bars</tle><g id="el_oZ84Hna1GC_65hRV2Qwn" class="css-1fxvzwo" data-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="0"><g id="el_oZ84Hna1GC_ILVvi2tqx" class="css-1wnday1" ata-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="2"><g id="el_oZ84Hna1GC"><rect x="34" width="6" height="36" id="el_qw_T_tngXw"></rect></g></g></g><g id="el_mYVjkduhMU_p_9Pm85Ac" class="css-fwki7z" data-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="0"><g id="el_mYVjkduhMU_WxG3R40yd" class="css-t3i5e6" data-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="2"><g id="el_mYVjkduhMU"><rect x="22.67" width="6" height="36" id="el_lf9GrROk6j"></rect></g></g></g><g id="el_o-EuxhgoAw_kYNRGDfcw" class="css-t9te0w" data-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="0"><g id="el_o-EuxhgoAw_3c3bzSjOJ" class="css-1r5375t" ata-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="2"><g id="el_o-EuxhgoAw"><rect x="11.33" width="6" height="36" id="el_-iueO8klO0"></rect></g></g></g><g id="el_F7mSMPhqpC_y_fKcpSxn" class="css-qknaag" data-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="0"><g id="el_F7mSMPhqpC_R6bNB6_Ys" class="css-1vd04" ata-animator-group="te" data-animator-type="2"><g id="el_F7mSMPhqpC"><rect width="6" height="36" id="el_dS5TKNZZ5w"></rect></g></g></g></svg></div><div><div class="css-1t7yl1y">0:00<!-- -->/<!-- -->3:59</div><div class="css-og85jy">-<!-- -->0:00</div></div></div></div></hear><div class="css-uzyn7p"><div class="css-1vxyw"><p class="css-1nng8z9">transcript</p><h2 class="css-9wqu2x">Ana’s Story: Transgenr Cuba</h2><h4 class="css-qsd3hm">The Cuban ernment paid for Ana Rafaela Diaz Gomez’s sex change, yet challeng still rema for same-sex upl on the island.</h4></div><dl class="css-p98d0w"><dt class="css-xx7kwh"></dt><dd class="css-4gvq6l"><p class="css-8hvvyd">Ana Rafaela Diaz Gomez builds a new life after her genr reassignment surgery and hormone replacement therapy two years ago.</p></dd></dl></div></div></div></div><script type="applitn/ld+json">{"@ntext":","@type":"VioObject","@id":","scriptn":"The Cuban ernment paid for Ana Rafaela Diaz Gomez’s sex change, yet challeng still rema for same-sex upl on the island.","url":","name":"Ana’s Story: Transgenr Cuba","thumbnailUrl":[",","],"embedUrl":","ntentUrl":","uploadDate":"2014-12-19T23:29:09.000Z","transcript":"Ana Rafaela Diaz Gomez builds a new life after her genr reassignment surgery and hormone replacement therapy two years ago.","duratn":"PT3M59S"}</script></div><div class="css-1cueeje" style="paddg-bottom:56.25%;transn:opacy 300ms ease--out"><div class="css-1ihorw"><img src=" alt="Vio player loadg"/></div><div class="css-ew1078"><div class="css-ptry2i"><div></div><div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><figptn class="css-1ifea e1maroi60"><span class="css-jevhma e13ogyst0">The Cuban ernment paid for Ana Rafaela Diaz Gomez’s sex change, yet challeng still rema for same-sex upl on the island.</span></figptn></figure><div class="css-1guqxks"><a class="css-1vknhtq" href=">See how this article appeared when was origally published on </a></div></hear><sectn name="articleBody" class="meteredContent css-1r7ky0e"><div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompannColumn"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">In Cuba, street march have historilly been ernment-orchtrated events or dissint protts that are swiftly cshed by the thori. So was downright startlg when, May 2007, Fil Castro’s niece sntered down the street wh a small army of drag queens wavg gay pri flags.</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Long before the Obama admistratn announced a dramatic shift Cuba policy on Wednday, assertg that isolatg the island had failed, a uple of Wtern ernments wh close ti to the Uned Stat saw the potential to help gay Cubans, even though meant workg wh a proment member of the Castro fay. Havana’s first observance of the <a class="css-yywogo" href=" tle="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Internatnal Day Agast Homophobia and Transphobia</a> marked the begng of a remarkable evolutn of gay rights the most populo untry the Caribbean, a regn where hostile attus toward sexual mori rema the norm.</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Mariela Castro, the dghter of the current print, Raúl Castro, has led the charge on legislative and societal chang that have given rise to an creasgly visible and empowered muny. In the procs, she has rved out a rare space for civil society an thorarian untry where grass-roots movements rarely succeed. Some Wtern diplomats Havana have seen the progrs on gay rights as a potential blueprt for expansn of other personal eedoms one of the most opprsed societi on earth.</p></div><asi class="css-ew4tgv" aria-label="pann lumn"></asi></div><div></div><div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompannColumn"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Norway and Belgium have fancially supported Ms. Castro’s anizatn, the Natnal Center for Sexual Edutn, offerg a tt of the mers of supportg certa polici of a ernment that the Uned Stat and European pals have largely shunned bee of s bleak human rights rerd. As the Obama admistratn begs rryg out s new Cuba policy, should draw lsons om the impact others have had by engagg.