Lázaro Raúl González, CPI
HERRADURA, June - I must confess that I've never been a fan of television,
but last weekend I took an interest in the options available to my fellow
citizens and in their preferences.
My informal survey shows that every day, starting at 6 p.m., government-run
television shows Open Tribunes and Round Tables. These are politically-oriented
discussion groups that got their start at the time of the Elián González
affair and have been going non-stop ever since.
On Friday, May 25, out of six TV sets in the building where I live, only one
was tuned in to the day's Round Table. The others were off, since there is no
alternative program running.
The next day in the morning, both national channels were broadcasting a "vibrant
revolutionary act" live from Havana. I visited 20 households that own TV
sets and only two were on.
It seems that in spite of the "revolutionary fervor" government
spokesmen tell us can be found in the heart of every Cuban and the thousands of
dollars spent in transporting marchers to the political acts, barely 10 percent
of the citizens in my neighborhood chose to participate from home.
Yet, there was a marked change at about 10 that night, when 12 out of 16
homes visited were found to be enjoying the Saturday movie. In most of those,
the whole family was in front of the set.
One minor enigma. How is it possible that in a country unanimously
anti-imperialistic, whose people are endowed with unequaled revolutionary and
anti-colonialist spirit and whose broadcast stations are controlled by the
Communist Party, both films shown on Saturday nights are American-made?
The title of the first film shown on May 26 was translated into Spanish as "Convicts
in the Air." It had plenty of violence, shooting, blood, deaths, blackmail
and attempted rape. The main characters were homicidal criminals of every type
driven by hate. All in all, a world that has nothing in common with
Marxist-Leninist Cuba.
The next morning's opinion survey found that 99 percent of those asked
thought the movie had been "very good" and one percent thought it had
been "good." Asked why she liked that type of movie, one young
Herradura resident said: "What am I going to do? There's nothing else on."
Versión
original en español
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