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By Franklin D. Lopez, former United Press International and The Associated Press news-writer.
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Light vs. Darkness - New Testament
“Darkness can never move darkness…only light can”- Anonymous
The cause for the passive and silent population of the colonial territory of Puerto Rico is due to the lack of reading habits, a failed education system, or simply living in a regime promoting almost total dependency on social programs to live and survive. It is very convenient for the control of a colonial territory to have an uneducated population. The colonial history of Puerto Rico has had times of the greatest darkness that human behavior and interaction can generate. As dense as the Nazi concentration and extermination camps in World War II. There are many supporters of statehood who attribute North American citizens virtues such as infallibility, pristine beings, noble, generous, just, and sensitive to the noblest humanistic behaviors. All of the above is a direct result of their ignorance of not reading history and because their densest and darkest activities are hidden, as Mark Twain said ” People are like the moon. They have a lighted side and a dark side.” Also, in Puerto Rico, the habit of reading has not been successfully promoted, the reason for the ignorance.  Ignorance serves well the metropolis. In order to know how to combat colonialism and fight for the eradication of discrimination and segregation, one must know the truth, and the conditions of the fighting territory.
But in the great and noble struggles of the African-American citizens,  following the humanist design of Martin Luther King, to claim and demand  Equality for millions of Afro-Americans, who were segregated, exploited, abused, and discriminated against only because of the color of their skin and physical features. , despite the fact that the Afro-American People carried on their shoulders for more than two centuries, the construction and the foundations gave strength and power to the American Nation! Dr. King carefully studied carefully the power structures of the Washington political power ecosystem in order to have access to the impenetrable decision-making chambers of powers in Washington and demanded reforms and aspirations that were enacted in multiple laws like the Civil Rights reform approved under the administration of Lyndon B. Johnson, the great master of the art of politics. a King studied the dark sides of power as well as the light sides of the system and that is why he was successful in moving sectors of the population with little education and freed them from the alienating lethargy of exploitation, discrimination, and injustice. In the Boricondiano Territory, there are people who recently exposed the dark side of the rulers of the North in their deranged colonial administration! They are known as “the petit Yankees” or in ‘Boricondiano’ slang “PITIYANQUI!” See: El Piti Yankee https://franklindelanolopez.com/2015/04/15/el-piti-yanqui/ via @trueblue51
During the administration of Governor Muñoz Marin, thousands of Puerto Rican soldiers were sent to Costa Rica for “training” when in fact they were used as laboratory “animals” in the testing of military weapons such as mustard gan and others.
The maximum act of colonial darkness is the sad and painful story of the doctor Cornelius Rhoads. What is most incredible about this story. is that Dr. Cornelius Rhoads came to Puerto Rico in 1931 invited by the hematologist William B. Castle to participate in clinical research of the Anemia Commission at the San Juan Presbyterian Hospital, as part of the University and the Rockefeller Institute! Doctor Rhoads used Puerto Ricans,in the same manner,as African Americans in Tuskegee, Alabama,  The historic Tuskegee scandal where African-Americans citizens were used in syphilis research draws a parallel between colonialism in the territory and the colonialization and exploitation of  African-American in the United States. Therefore, those of us who believe in Equality as a solution to our colonial status, must stand up and demand, as reparation for all these discriminatory injustices and abuses of power, that the damage done by granting us Equality be repaired. In a letter that he allegedly wrote under the influence of alcohol, Dr. Rhoads referred to Puerto Ricans as follows: “they (Puerto Ricans are undoubtedly the dirtiest, most degenerate, lazy, and rogue race that has ever lived on the face of the earth land. They are worse and lower than the Italians. What this island need is not public health but a big wave that exterminates its entire population. Then the Island could be habitable.I have done my best to promote the process of extermination, murdering eight, and transplanting cancer cells to others! The latter has not resulted in additional fatalities. Considerations for patients have no place here, moreover, doctors enjoy torturing, abusing, and inflicting pain on these unfortunate subjects,” Collaborators at the Anemia Commission obtained the letter and made it public, exposing a major scandal. It is very revealing that the only principal public figure at the time who publicly denounced the scandalous dark matter was Pedro Albizu Campos, the leader of the Nationalist party of Puerto Rico. Albizu Campos was subsequently arrested under the administration of Governor Luis Muñoz Marín and while in prison was subjected to torture using radiation therapy on his legs.