</p></div><asi class="css-ew4tgv" aria-label="pann lumn"></asi></div><div><div style="max-width:100%;marg:0 to" class=""><div data-id="100000003363731" data-slug="cuba-transgenr-spanish-button" class="css-1ax702a" style="max-width:300px"><iame src=" class="css-sqdgy8" ameBorr="0" scrollg="no" width="100%"></iame></div></div></div><div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompannColumn"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">“It’s fe to cricize, but you also have to acknowledge that they’ve done good,” said John Petter Opdahl, Norway’s ambassador to Cuba, a recent terview. Mr. Opdahl, who is gay, said his ernment gave Ms. Castro’s anizatn $230,000 over the last two years. “She has taken off a lot of the stigma for most people the untry, and she has ma life so much better for so many gay people, not only Havana but the provc.”</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Fil Castro’s ernment ostracized sexual mori durg the 1960s and 1970s, sendg some people to labor mps. The btal treatment of gay men was poignantly chronicled by the Cuban wrer Realdo Arenas, who was jailed 1974 for lerary works the thori emed an “iologil viatn.” His tobgraphy, “Before Night Falls,” a crilly acclaimed book that was ma to a movie, is perhaps the most thorative ttimony of a particularly dark chapter of Cuban history.</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Ms. Castro said she and her mother, Vilma Espín, for years quietly prsed the Castro brothers to soften their attu toward sexual mori. A ago, Cuba’s gay muny was no longer as persecuted, but nohels operated the shadows. Ms. Castro, a member of Cuba’s Natnal Assembly, opted to take on the issue.</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">After the 2007 march, Ms. Castro, who is straight, began a public mpaign to promote tolerance. She persuad the ernment recent years to offer state-paid genr reassignment surgery and hormone treatment for transgenr people. Last year, when the Assembly passed a labor that protected gays and lbians — but not transgenr people — om discrimatn the workplace, Ms. Castro beme the first lawmaker Cuban history<a class="css-yywogo" href=" tle="AP story" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> to st a dissentg vote prott.</a> Her ultimate goal, she said, was difyg full equaly unr the law.</p></div><asi class="css-ew4tgv" aria-label="pann lumn"></asi></div><div></div><div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompannColumn"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Gay Cubans say that discrimatn remas a problem, particularly outsi big ci. Still, last year, a woman Caribién, a municipaly east of Havana, beme the untry’s first transgenr elected official. At the urgg of Ms. Castro and gay bloggers, 2010 Cuba began votg favor of rolutns supportg gay rights at the Uned Natns, breakg ranks wh alli Ai and the Caribbean.</p><p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">While wily admired, Ms. Castro and her state-n anizatn are not whout crics Cuba’s gay muny. In 2011, Yasmín Portal Machado, a gay rights activist, cid to <a class="css-yywogo" href=" tle="Proyecto Ar Iris web se" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">start a new group</a> lled Proyecto Ar Iris, or Rabow, feelg was necsary to have a platform for other voic and ias.</p></div><asi class="css-ew4tgv" aria-label="pann lumn"></asi></div><div><figure class="sizeMedium css-sx232s" aria-label="media" role="group" data-ttid="VioBlock"><div class="css-1xb94ky"><span class="css-1dv1kvn">Vio</span><div><div class="css-n27z15" style="paddg-bottom:56.25%"><div class="css-mm3pwi"><div class="css-1g7y0i5 e1drnplw0"><button tabx="100" class="css-1rtlxy" type="button" aria-label="close"><svg width="60" height="60" viewBox="0 0 60 60" fill="none"><circle cx="30" cy="30" r="30" fill="whe" fill-opacy="0.9"></circle><path fill-le="evenodd" clip-le="evenodd" d="M38.4844 20.1006L39.8986 21.5148L21.5138 39.8996L20.0996 38.4854L38.4844 20.1006Z" fill="black"></path><path fill-le="evenodd" clip-le="evenodd" d="M21.5156 20.1006L20.1014 21.5148L38.4862 39.8996L39.9004 38.4854L21.5156 20.1006Z" fill="black"></path></svg></button><div class="css-rdbib0 e1drnplw1"></div><div class="css-18ow4sz e1drnplw2"><div aria-labelledby="modal-tle" role="regn"><hear class="css-1bzlfz"><div class="css-mln36k" id="modal-tle">transcript</div><button type="button" class="css-1igvuto"><div class="css-f40pzg"></div><span>Back</span></button><div class="css-f6lhej" data-ttid="transcript-playback-ntrols"><div class="css-1ialerq"><button tabx="99" type="button" class="css-1t9gw" aria-label="play"><svg xmlns=" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none"><path fill-le="evenodd" clip-le="evenodd" d="M8 13.7683V6L14.5 9.88415L8 13.7683Z" fill="var(--lor-ntent-sendary,#363636)"></path><circle cx="10" cy="10" r="9.25" stroke="var(--lor-stroke-primary,#121212)" stroke-width="1.5"></circle></svg></button><div class="css-1701swk"><svg xmlns=" viewBox="0 0 40 36" id="el_0kpS9qL_S"><tle>bars

