"The first victory we can claim is that our hearts are free of hatred. Hence we say to those who persecute us and who try to dominate us: ‘You are my brother. I do not hate you, but you are not going to dominate me by fear. I do not wish to impose my truth, nor do I wish you to impose yours on me. We are going to seek the truth together’. THIS IS THE LIBERATION WHICH WE ARE PROCLAIMING."
Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas (2002)
Showing posts with label Rosa Parks Feminist Movement for Civil Rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rosa Parks Feminist Movement for Civil Rights. Show all posts
On December 1, 1955, while sitting in the back of the bus [the area reserved for African Americans during segregation], the "white" section was filled to capacity with a white man standing, and the bus driver told Rosa Parks to stand up and give him her seat.
Rosa
Parks refused and she was arrested, finger printed, photographed,
jailed and fined $14 dollars for refusing to give up her seat. This
action would lead to the Montgomery bus boycott that would inspire
people of good will to action. Civil rights pioneer Rev. James Lawson on
June 20, 2010 described what it was like to learn of the boycott:
"December 6, 1955 that was the date when many people in the world learned of the beginning of the Montgomery bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama;
a very simple stroke it was not initially called a non-violent
movement. But Rosa Parks, Ed Nixon, Mary Jo Robinson, Martin King, Ralph
Abernathy, and a host of other people who engaged that first effort
sent a wave of hope around the world."
Rosa Parks would go on to live a long and productive life and passed away on October 24, 2005 at the age of 92. She was laid in state in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. Rosa Parks was the first woman and second non-government official to be honored in such a manner. Today, a hundred and ten years after Rosa Parks was born, women in Cuba inspired by her example have organized a movement,Rosa Parks Women's Civil Rights Movement , named
after the civil rights pioneer and are engaged in marches and
demonstrations in defense of human rights in Cuba. Much has been
achieved since 1955 but challenges still remain and for Cuban women the battle for basic human rights continues.
How do communists celebrate socialist holiday for women? Answer: Arresting them.
Members of Rosa Parks Women's Movement marching
Cuban police arrest nine women activists as they try to commemorate International Women's Day
Cuban police in Camaguey on Sunday, March 8, 2015 arrested nine members of the Rosa Parks Women's Movement for Civil Rights and 10 other activists as they tried to commemorate International Women's Day.
"How sad and embarrassing that the government sees as a threat to state a group of women who gather to celebrate such a symbolic date," said the group's leader, Marvelis Rodriguez. "It is demeaning that the government hits and jails defenseless women."
Along with Rodriguez, other women arrested Sunday were:
"I have learned over the years that when one's mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear." - Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks was born one hundred years ago today, February 4, 1913 in Tuskegee, Alabama. Four decades later she would engage in a moment that would transform the United States of America through nonviolent action. Before the 1960 lunch counter sit-ins in Greensboro, North Carolina and the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. there was Rosa Parks. On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama sitting in the back of the bus [the area reserved for African Americans during Segregation] the "white" section having been filled to capacity with a white man standing the bus driver told Rosa Parks to stand up and give her seat to him. Rosa Parks refused and she was arrested, finger printed, photographed, jailed and fined $14 dollars for refusing to give up her seat. This action would lead to the Montgomery bus boycott that would inspire people of good will to action. Civil rights pioneer Rev. James Lawson on June 20, 2010 described what it was like to learn of the boycott:
"December 6, 1955 that was the date when many people in the world learned of the beginning of the Montgomery bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama; a very simple stroke it was not initially called a non-violent movement. But Rosa Parks, Ed Nixon, Mary Jo Robinson, Martin King, Ralph Abernathy, and a host of other people who engaged that first effort sent a wave of hope around the world."
Rosa Parks would go on to live a long and productive life and passed away on October 24, 2005 at the age of 92. She was laid in state in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. Rosa Parks was the first woman and second non-government official to be honored in such a manner. Today, a hundred years after Rosa Parks was born, women in Cuba inspired by her example have organized a movement,Rosa Parks Women's Civil Rights Movement , named after the civil rights pioneer and are engaged in marches and demonstrations in defense of human rights in Cuba. Much has been achieved since 1955 but challenges still remain and for Cuban women the battle for basic human rights continues.
