (2012c)) observed that the 2012 symposium was signiﬁcant in that it pro-vided a synopsis of their DSM, ICD and SOC consensus process, demonstrating theclinical application of WPATH’s evolution and a snapshot of their human rights andpublic policy work. Furthermore, Cuba has proven to be a bridge linking the work of this international association with professional groups and organizations throughoutLatin America and the Caribbean.

Argentina followed Cuba in the depathologization of transsexuals and trans-gender persons but took it a step further in the legislative ﬁeld, recognizing andrendering complete sexual and gender-self-determination. The 2012 Argentine Lawof Gender Identity recognizes depthologization, allowing for citizens to decide theirown gender identity and thereby entitling them to change their sex on oﬃcialrecords by judicial declaration without the need for any medical intervention what-soever (FNLIG, 2012). The changes in legislation have come under the discourse of human rights, citing the Yogyakarta Principles. US-based physician and ExecutiveDirector of Gender Rights Maryland, Dana Beyer, has remarked that ‘[I]t is arecognition of innate human variation, and the ability of human beings to knowthemselves suﬃciently, to live free and pursue happiness. It is the new standard forglobal human rights’ (IGLHRC, 2012).

Finally, on 1 December 2012, the APA announced that its Board of Trusteesapproved the publication of the DSM-V to be published in 2013 (APA, 2012). Thisnewly revised edition has proven to be a step forward in the depathologization of transsexuals and transgender persons, replacing the term Gender Identity Disorderwith Gender Incongruence. While applauding APA eﬀorts, WPATH (2012a) akesissuewiththetermGenderIncongruenceasitcontinuestosuggestthat‘congruenceisthenormandthatincongruenceisperdeﬁnitionproblematic,whichisnotnecessarilythe case’. The professional association prefers the term Gender Dysphoria, the termnow used in Cuba, in order to recognize that diagnosis is only needed in cases wheretransgender individuals experience signiﬁcant distress associated with their gendervariance. The stress is recognized as fundamentally induced by society and culture.

The call on behalf of transgender persons worldwide to healthcare professionals,as well as to legislators and other governmental authorities, to radically changetheir practices and ethics, as Butler has suggested in 2010, found allies in Cuba’snational health care system. As has been demonstrated, this was made possiblethrough a long process of decolonizing knowledge, drawing on a Cuban feministperspective with an emphasis on popular education and the principle of sexual self-determination.

Final considerations

Our intention here has been to provide a conceptual framework for understandingpublic policy on gender and sexual diversity in Cuba and how it was shaped. Key to this study has been the principle of sexual self-determination as a human right,allowing for each individual to deﬁne his or her own orientation, condition andgender identity without the stigmatization proposed by psychiatric pathology orthe religious-modern-socio-scientiﬁc bloc that until recently has dominated Cubansocialism and its management of sexuality. This process of emancipation, whichhas its roots in Cuban feminism and its inﬂuence upon sex education, cannot beseen as an accomplished deed but as an ongoing process that at times ﬁnds itself caught in a battle with state bureaucracy domestically and with internationalbodies.Border thinking, the rescuing of epistemologies of subalterns marginalized bymodernity/coloniality science, medicine and law, has, in the case of Cuba, provento be a useful tool in the reformulation of ethics. What the Cuban experience sug-gests is that universal ideas of emancipation and good treatment cannot be exclu-sively contained in deﬁnitions provided by Westernized, scientiﬁc hierarchies.Contrarily, the solutions to the problematic of non-conforming identities, sexualor otherwise, can be found in a decolonial reading of the institutions and socialrelations that constitute contemporary society. This requires Cuban policymakersto reconsider the political trajectory of the country, recognizing and denouncing thehorrors committed against non-heterosexual communities, and to shed itself of sci-entiﬁc dependency on Western pathology and the legacy of Cold War alliances thatbring to the fore inconsistent positions in the area of human rights.The methodology used in educational programmes and in shaping social policyfocuses on the needs assessment carried out among communities and families of LGBT individuals, exercizing the means proposed by Paolo Freire, and reveals thepossibilities that are to be located within the current political framework.Paramount to this work is an intersectional approach that considers trans/homo-phobia to be related to other forms of discrimination; namely of race, class andgender.What we have found is that the changes in social policy and health care practices,which the Republic of Cuba is now undergoing in its legal application of sexual self-determination, has been guided by the narratives of diverse autochthonous groups,educators, social activists and professional health care providers within a highlypoliticized context. Leading ﬁgures of the LGBT community saw to it that socialpolicy fell into the framework provided by the country’s ruling Communist Party.For nearly a decade, between the fall of the Soviet bloc in 1990 and the buildingof friendly relations between Cuba and Venezuela since Hugo Chavez’ rise topower in 1999, Cuba was isolated politically. It is interesting to note that preciselyduring this time of seclusion, social policy regulating gender and sexuality madegreat advances in favour of non-heterosexual communities. These developmentsreceived scant attention in academic journals in North America and Europe. Thepoliticized nature by which the case of Cuba has been studied, however, should nothinder the expansion of research on sexuality and social policy in this country.

The authors of this article recommend that rigorous ethnographical research beconducted in order to assess the impact of the changes in social policy and the way it is experienced by the concerned population in Cuba. This can be done by takinginto consideration the work that has already been achieved by Cuban institutions,which throughout the last two decades have built stronger ties with both scientiﬁcbodies that are willing to revise or at least question their own standards, as wellas with LGBT communities internationally. A cross-sectional study of the impactof social policy change, depicting improvement in the quality of life, may prove tobe beneﬁcial in concretizing the notion of sexual self-determination. To this end,the authors also endorse further analysis of the operationalization of new ethicalstandards in clinical practices and research endeavours in Cuba, so as to criticallyidentify areas that need more support in carrying out social and public policy-making regarding gender and sexuality.