castro gay rights

Over the weekend Philalphia, the dghter of Cuban Print Rl Castro and niece of Fil Castro received an award for her gay rights advocy. To unrstand the signifince of Mariela Castro's honor, you have to go back to the 1960's when gay people were sent to forced labor mps.

Contents:

FIL CASTRO TAK BLAME FOR PERSECUTN OF CUBAN GAYS

Former Cuban lear Fil Castro said he acknowledg the persecutn of gays and lbians durg the Revolutn his untry, acrdg to a newspaper terview published Tuday. * castro gay rights *

Image ptn, Mr Castro told Carmen Lira that he had not paid enough attentn to the treatment of homosexualsFil Castro has said that he is ultimately rponsible for the persecutn suffered by homosexuals Cuba after the revolutn of former print told the Mexin newspaper La Jornada that there were moments of great jtice agast the gay muny. Embargo agast Cuba enuraged his untry to be creative Havana, Cuba (CNN) -- Former Cuban lear Fil Castro said he acknowledg the persecutn of gays and lbians durg the Revolutn his untry, acrdg to a newspaper terview published Tuday.

CASTRO ADMS 'JTICE' FOR GAYS AND LBIANS DURG REVOLUTN

Concentratn mps for gays. Polil prisons where they were treated like ‘beasts.’ Listen up, liberals: Before you celebrate Castro, remember his victims. * castro gay rights *

Some have argued that another explanatn for Havana’s homosexual polici is that Cuba’s ntued pennce on the Soviet Unn for tra and assistance led to a Stalist-style tolerance of homosexualy throughout the earlier part of the . 24 Gay rights activists, both Cuba and abroad, have acced the Cuban thori of applyg the crime of “pre-crimal dangerons” unfairly to homosexuals, and ignorg plats of those who have been beaten or fired om their jobs bee of their sexual orientatn.

