HOW WOULD YOU FEEL?

How would you feel if a well known rich man jails your mother in his basement because she doesn't think that he ought to take his children’s food away from them and give it to the poor down the street? What would you think of that same rich man if he’d jailed one of his children for saying he wanted the food his father was giving to other children?

He doesn’t feed his two prisoners, or his other children. He beats his two prisoners and tortures them, but everyone up and down the city loves this rich man to death because he's been so good to everyone and has stood up to another man they all hate.

The press conveniently ignores that he’s got his maid, your mother, and one of his children in a jail. Whenever they see you coming they close their doors, so as not to here your ranting and raving, or to deal with your rabid hatred of this man, who is so good to everybody else. Some have even told you in your face that what’s a little beating when he does so much good around the city. You tell them that the children he has not jailed are starving, but they answer you back with, “Oh but he sends them to school and they have very good healthcare.”

You know his children are not that well taken care of medically because it costs him too much, and your mother, you cry for her, she nurtured you, you were born from her and you know she is deteriorating by the day, soon there will only be a whisper of what that great lady use to be.

You sit there and run up and down the street telling these people that your mother is dieing, and that his children are also, that this isn’t the great man he wants everyone to believe. You try to save your mother and his children on your own, believing that if nobody else will do something, you might as well do something.

The city folk, learn of your plan and hold you back. Finally one day, the rich man that everyone hates, heads your call, and starts yelling it from the ramparts. He starts bombarding the people with the truth, yet because they hate him, nothing he says is heeded.

Since he can lose a lot, the hated rich man tells you that the scum’s children must come out and tell the people what is happening to them. The children and the babysitters must do something for themselves before he can lift a finger to help them.

You try to get these messages to his children and the babysitters through any means possible and a group in the city says that you’re trying to outsmart one man’s sovereignty over his house.

You’ve tried screaming, crying, talking, showing, but nothing. How would you feel? Can you even imagine something like that? Can you come up with a reason as to why so many are willing to look the other way? Can you rationalize that they do it because they hate the other rich man, the one who’s willing to help? Who will you go to, if he’s the only one willing to help? He’s the ONLY one who gave you a bedroom to sleep in when your mother was taken from you.

**Now go back and read it, but this time you're Cuban, your mother is Cuba, the children are Cubans and the city is the world**