"I have learned over the years that when one's mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear." -Rosa Parks
Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera
Update #3: SOS from Jorge Luis Garcia Perez "Antunez" on twitter on June 16, 2011:Regime police brutally beat Yris in the head a few days ago. She has not recovered. Needs protection and a medical doctor urgently. Guillermo Fariñas Hernández on twitter today reported: "State Security prevented Antunez from taking his wife, recently hit in the head, for a medical consultation to a hospital in Havana." Update #2: SOS from Jorge Luis Garcia Perez "Antunez" on twitter on Saturday May 28, 2011 : "Yris my wife with headaches and numbness in right cheek. I hold Castro brothers responsible for what happens to Yris as a result of police brutality she suffered. What was Yris's crime? Go outside peacefully to the streets with clothes inside out in protest? Caridad Caballero Batista, whereabouts continue to be unknown. We fear for her life." Update:Yris is accounted for and back with her family as of Friday, May 27, 2011. Bloodied, bruised and disoriented from the beating suffered at the hand of Cuban state security but thankfully alive according to an early afternoon tweet from her husband.
Her husband, arrested along with her and still detained (but his location and health status are known) is Jorge Luis García Pérez, an opposition leader in the locality of Placetas, who was imprisoned on March 15, 1990 for "oral enemy propaganda" when he spoke out in favor of Eastern European style reforms in Cuba. García Pérez, known as "Antunez", was finally released more than 17 years later on April 22, 2007, having served one of the longest sentences for the present generation of political prisoners on the island. While in prison he founded along with others, an organization called the Pedro Luis Boitel Political Prisoner’s Movement. In November of 2009 he founded the Orlando Zapata Tamayo National Civic Resistance and Civil Disobedience Front.adding the name after the Front's founding in honor of a prisoner of conscience who died on hunger strike on February 23, 2010.
A violent assault
A State Security agent who goes by the nickname “ the weightlifter” on the morning of May 25, 2011 at the end of an activity in remembrance of both Orlando Zapata Tamayo and Pedro Luis Boitel beat up Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera so badly that according to Cuban activist, Donaida Pérez Paseiro, she lost consciousness and when Yris came to she was suffering from nausea, a headache, dizziness and herhands were numb. She was arrested and jailed then taken to the hospital only to be returned to a cell but here whereabouts have been unaccounted for since then.
Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera and her husband, Jorge Luis García Pérez
Today, activists were detained as they walked towards State Security headquarters to try and find out the whereabouts of Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera and what had been done to the young activist as well as to request the release of all the detained activists. The march was led by Librado Linares, one of the prisoners of conscience released this past spring after more than 7 years in prison, who was the one designated to speak to the State Security agents representing the group. Víctor Castillo Ortega, José Lino Ascencio López, Mayda Conlledo García, Yanisbel Valido Pérez, Alberto Reyes Morales, Michel Oliva López, Félix Reyes Gutiérrez, Guillermo Fariñas Hernández (the 2011 Sakharov Prize winner), Guillermo Del Sol Pérez, Ana Alfonso Arteaga, Chichi Bernal Serpa and Librado Linares García were all arrested and at this hour remain in detention.
Video above is from a February 2011 arrest of Yris
However, this time it seems to be a coordinated effort to terrorize and repress at all levels. Today, Marcos Maikel (age 33) and Antonio Michel Lima Cruz (age 28), were sentenced to three and two years in prison (respectively) for "disrespect of patriotic symbols." A slow motion crackdown There is slow motion crackdown underway in Cuba. Some questions that arise: How long are the detentions and prison sentences and how violent are the Cuban State Security beat downs of nonviolent activists going to be? The death of Juan Wilfredo Soto Garcia three days after a beat down by the political police of the Cuban dictatorship along with beat downs of Angel Moya Acosta and Sara Marta Fonseca indicate this is policy, not an isolated incident by over enthusiastic police.
In Cuba asking these questions and requesting the freedom of innocent nonviolent activists can get you arrested and beaten up. Celebrate the courage of those willing to risk all for their fellow citizens and at the same time living in the free world please take a moment and speak out for them.
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