25 Other gay rights activists have cricized Mariela Castro for her nsistency and hypocrisy when to gay rights, argug that gay rights activists ntue to be imprisoned, beaten, or simply disappear while she provis ltle more than lip service to the issue.

FIL CASTRO’S HORRIFIC RERD ON GAY RIGHTS

Members of the LGBTQ muny are worried that San Francis's Castro District, long the cultural center for gays and lbians the cy, is beg ls queer. * castro gay rights *

) When the Human Immunoficiency Vis h the island’s gay muny the mid-1980s, the regime’s rponse was to quarante all HIV-posive people sanariums, referred to as “pretty prisons” by the founr of the World Health Organizatn’s Global Program for AIDS. No doubt attuned to the way which gay rights has bee central to the agenda of a global left creasgly sensive to the claims of inty polics, the Cuban regime recent years has tried to fashn self as beg the vanguard of homosexual liberatn. But no matter how much life for gay Cubans might have improved om the days of forced labor mps, ’s all occurrg wh the ntext of a totalarian society whose cizens nnot vote, are nied basic eedoms like the right to speak or prott eely, and nnot form anizatns pennt of the ernment.

MARIELA CASTRO WS GAY-RIGHTS ADVOCY AWARD

The Castro, a televisn documentary, chronicl the dramatic saga of a muny that has bee an ternatnal symbol of gay liberatn. * castro gay rights *

"But… I'm jt lookg around at my own iends and who are also gay and lbian and they're leavg the neighborhood, " The Castro's roots wh the gay rights movement began after World War II, when workg class fai moved out and gay men moved . SEE ALSO: US rtor gay and transgenr health protectns reversal of Tmp-era policy District 8 Supervisor Rafael Menlman says 's important to strike a balance between matag the Castro's cultural inty while welg non-gays and straight fai.

CASTRO'S NIECE CASTS RARE 'NO' VOTE IN PARLIAMENT, CG GAY RIGHTS

* castro gay rights *

On May 21, 1979, thoands of members of San Francis’s predomantly gay Castro District muny took to the streets to prott the lenient sentence received by Dan Whe for the murrs of lol polician and gay rights activist Harvey Milk and Mayor Gee Mosne. The rultg vlence affected San Francis’s LGBT muny for s to Milk rose to promence as a gay rights activist and beme the first openly gay person elected to a public office the state of California when he was elected to the San Francis Board of Supervisors 1977.

JAFFARI ALLEN: What has happened is a tremendo difference terms of visibily of LGBT people the prs, on televisn, to remd other Cubans that they are part of the natn and part of In 2010 Fil Castro apologized for his regime's treatment of homosexuals.

IS THE CASTRO GETTG LS GAY?

Des after Fil Castro’s ernment ma a practice of tormentg gay Cubans, his niece has ma LGBT rights a top prry. * castro gay rights *

Mariela Castro says she hop chang attu will soon translate to ncrete laws, like gay marriage (Foreign language spoken)GARSD: Castro, a straight mother of three, says she felt gay rights were a bld spot Cuba's revolutn, so she cid to take actn.

And I fd pretty sad that this is now what we're nsirg Back at the panel, gay activist Ada Bello says the picture is more Whether this is somethg that is beg done to make the ernment look better, or bee they have fact evolved, the realy is that 's She says, whatever happens next, 's too late to turn back the clock on gay rights Cuba. If you’ve read Before Night Falls, the tobgraphy of gay Cuban wrer Realdo Arenas, or seen Julian Schnabel’s wonrful film adaptatn starrg Javier Barm, you have some notn of the dismal treatment of LGBT people Cuba durg the long reign of Fil, the munist revolutnary turned dictator, died Friday at age 90, eight years after cedg learship of his untry to his younger brother, Raúl. After takg power, we’re remd, the lear treated homosexualy as an afont to the hypermascule revolutnary ial, gog so far as to tern gay Cubans forced labor mps, and later, durg the AIDS crisis, to sequter HIV-posive cizens sanariums that were tantamount to 2010, Castro fally acknowledged an terview wh a Mexin newspaper that the programs reprented “a great jtice.

