Escrúpulos Una piedra en la conciencia del software libre, calidad y la vida misma

"Desaparecidos", vanished. That's the term applied to people abducted by the last totalitarian regime in Argentina. Today, March 24th is the anniversary of the coup d'etat that in 1976 took a gang of thugs to power, disguised as military and civilian moral values defenders, with the purpose to "reorganize the nation" . As a result of that, between 12,000 and 30,000 people were imprisoned, tortured, and, in many cases, killed. Those days were not good for people with an independent thought and a desire for freedom.

Several hundred babies were kidnapped and given away to people within the regime, of which only 100 have recovered their identities. Those babies are or would be about my age, as I'm part of that generation. As such, I can't help thinking that I could be one of them.

Working for freedom is another situation that would have put me in danger, had I been a grown up at that time. Indepedent thought is a dangerous thing for any kind of repressive regime, specially one with the intent to change the culture so dramatically as the one we endured.

Today's a holiday in our country. It's called "Day of Remembrance for the Truth and the Memory". Truth, because even after 30 years, we only know a tiny part of what really happened. There's not even consensus on the quantity of people killed or vanished, but some CIA FOIA requests place that number well above 12,000. Memory, because only the memory of those events will allow us to avoid a recurrence of such tragic happenings. Nunca mas (Never again).

As a silent online demostration, many of us have taken off the profile photos in Facebook. It's a futile, naive, and useless gesture, but nonetheless it's a way to show we remember those who lost their identity for ever.