Elian Tape

* Whatever the intensity of their feelings about Fidel Castro and Cuba, the Miami “family” of Elian Gonzalez has used the child from the beginning as a meal ticket and a media magnet. Now, after refusing to cooperate with the U.S. government, they have produced a videotape where Elian is shown saying he doesn’t want to return to Cuba (April 14). This is the moral equivalent of a POW video sent by a terrorist group.

The bottom line is that the Gonzalez family has cruelly manipulated an already traumatized 6-year-old, parading him around like a grateful pet. If there was any justice, they would be charged with child abuse.

PAUL ZELEVANSKY

Beverly Hills

* Can anyone be possibly surprised that Elian would choose to remain in the U.S. after being treated like a prince for the past several months--all the attention he has been getting, gifts, etc.? And, of course, the brainwashing he has to have been getting from his relatives. The boy belongs with his dad, no doubt about it.

JOHN CONCILIO

Garden Grove

* Elian’s father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, is truly living the good life. New wardrobe for him, his wife and his baby, while Cubans in Cuba have to bring their own sheets if they are hospitalized. But this is not all; free trip to Washington, room and board, food and entertainment included, while Cubans in their homeland are denied the right to go to a restaurant or go shopping unless they have dollars. But all this has a price that he will have to pay: to bring his son Elian to Fidel’s Cuba.

GINA PEREZ

San Gabriel

* Enough is enough! For weeks we’re been hearing and reading about Elian’s problem. I suggest we stop the presses and let Elian go home with his father. He does belong with his father.

Then, I suggest that all the feverish people in Miami who have been behind this uproar shift their emotional attention to focus on the physical, emotional and scholastic needs and welfare of all the Cuban children who are legally in this country. I’m sure that many of them need more love, caring and attention than they’re getting.

BILL WALKER

Studio City

* We need not worry if America is divided over the fate of Elian. The real winners are the American people, who have a right to stand together or to have different opinions on Elian’s fate. My prayers go out to all who feel so very passionate about the fate of this beautiful young boy. How blessed he is to have so many who care.

Castro and the U.S. government should find a way to let all the family members share in the boy’s life, for that is what is good for Elian. Maybe it is Elian’s fate to change relations between the U.S. and Cuba and bring families back together, because then Castro would surely be the loser.

JEANNE MOELLER

San Bernardino

* Some see Lazaro Gonzalez as a freedom fighter. As a father, I only see a kidnapper.

ROBIN WEITZ

Los Angeles

* Everyone who is not sick, sick, sick of the Elian story will meet in a phone booth.

MELVIN BRAGMAN

Laguna Woods