Two decades ago, I was attacked and demonized by the Cuban-American community of Miami because I was saying a truth that few wanted to hear at that time or were prepared to hear. But in the meantime, what has changed is the Cuban-American community itself. A new, younger and more liberal generation is on the scene. I would not even be surprised if most of these young Cuban-Americans voted for Barack Obama in the presidential elections. This generation has been socialized in American values of racial fair play, affirmative action and multiethnic politics. That is the exact opposite of the socialization that their parents -- who arrived in South Florida from Cuba, in the '60s and '70s -- had received. Their parents were socialized in a thoroughly racist, authoritarian, chauvinistic, sexist and homophobic society; and it was with the latter people that I clashed in the 1980s when I taught at FIU. But two decades later, perhaps 50-60 percent of the Cuban Americans that I am bound to meet were born in the U.S., went to school at some point with blacks and with people of various national origins, and were exposed to an extensive bath of multiculturalism. As a consequence, these neo-Cuban-Americans -- if I may so call them -- espouse liberal and moderate social views. They are more interested in leading meaningful lives in America, than residing in the myths of a past that will never return, anyhow. I feel at ease with this neo-Cuban-American generation. I believe that this new crop of Cuban-Americans can contribute much to the new Cuba that is in the making.

Carlos Moore on the racial boundries that exist in Latin America