Cuba Bloggers Yes… But Organized

Cuba Bloggers Yes… But Organized
May 3, 2012
Fernando Ravsberg*

HAVANA TIMES, May 3 — When they told me about the idea of holding a
meeting of blogueros (bloggers), I thought it would be a good
opportunity to join forces and gain ground. As long as there is respect
for the freedom of opinions that should guide all human beings.

I warned them of the possibility that an attempt might be made to
"organize" them under the control of the same people who already ruined
the credibility of the national press.

That there existed the danger of this effort being converted into the
online version of the same failure – just as monotonous, uncritical and
simplistic.

I got a bad feeling knowing that a commission had been created to
exclude certain Internauts and that this body's selection criteria was
so narrow that it had left out Yasmin and her husband, an active couple
in the blogosphere who also define themselves as revolutionaries.

After the event, journalism professor Elaine Diaz noted in her blog that
the meeting lacked "life, authenticity, spontaneity as well as the
slightest bit of courage," which is what would have been required to
invite activists from the Observatorio Critico, a group of the
non-officialist left.

In defense of the event, there appeared Yohandry (the blogger who has
the most access to official information), but all he did was to repeat
the tired argument of the Cuban press: "If being 'officialist' means
defending the revolution and socialism — even though we know that many
things have to be improved — then that's what I am – proudly."

However, up until now the officialist media have only proven themselves
to be masters at publishing praises of the "revolution," while at the
same time seeming unable to defend it effectively, says well-known
Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano, who —curiously— Yoahandry likes to quote.

Officialist pride was reflected in the meeting's final resolution: "We
respect and promote critical thinking, which is necessary and useful to
preserve our status as revolutionaries, with the premise that one cannot
be revolutionary outside of the revolution."

The phrase has a strong political overtone. For some members of the
bureaucratic class, to be "within the revolution" means accepting all
directives from above – though no one knows for sure at what link in the
chain those decisions are made.

These bloggers condemn "the blockade by the US government, which creates
the difficulties of connectivity and access to info-communications
technology on the island," but they avoid talking about the undersea
cable that could be used to rupture the blockade.

The final resolution of the meeting doesn't mention the fact that the
fiber optic cable between Cuba and Venezuela should have been
functioning a year ago. Its proper operation would increase the
connectivity of the country by 3,000 times, thus facilitating Internet
access to the Cuban people.

This was a project that cost tens of millions of dollars that were paid
for by the workers who provide the money in the state budget – those who
sow, those who build, those who work in Venezuela to ensure the
provision of the oil that's essential for the country. Yet the
communications minister won't even talk of the submarine cable.

I think people have a right to know what the government did with their
money, so I went to the minister of Communications. After sidestepping
the determined justifications from his press chief, I managed to get the
minister himself to respond. However — in a patently bad mood — his only
reply was that had nothing to say about the cable.

It seems then that the bloggers will have to turn to the approach of
Cuban journalist Francisco "Paquito" Rodriguez, who called on all of
them to work together to try to "find out what happened to the fiber
optic submarine cable that was laid from Venezuela for more than a year
ago."

Despite working in the Cuban media, Paquito has no information with
respect to this. "No one knows anything about it or when it will start
working" he said. But he asserts that when the cable finally does begin
operation "we bloggers will multiply like bread and fish."

Francisco has one of the most popular blogs on the island: Paquito el de
Cuba, on sexual diversity. His was another one of the notable absences
from the meeting (though he had been asked, he politely refused the
offer to take part in the organizing committee and went on a camping
vacation).

The most astounding element in the final declaration of the bloggers'
meeting was their request to the government agencies to "reformulate the
regulations that limit connectivity and access to the Internet by the
country's institutions, for the sake of a greater presence of Cubans in
cyberspace."

In this way they relinquished and abdicated all of their rights as
citizens to participate in the reformulation of those policies that
govern the use of the Internet. They left everything in the hands of the
very same "government agencies" that have restricted access up until now.

When the meeting ended, I wrote to one of the organizers wishing them
great successes so they offset the huge shortfalls, especially with
regard to credibility – the principal ammunition of any communicator.
—–

(*) An authorized translation by Havana Times (from the Spanish
original) published by BBC Mundo.

http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=69046