Celebrando el
Mes de la Historia de la Mujer y el Día Internacional de la Mujer pienso en Berta Cáceres, partera y activista
por los derechos indígenas y humanos en Honduras recientemente asesinada por su
trabajo en nombre de la justicia.
Hace mucho
que he dicho que ha llegado el tiempo de que tales mujeres tomen las riendas
del liderazgo por el mundo entero. El patriarcado ha seguido su curso y nos ha
traído peligrosamente al borde de la extinción. Lo que el mundo ahora necesita
es la ascendencia de lo femenino, la esencia mamífera de unir, fundación del
amar, de la compasión, del nutrir, del cuidar, proteger. Y ha llegado el tiempo para que nosotros los
hombres liberemos y cultivemos lo femenino en nosotros — y para que la
humanidad nos unamos para crear un nuevo mundo de justicia profundamente
arraigada en el amor.
---Por medio milenio y
más
-------------a
Berta Cáceres
---------y a todos
los mártires
-------------de
las Américas
---muertos
defendiendo la tierra
Por medio milenio y
más
hemos muerto
defendiendo
la tierra, los
bosques, los ríos
de invasores
extranjeros
cegados por la
codicia,
enloquecidos por la
ganancia
en moneda sangrienta.
Hemos sufrido
traidores
infectados por esa
locura
que por esa misma
moneda
venden a sus propios
dioses.
Nuestros huesos
siembran la tierra,
nuestra sangre la
riega
y el sagrado maíz
a veces nos sabe
amargo.
Pero seguimos luchando
y nuestros huesos y
sangre
crecerán un nuevo
mundo en flor.
-----------------©
Rafael Jesús González 2016
(4 March 1973 – 3 March 2016
¡Presente!
-->
---For
Half a Millennium & More
---------------to
Berta Cáceres
-------------&
to all the martyrs
----------------of
the Americas
---------killed
defending the land
For
half a millennium & more
we
have died defending
the
land, the forests, the rivers
from
foreign invaders
blinded
by greed,
crazed
by profit
in
bloodied coin.
We
have suffered traitors
Infected
by that madness
that
for that same coin
sell
their own gods.
Our
bones sow the earth,
Our
blood waters it,
&
the sacred corn
sometimes
tastes bitter to us.
But
we go on struggling
&
our bones & our blood
will
grow a new flowering world.
-----------------© Rafael Jesús González 2016
Celebrating Women's History
Month and International Women's Day, I think of Berta Cáceres, midwife and activist for
indigenous and human rights in Honduras recently murdered for her work
in the name of justice.
I have long said that the time has come for such women as she to
take the reins of leadership throughout the world. The patriarchy has
run its course and brought us dangerously close to the edge of
extinction. What the world now calls for is the ascendancy of the
feminine, the mammalian nature to bond, foundation of love, compassion, of
nurturing, of caring, protecting. And the time has come for us men to liberate and
cultivate the feminine in us — and for humanity to come together to
create a new world of Justice deeply rooted in Love.
Known for the avowed feminist that I am, calling for the
leadership of women, I have been justifiably asked why it is that I
do not support Hillary Clinton as the presidential
candidate of the Democratic Party. At the risk of seeming flippant, I
reply, "Because she is not woman enough."
I support Bernie Sanders because he most manifests those
qualities of love, of nurturing, of caring that we associate with the
feminine and which are so desperately called for at this juncture of
history.
Recently, Clinton has been quoted as saying that she is "about
love" and has taken to hugging Latina leaders and black mothers of
children killed by police. Such acts have won her the endorsement of
some Latinas and African-American women. I do not doubt that Hillary
can be personable and warm with folk face-to-face, but we should be
wary of voting for someone on the basis of kissing babies and
hugging bereaved mothers. Random acts of kindness are not enough;
kindness should not be random but legislated into the very fabric of
policy.
And Hillary Clinton's record does not support the belief that
justice rooted in compassion is the basis of her policy. After
all:
1) The Clinton administration brought NAFTA that has destroyed
Mexico and other Latin-American countries forcing many to
migrate, and in the U.S. has benefited only the rich. She supports the
TPP (more cynical "free trade" to impose predatory Capitalism on
the world.)
2) Hillary was on the team that ended the financial protection of
the Glass-Spiegel Act and since then the banks have run rampant and
crashed the world economy, causing so many to fall into poverty. And
furthermore, Clinton continued the tax cuts to the rich instituted by
Reagan.
3) The Clinton administration cut welfare benefits to the very
poorest (Latin@s, African-Americans, Indigenous, single
mothers, foremost among the poorest communities.)
4) Clinton's adherence to and forceful waging of the "War on Drugs" and the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994
enforced harsher sentencing at the federal level, which increased mass
incarceration (mostly of Latin@s and African-Americans, so many of
them women) and made it so profitable for the privatized prison
industry, increasing the tendency of police to unjustifiably kill unarmed, mostly black and Latin@s, suspects.
5) As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's policy of bombing
Syria is killing a great many people and causing a great many to flee
the violence. Hillary Clinton facilitated the military coup of Honduras'
legitimately elected government of Manuel Zelaya in 2009 setting in
place the conditions for Berta Caceres' murder.
Hillary Clinton is not the woman I would want as president.
Hillary Clinton most definitely is not a Berta Cáceres, nor for that
matter, an Elizabeth Warren, or a Barbara Lee. Hillary Clinton's
policies are as toxic as those of an authoritarian patriarch and her
election would only carry on the same institutionalized injustices
that have made a sham of our democratic ideals.
Bernie Sanders is the only true
choice we have for changes in the policies, domestic and
international, that cause so much suffering among the many and so
severely harm our great Mother the Earth. For the sake of women throughout
the world, and for the sake of us all, it is Bernie Sanders
whom we must elect.
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