[News] Castro's Cuba brain-washes innocent Venezuelan barrio-slum dwellers

[News at freedomarchives.org]

Posted: Wednesday, February 04, 2004
http://www.vheadline.com/printer_news.asp?id=14788
By: <mailto:hardyce2 at yahoo.com>Charles Hardy

Charles Hardy: Castro's Cuba brain-washes innocent Venezuelan barrio-slum 
dwellers

VHeadline.com commentarist Charles Hardy writes: I recently saw students 
leaving a Caracas public school carrying rather huge red, yellow and blue 
boxes about the size of three reams of paper. My curiosity got the best of 
me and so I stopped one student to ask if I could see the box. It was a 
Home Library(Biblioteca Familiar). Each student, teacher and aide in the 
school received one that day.

Later, I was able to obtain one of the boxes ... a gift from a barrio 
family that received two of them. The contents of the library are worth 
studying, but, before examining them, it should be pointed out that the 
outside of the box contains the following words: Impreso en Cuba para el 
Ministerio de Educacion, Cultura y Deportes de la Republica Bolivariana de 
Venezuela (printed in Cuba for the Education, Culture & Sports Ministry of 
the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela).

Seeing the word Cubasparked my interest in the box even more, since the 
opposition has complained repeatedly about the Cubanization of Venezuela. I 
suppose that the books were purchased by the Venezuelan government in 
exchange for oil, which would not sit well with Venezuelans who consider 
Miami their promised land ... but a bigger concern would be the content of 
the material that was being given freely to young people to take into their 
homes.

Therefore, in the interests of letting the whole world know about the 
"subversive literature" that Cuba is sending to Venezuela, I would like to 
let the reader know what was in the box.

The first book that caught my attention was The Little Prince by Antoine de 
Saint-Exupery. I was in college when someone recommended that book to me. I 
thought it was pretty good and have re-read it several times. I never 
realized that it was Communist propaganda.

Then I noticed Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, The Call of the 
Wild by Jack London, Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe, a book of Grimms 
Fairy Tales, The Thousand and One Nights, For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest 
Hemingway, short stories by Cervantes and The Wild Asss Skin (La Piel de 
Onagro) by Honore de Balzac.

There are books with childrens stories such as Cinderella and Sleeping 
Beauty; books of poetry for adults by Pablo Neruda and others; biographical 
books about Columbus, Magellan, Bolivar and Ezequiel Zamora; documents of 
Simon Rodriquez (a teacher and friend of Simon Bolivar) and of Jose Marti 
written in 1895.

In total there are over 2,500 pages ... printed on newsprint, but to 
purchase the content of these books in a bookstore would cost a few hundred 
dollars. Now they are in the hands of thousands of Venezuelan barrio homes. 
I wonder how many US citizens have ever read any of the books included in 
the library.

Having now published this information, I am worried that some of the 
right-wing library committees in the United States will be rushing to their 
public library and public schools with a new list of books to be put on the 
forbidden list. There must be something Communistic in "Cinderella" and 
"Sleeping Beauty."

Why else would Cuba and Venezuela be sending these subversive, communist 
loaded stories into the homes of innocent Venezuelan barrio-slum dwellers?
    * I also wonder if opposition leaders, who have never read these books, 
are upset about ordinary people having this literature.

Education is a dangerous thing.

With more and more Venezuelans learning to read and write and finishing 
their formal education, they may not be willing to accept the pious 
platitudes of those who have dominated them for the past few centuries.

Books for oil might not make sense to those who only see value in money, 
and especially in the US dollars.

Personally, I like the idea.

What a shame that previous governments never thought of it.

Charlie

A native of Cheyenne, Wyoming (USA), VHeadline.com
columnist Charles Hardy has many years experience
  as an international correspondent in Venezuela.
You may email him at: <mailto:hardyce2 at yahoo.com>hardyce2 at yahoo.com


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