But Muñoz Marin, the “darling” of Washington’s colonial policies, reached the extreme of servility and submission by introducing before the colonial legislature, the law known as the Gag Law at the end of the 1940s. For decades, the Puerto Rican press, an ally of colonialism, did not even have the courage to condemn an ​​act contrary to the most basic human rights. SHAME! On May 21, 1948, the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico, under the Popular Democratic Party (PPD), approved in session three bills aimed at punishing any action against the Government of the Island. It was not until June 10 of the same year which becomes Law 53, which declared “a serious crime to promote, advocate and advise or preach, voluntarily or knowingly, the need, desirability or convenience of overthrowing, destroying or paralyzing the Insular Government by means of force or violence.” It also includes as a crime the printing, publishing, editing, selling, exhibiting or organizing, or helping to organize any society, group, or assembly of people that promote the intention of overthrowing, paralyzing, or destroying the Insular Government. As a penalty, it is constituted with a maximum of 10 years in prison, a $10,000 fine, or both for committing said acts celebrated by a court of law. This law was baptized by Representative Leopoldo Figueroa as what we know today as the “Gag Law”, who considered this law as a “gross copy of the North American Smith Law and is part of the repressive and tempting legislation of freedom of expression and a violation of civil rights”: Wikipedia source. And after all of the above, the colonial press slept with the flea-ridden dogs of the colony and never protested!
Muñoz Marin, pressured by former US ambassador to Venezuela, Teodoro Moscoso, allowed thousands of Puerto Rican women to be used in experimental sterilization programs. This record should not be shelved in the archive of oblivion.
Since the baptism of the “Free Associated State” or “Commonwealth” of Puerto Rico on July 25, 1952, up to 1968, more than 1 million Puerto Ricans left the island looking for work. Many worked on farms in New Jersey, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania living in deplorable conditions. The segregationist and discriminatory policies from Washington forced the massive exodus an act considered by the International Tribunal at the Hague as “a crime against humanity.” What is more disconcerting is the passivity and silence of the majority of the population living in a bubble that could come crumbling down if Washington gets exhausted in sending billions of dollars that are wasted and used in corrupt activities. The
Congressional discrimination is so blatant that American citizens residing in the Republic of Costa Rica are entitled to receive the Supplemental Social Security (SSI) and denied to its American citizens living in the colonial territory of Puerto Rico! In a meeting in February 2010 with Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) then Chair of the Senate Health, Education and Labor Committee he volunteer this information. According to The Economist in an article published on January 8, 2011, American citizens residing in the territory paid $73.7 Billion dollars in Federal taxes from 1990 to 2009. Puerto Rico pays more Federal taxes than Alaska, Vermont, Montana, Maine, North Dakota, and Wyoming. Despite the fact that American citizens paid 100% of the Social Security taxes they are discriminated against in the application of federal social programs. Congress has extended 100% applicability of all Social Security benefits to Americans abroad and to those retired in independent republics abroad. Taxation without representation? Discrimination is against our Constitution. Congress does not have the power to be above the Constitution.
The powers that be in Washington must be reminded that more than 250,000 American citizens from the colonial territory served in the Armed forces of the United States since 1917 and thousands died in all United States involved international conflicts.  We must demand reparation for the people of Puerto Rico can expect and deserve from this dark chapter of colonialism in Puerto Rico, and that reparation is political EQUALITY and thus have the powers to be able to defend the interests and aspirations of our people! It should serve as a light to illuminate dark consciences due to the lack of historical awareness and lack of knowledge.  You fight standing up and don’t kneel! The is no liberty without equality. The struggle for equality continues and the cause endures.