Social Inequality In The Cuban Economy

“Sex. In America an obsession; in other parts of the world a fact.” (Dietrich, 1962) Sex is a basic need for humans because the urge to reproduce is very strong. As the quote states, in America, sex is this object that everyone craves and desires while in other parts of the world, it’s just a fact. Sex, is a part of everyday life and can be seen as a commodity. Sex tourism is a facet of many countries’ tourist industries. Sex tourism is defined by the World Tourism Organization as “trips organized from within the tourism sector, or from outside this sector but not using its structures and networks, with the primary purpose of effecting a commercial sexual relationship by the tourist with residents at the destination.” (1995) In other words,
And since the bottom fell out of the Cuban economy in the early nineties, the tourist industry has become the country’s main source of hard currency. “Many researchers consider the economic problems that have generated new forms of social inequality, and the subsequent damage in the ideological and moral spheres, as elements that could be conditioning the persistence of these sexual practices.” (Silva & Zaldívar, 2002) Researcher Aurelio Alonso of the Center for Psychological and Sociological Research of the Ministry of Science, Technology, and the Environment, states that “Prostitution is mentioned as one of social costs of the changes, but more serious than that is the problem of the progressive inequality of the standard of living, moreover, also a fundamental cause of the increase of prostitution. It is borne out of inequality, not out of abstract shortages, not out of abstract poverty, or abstract neglect. It is true; we have lived through this collapse without having neglect. But perhaps protection is not yet enough.” (Silva & Zaldívar,
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