Much More Frightened Than Me

Much More Frightened Than Me

This Friday was complicated from the start, I won't deny it. In the
morning, we were missing Claudio, a photography professor at the Blogger
Academy, because an agent – who barely deigned to show him a card with
the initials DES (Department of State Security) – arrested him. We had a
little party at our house after the classes to celebrate the first
anniversary of Voces Cubanas, which in its brief life now has 26 sites.
I remember that in the middle of the hugs and smiles, someone told me to
be careful. "In the system as it is today, there is no way to protect
yourself from attacks from the State," I told him, with the intent to
scare away my own fear.

Around six in the evening we were on our way to a family gathering. My
sister was celebrating her 36th birthday; my father heard her first cry
early in the morning on the day set aside to celebrate railroad workers.
Even Teo, with his adolescent reluctance to participate in "old
people's" activities, agreed to come with us. We were expecting the
usual birthday party, with photos, candles to blow out, and "Happy
birthday to you, Yunia, may you enjoy many more." But, the many eyes
that were lurking had another plan for us. On Boyeros Avenue, a few
yards from the Ministry of the Interior and Raul Castro's office, three
cars stopped the miserable Russian Lada we had taken at a corner.

"Don't even think about going to 23rd Street Yoani, because the Union of
Young Communists is having an event," shouted some men who got out of
the Chinese-made Geely, which reminded me of a sharp pain in my lumbar
zone. I lived through something similar already last November and today
I would not allow them to put me head first into another car, with my
son. A huge man got out of the vehicle and started to repeat his
threats, "What is your name?" was Reinaldo's question which the man
never bothered to respond to. From Teo's lanky body rose the ironic
phrase, "He doesn't say his name because he is a coward." Worse still,
Teo, worse still, he doesn't say his name because he is not recognized
as an individual, but rather simply as a voice for others much higher
up. A professional camera was filming our every move, waiting for an
aggressive pose, a vulgar phrase, an excess of anger. The injection of
terror was brief, the birthday found us bitter.

How can we emerge unscathed from all this? How can a citizen protect
himself from a State that has the police, the courts, the rapid response
brigades, the mass media, the capacity to defame and lie, the power to
socially lynch him and turn him into someone defeated and apologetic?
What were they thinking would happen on 23rd Street today that would
make them arrest several bloggers?

I feel a terror that almost doesn't let me type, but I want to tell
those who today threatened me and my family, that when one reaches a
certain level of panic, higher doses don't make any difference. I will
not stop writing, or Twittering; I have no plans to close my blog, nor
abandon the practice of thinking with my own mind and – above all – I am
not going to stop believing that they are much more frightened than I am.

Generation Y » Much More Frightened Than Me (4 February 2010)
http://www.desdecuba.com/generationy/?p=1443