#ueesspeech

[cas-lenac]

Después del Concurso

Estoy feliz y en shock de haber ganado primer lugar en el concurso. La verdad es que no me lo esperaba pero sé que junto a mis profesores trabajé duró para poder presentar el mejor discurso posible. Después de esta experiencia siento que mejoré mis habilidades de hablar en público además de escribir textos impactantes que enserio le lleguen a los que los escuchan. 

[cas-lenac]

Fotos del concurso

[cas-lenac]

Brexit Speech

What were you doing on June 2016? Maybe you were at work sipping the last bit of your coffee, or having a lazy day at home. I'll tell you what I was doing. I was living my best life in the UK, Scotland, to be more specific. My family had moved there for almost 2 years before then and to anyone who met me, including many of my scottish friends, I had already turned more british than a lot of people that were actually from there. And that's because I loved everything about it. The green sceneries, the old mixed in with the new, so on, so on. As you can probably tell, I really felt like Scotland was my second home, and apart from all the stereotypical stuff I mentioned, every one always seemed to be sort of in sync with each other and I was happy to be a part of that. Except when one word is mentioned. Brexit. 

Where do we even start with Brexit? For those of you who don´t know, Brexit is a term that mashes the words British and exit and it refers to the United Kingdom´s decision to leave the European Union. Leading up to the country's referendum, the word Brexit caused chaos and on the spot debates by leavers, those who want to leave the EU and remainers, those who want to stay. It even caused divisions in my own friend group because of how strongly we felt about our separate views. And it was only made worse by the announcement of the results. Just try and picture you woke up on 24 of June 2016 to find out your country had voted to leave the EU, Scotland was strongly considering leaving the UK and, to top it all of, the prime minister had resigned. Seems like everything fell apart, doesn't it? But here's where things take a turn because now that Brexit is causing more chaos than ever, if you mention Brexit to anyone that's 30 or younger, they will probably just laugh or at least crack a smile because most young people, myself included, have come to the conclusion that its a bad idea.

But why laugh?, Well first of all, brexit causes so much frustration that it is better to just laugh it off. The UK was given a 2 year negotiation period in which they and to agree on which laws would remain after the leave. But Theresa May, the prime minister during this period, already had the UK go through not 1, not 2, but 3 rejections of  withdrawal agreements between the EU and UK. There has even been talk about a no-deal Brexit, implying that none of the relevant issues get discussed or resolved and all ties with the EU will be broken with no transition period meaning that the negative parts of brexit will most likely be blown out of proportion. Which brings me to my other point, The economy. The reason why David Cameron resigned as prime minister. You see, Europe buys over 50% of UK exports, however leaving will damage this trading system making the price of goods go up and UK products less appealing to european trading laws and barriers. And speaking of appealing to other countries, the EU accounts for nearly 20% of the world's GDP which is why it is easy to negotiate trade agreements with the rest of the world. On its own the UK would have to renegotiate trade deals but since they wouldn't be a in one of the most powerful alliances in the world, with their economy going down, and just learning to walk on their own, why would any outside nation want to deal with the UK? To put it in Cameron´s words, it would be “Economic self-harm”..

Brexit was supposed to bring them closer together but instead has caused division between those countries, and even generations. Remember that divorce can be messy and wasteful. The door is still open for change. If we look at the bigger picture, Brexit seems like a good idea if the UK wants to gain back some sovereignty. But , I have to ask myself , is  it really worth losing everything else? Thank you.

[cas-lenac]

Same sex marriage speech

Marriage, love, and family; there was once a time when most people had their own, clear definition of these 3 words, and even though every definition might have been slightly different, it seemed like everyone was on the same page.

You would be correct to notice that I have been speaking in the past tense and that's because, due to recent events involving the approval of marriage equality by the Constitutional Court in our country. It has become clear to me that we are not on the same page anymore, or maybe we were never there in the first place.

The decision about marriage equality was made official July 8th 2019. This was it, times had changed. Ecuador was moving forward. The Ecuadorian Constitutional Court declared that banning same sex marriage is unconstitutional. But not everyone felt that way due to things like Article 67 in the Constitution.

It  states that “ Marriage is the union between a man and a woman ”. This led people to believe that the court made a mistake. That this new ideology went against everything our country stood for. But doesn't our country believe in equal rights for all of its citizens? The nation's highest court ruled that Article 67 must be interpreted in the sense that most favor the full validity of rights. If the court approves it, then why shouldn't we do so as well?

Let's take a step back for a minute while I tell you a short story. In Chile 2006, a woman by the name Karen Atala lost custody of her 3 daughters after Chiles Supreme court found out she had begun to identify as lesbian. Therefore, they decided that she wasn't capable of providing a “safe” environment for the children. Being a judge herself, Atala knew how to approach the unfair situation and that's when her case, appealed to the Inter American Commission on Human Rights (ICHR). And after 2 years of debating, it was clear that Judge Atala´s case overflowed with violations of various human rights, most importantly, her right to not be discriminated against . But how does this relate to us, Ecuadorians,? Well, we are  part of the ICHR, and they found that Karen Atala´s case had a flaw. It came from Article 17, established at the Inter American conference about human rights in 1969. The article states rely on to protect Family. But it is so general that it never talks about what kind of families fall into that category. That was what Karen needed to get her children back. Her children and/or future partner could be considered a family. And, like I previously mentioned, Ecuador is also a part of all of this and by allowing same sex marriage we stick to our comprise of accepting other types of families.

We are talking about equality here. About people, human beings, a minority that just wants and deserves the same rights as everyone else. But here's the crazy part, as soon as people hear the word `minority`  they immediately get into their heads that they shouldn't sacrifice their own ideas of marriage to satisfy a small group of people. They think it's unconstitutional because it is not what was originally written down on paper. But saying that, implies that a government action violates the authority and rights defined in the Constitution. 

So, why not allow love to prosper? We should be proud of how far Ecuador has come. We should be proud to call ourselves Ecuadorians. Citizens of a country that finally recognises equal rights for everyone. Even though, we still have a long way to go; legalizing same sex marriage brings us one step closer to being a part of a brighter future.

 “Everyone is equal and will enjoy the same rights, duties and opportunities. No one will be discriminated because of reasons to do with race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation”. Article 11 of The Constitution of Ecuador