Funding

This research received no speciﬁc grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial,or not-for-proﬁt sectors.

Notes

1. Also called,

Libre orientacio´ n sexual e identidad de ge´ nero [Free sexual orientation andgender identity]. See Castro Espı ´n (2008: 172); CENESEX Code of Ethics: http://www.cenesex.org/socumes/codigo-de-etica-para-profesionales-de-la-sexologia-en-cuba/(accessed 27 July 2014); Declaracio ´n Hombres por la Diversidad para la Vta JornadaCubana Contra la Homofobia: http://hxdcuba.blogspot.nl.

2. Martiano thought refers to the legacy of Cuban national hero Jose Marti, as stated in theConstitution of the Republic of Cuba.

3. In the late 1980s, Canadian intellectual and bioethicist Blye Frank introduced the conceptof hegemonic masculinities to political economy, arguing that heterosexuality and mas-culinity are ‘social accomplishments of political nature located within a larger set of political, economic and social relations’ (Frank, 1987: 160–1).

4. In 1984, Arguelles and Rich argued: ‘The need for a distinctively Cuban socialist counter-critique on behalf of homosexuality is increasingly evident. It must reconcile lesbian andgay male experiences with the island’s realities and offer the international gay communitycritical insights into the immensely complex, rich, expressive and problematic nature of those experiences. Until such a countercritique exists, the manipulation of the Cuban gayissue by anti-Cuban interests will remain largely unchallenged, and homosexual experi-ence will continue to be marginalised within Cuban society’ (1984: 684–685).

5. For a good read on the racialization of sexual practices and codes, see Stolke (1992).

6. The first documented statement on the need to pathologise homosexuality in Cubawas from Dr Luis Montane ´, author of infamous article ‘La Pederastia en Cuba’, whichwas presented at the first Regional Medical Congress of the Island of Cuba inJanuary 1890.

7. It is particularly the influence of Stalinism in both Cuba’s pre-revolutionary Communistparty (PSP) and the political organisations, which were consolidated into the PCC in 1968that is regarded as the source of politically charged persecution of non-heterosexuals inCuba during the first two decades of the revolution. See Roque Guerra (2011) and Evans(2011). Lilian Guerra (2010: 270) provides the counter argument that assault against homosexuality as well as youth culture in general ‘was intrinsically connected to essen-tialist standards of judging what made a citizen ideologically reliable and worthy of inclusion in the category of ‘‘revolutionary’’’. The problem with this line of argument isthat her depiction of totalitarian society leaves absolutely no room for the changes thatare taking place now, which are rooted in debates that can be found throughout theentire revolutionary period. The debates, other than scant mention of denunciations bywell-known public figures in the article’s abstract, are not documented.

8. It might be interesting to note here that in a 2011 interview conducted by the authorsof this article, CENESEX director Mariela Castro Espı´n commented on the absence of aGay Pride parade in Cuba: ‘We do not have a gay pride parade. We make a Conga, a Cuban dance form that is very satisfactory and more pleasuring from a rhythmicand sound standpoint, visualising among the population the need to work-off prejudice.We do not uphold ‘gay pride’ because there is also heterosexual pride, lesbian pride,the pride of trans people, we do not see just gay. We focus the eyes of the population onhomophobia, that is what we believe should be changed; you must unravel homopho-bia in order to articulate the full respect for the dignity of individuals. Furthermore,homophobia is closely linked to other forms of discrimination that LGBT peoplealso experience, namely: racial discrimination, discrimination by geographical area,between those living in rural and non-urban areas, in being an immigrant and notnative, as a non-white person, as a woman, age, etc. Thus, there are many forms of discrimination and we identify homophobia as a form of discrimination that has notbeen sufficiently dealt with, and it is not yet contemplated by international and nationallaw; and where it is recognised, it is not sufficiently treated by law.’ (Castro Espı ´n,2011b).

9. In 2006, in response to well-documented patterns of abuse, a distinguished group of international human rights experts met in Yogyakarta, Indonesia to outline a set of international principles relating to sexual orientation and gender identity. The result wasthe Yogyakarta Principles: a universal guide to human rights which affirm bindinginternational legal standards with which all States must comply. They promise a differ-ent future where all people born free and equal in dignity and rights can fulfil thatprecious birthright: http://www.yogyakartaprinciples.org/principles_en.htm

10. In Cuba there are over 17 organisations and online blogs promoting sexual diversity andproviding service to sexually diverse communities. See CENESEX website: http://www.cenesex.org/.

11. See Manifesto of the International Network for Trans Depathologization, on StopTrans Pathologization: http://www.stp2012.info/old/en/manifesto

Comparte este contenido:

Page 2575 of 2675

« Anterior 1 … 2.573 2.574 2.575 2.576 2.577 … 2.675 Siguiente »

SOLILOQUIO: Reflexión sobre la coyuntura política actual

A tu salud

El experimento

Pedagogía de la punición

¿Hacia dónde se encamina la reforma educacional?

Maestro: educarse en la autonomía o desaparecer con la reforma educativa

Sexual Self-determination in Cuba and the Decolonial Epistemic Turn

OtrasVocesenEducacion.org

Recomendamos

Búsqueda

Visitantes

OtrasVocesenEducacion.org

Recomendamos

Búsqueda

Visitantes

Tu voz en Otras Voces

¡Ayúdanos a mantener abiertas las puertas de esta aula!