It is no coincidence that in the colonizing efforts of those who detract from the freedom of peoples, culture is an invariable target.
It is no coincidence, because whoever strips a people of its culture, which is the same as stripping it of its identity, leaves it in the most extreme defenselessness, in a state of decadence and helplessness that armies, weapons and bombs cannot achieve. As long as culture lives, a people lives.
That was the reason why that man, a man as precluded as few, an exceptional visionary of the destinies of humanity, understood that saving it was imperative for the survival of sovereignty, of the freedom conquered at such a high cost.
For that reason, the Cuban revolution was not only social, but also a cultural revolution. One that removed that concept from its foundations, dignified it, and thus recovered the pride of a people for the confluence of races, traditions, creeds, knowledge and arts in the depths of its essence.
Culture became from then on, as never before, the sword and shield of the nation, as the Apostle had already predicted, as history commanded, as the patriotic and rebellious nature of the Cuban imposed.
Every battle won in its name also counts as a victory for everything we believe in, for the country we dream of, for our ever-evident defense of noble causes. Culture has become, in its own right, the banner of this Island, and one of the powerful reasons why we are admired in this world.
To defend it, to save it, has been for us an inalienable decision. Faithful to that agreed promise of heart and principles, we navigate the bloody waters of the perennial attempts of cultural colonization, of symbolic deconstruction, of incessant calls to the loss of identity, of not knowing ourselves as Cubans.
To ignore those dangers, or to pretend that they do not make any dent in us, would imply paying the highest price of ignorance, the macabre transculturation that comes hand in hand with conquest.
So, let us understand the danger, and let us be resilient and prolific in alternatives to the cultural siege. Let us let the enemy know, this day and every day, that Cuban culture and its values have been, are and will continue to be their unattainable longing, because there are many things that this people has never negotiated with, and its culture is at the top of all of them.
