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RMS Protest Song On Gitmo
An anonymous reader tipped us to a protest song RMS has written and recorded (while visiting Cuba) and is hosting on stallman.org. It's a sort of parody, although it's too serious really to be called that, in Spanish of the song "Guantanamera," in which a Gitmo prisoner talks about his experiences and mourns his fate. RMS wrote the lyrics in 2006 after learning what "Guantanamera" actually means. The lyrics are moving, and the recording, in Ogg, is competent — RMS sings well and he's got some amateur musicians from Cuba backing him up. Here are the lyrics and an English translation.
The Road to Guantanamo - about three British muslims who end up in Gitmo, get abused and then released.
Real life is overrated.
"it is totally legal to visit Cuba (up to X times per year, [IIRC X is one])"
You know, having grown up in an Eastern Block country where a symptom of the dictatorship we had was that we were allowed to go to the "West" only once in every four yours, I find this limit in the "Land of Free" totally hilarious (and, on the other hand, totally sad).
Real life is overrated.
Stallman isn't supporting Castro, he's just shitting on Bush more. The fact that Cuba isn't the bastion of human rights doesn't reduce the severity of the United States - the most powerful single country in the world - having questionable human rights practices.
Stallman is always very careful about what he says in cases like this. Don't put words in his mouth, find out what he's actually said and respond to that.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
Not saying that Cuba is paradise or even a good place but come on! Second worst? You are quoting from Reporters without Borders, a NGO that receive a lot of cash from US State Department and other departments. That's why their main enemies lately are Cuba and Venezuela.
It is difficult to believe that Cuba is worse than Saudi Arabia, a country that does not allow non business visits by any non-muslim. Uzbequistan is certainly much better than Cuba. The list of US client states that are a "paradise" compared to Cuba is long.
Iraq is also much better! If you don't get killed by the different kind of wackos you will be popped by some trigger happy "coalition" soldier. China is another fine example of free press.
With so many countries with free press, no wonder Cuba and Venezuela are at the bottom.
There are independent Human Rights organizations that can be consulted for the truth about the deplorable prison conditions in Cuba and the Political dissidents housed in said prisons.
You're throwing up a 'deflector shield' in the form of counter-red-baiting. You should honestly be ashamed of yourself. Remember: the Kremlin archives were opened up to journalists for long enough during the initial period of post-Soviet Russia, and many of the accusations made by western anti-Communists were definitely proven.
Until there is freedom in Cuba, probably (sadly) long after Castro is dead, the full truth cannot be known.
But said independent Human Rights organizations (which also have something to say about abuses in the West) should be respected.
Don't be part of the latest batch of 'Useful Idiots.' You're better than that and history WILL document you for what you are, eventually.
A fully reasonable comparison. When my dad once went to the United States, he first thought that he had gotten on the wrong plane and landed in the Soviet Union (this was while the USSR still existed). Where else would you need to fill in a whole range of papers declaring this and that*, as well as tell the immigration officials where you intend to stay and so on.
*= To a foreigner, the US immigration papers look more than silly, they make a laugh of the entire US (first impressions, you know). You have to answer questions on whether you were ever a member of a communist organization, whether you are going to the US to commit terrorist acts, etc, etc. Do they really expect the communists or terrorists to answer Yes in any of these forms? How naive are those immigration officials really?
No offense, but it is insanely ridiculous.
"I think people who were wavering about whether what we are doing in Guantanamo is right,"
All six of them? After all, it's been over five years now.
"will come down on the side of Bush when they see unkempt hippie commies like RMS"
Ah yes, victim of the ol' Secret Constitutional Amendment that strips citizenship away from "unkempt hippie commies."
"we are at WAR after all."
With whom, exactly? Iran? North Korea? Cuba? And whether your answer is Afghanistan, Iraq, or Oceania this week, there's still the fact that the United States hasn't been at war with anybody since 1945.
"RMS should be put on trial for treason..."
It's nice to know you share your grasp of the federal constitution with your chosen president.
Now the current, corrupt US administration is of course another story. They basically, callously and corruptly used the 11/9 incident as a means by which to profit their corporate partners and in turn themselves.
The utterly contemptible way in which they have traded human lives for profit, corrupted justice for greater corporate power and used two religions as nothing but a cynical exercise in political marketing, puts them beyond doubt, as the most corrupt and criminal administration in US history.
The worst possible mistake the Americans can now make, is to fail to prosecute the current administrations for the crimes they have self evidently committed, this failure would inevitably lead to even greater excesses by future administrations.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Ultimately the people in Cuba are more free than what they had before - comparing it to somewhere else is often fairly pointless. The USA has a childish attitude to Cuba becuase they ran it, let it get away through incompetance and most likely corruption and let it become such a mess (literally a gansters paradise) that a revolution with popular support occured. The odd relationship where GITMO is based there and Cuban imports are still prohibited but their cigars even end up in odd places in the White House is all really about appearance and "sending a message". It's all old news and time for US policy to grow up - you will not change anything by ignoring it or by complaining that something as old and irrelevant as losing a place that the USA went to war with Spain over is a big deal.