CUBA’S GAY RIGHTS EVOLUTN

A visible and empowered gay muny offers hope that other eedoms will take root. * castro gay rights *

” Later she briefly acknowledg her ground-breakg dissentg vote agast a labor bill that failed to aquately addrs gay rights (Cuba’s parliament generally vot unanimoly), then clar that her work remds her of John Lennon’s “All You Need Is Love, ” which she sgs thickly accented English. “It's gone om beg a gay village to beg a tourist statn for people around the world who want to e here and experience a ltle b of the gay, ” says Don Romburg, an LGBTQ historian who moved to the Castro the 1990s after llege.

GAY MOSW MOSW CY GUI

Explore gay Mosw wh Mr Hudson. The bt of Mosw for the discerng gay man. Where to sleep, eat, drk, shop and play. * castro gay rights *

“To have a place San Francis, the world, where gay people n e together as a muny and feel like they tly belong and that there's no real sense of stigma, that's what ma the Castro very special for me as a young guy my 20s, ” Romburg says. So was downright startlg when, May 2007, Fil Castro’s niece sntered down the street wh a small army of drag queens wavg gay pri before the Obama admistratn announced a dramatic shift Cuba policy on Wednday, assertg that isolatg the island had failed, a uple of Wtern ernments wh close ti to the Uned Stat saw the potential to help gay Cubans, even though meant workg wh a proment member of the Castro fay.

Havana’s first observance of the Internatnal Day Agast Homophobia and Transphobia marked the begng of a remarkable evolutn of gay rights the most populo untry the Caribbean, a regn where hostile attus toward sexual mori rema the norm.

NOT THE ONN: MOSW BANS GAY PRI FOR NEXT 100 YEARS

That said, the vast majory of viss rema trouble-ee, even for visors who equent the cy’s ls-than-secret gay bar and club bt hotels MoswThe historic exterr of the Hotel Metropol, facg the ternatnally-celebrated Bolshoi Theatre and close to many of the other ma thgs to do Mosw, is nothg pared to s sumptuo terrs.

Mosw's cy and district urts are unison that gay pri paras Mosw will be banned until at least 2112 -- 100 years om Rights First is already out wh s nmnatn:Human Rights First nmns the Tverskoy District Court lg to uphold the cisn of Mosw thori to ban gay pri paras the cy until May 2112. Rsia -- strategilly important, a key member of the UN P-5, a untry Ameri mt work wh on challeng rangg om Iran to Syria to global oil and energy issu, wh a steady and mostly sensible foreign mister -- is creasgly beg a farce among natns, s serns dissolvg wh idtic gtur like this gay ban.

FIL CASTRO PUT GAY MEN LABOR CAMPS. HIS NIECE MARIELA IS LEADG CUBA’S LGBTQ REVOLUTN.

Otherwise, the siwalks and the streets leadg off to the downtown were nearly serted; there were no spectators to watch this hor, s outlandish stum, march to the summer— was 1978—timat of the gay populatn of San Francis ranged om seventy-five thoand to a hundred and fifty thoand. If the oft-ced figure of a hundred thoand was more or ls rrect, that meant that this cy of fewer than seven hundred thoand people approximately one out of every five adults and perhaps one out of every three or four voters was gay. It was, after all, the third year the mayor had gone to a drag ball the civic program my prs k showed that there were a hundred and thirty-eight ntgents the para, and that wh a few exceptns, such as Straights for Gay Rights and the San Francis Commissn on the Stat of Women, all of them reprented gay anizatns of one sort or another.

*BEAR-MAGAZINE.COM* CASTRO GAY RIGHTS

Mariela Castro Ws Gay-Rights Advocy Award : NPR .

TOP