chile

now that's direct action fuckin hell ahahahahahaha yes lads https://t.co/C79kJNF0p4

— niko 🐝 (@nik0_mcr) October 19, 2019

A lot of metro stations and buses were set on fire too. FIRE!

This:

https://www.reddit.com/r/chile/comments/dkl5j8/y_recuerden_amigos_el_lumpen_no_es_aliado_de_la/

So much hair-raising footage going round.wonder how long it can go on for?

Pinera is a fool.

yes, he really is.

for those not following he was seen dining in a nice resto the first night of the unrest, and then has made statements typifying the unrest (with lots of the participants being teens/youth) and the police/military response as being a war against evil.

I didn't realize he was one of chile's 11 billionaires.

or 13 or 14 or however many they have now with the minimum wage still being ~400usd a month.

After he made that comment all the neighbors were banging their pots in all the buildings around me (I live in providencia).

Chilean troops fired on civilians from APC, footage from 1 hr ago pic.twitter.com/oUF9shP9B0

— Carl Zha (@CarlZha) October 21, 2019

jesus, fucking armed troops on tanks firing at will here

I am surprised an apology and changes came this fast. https://www.cnnchile.com/pais/presidente-pinera-medidas-agenda-social_20191022/
I also see that there may is impeachment talk for Pinera.

I’m seriously relieved by Piñera’s statement. It’s just a beginning obviously, and needs to be backed up by real reforms, but man his tone up until now, combined with the specters of the junta crystallizing on the streets, was started to freak me out, having lived through ‘73 and all...

Then after checking on my family and friends there (including some who live right on Plaza Italia), and calming down a bit, I begin to wonder ... why aren’t we in the US rioting? Brutal neoliberalism for decades, violently racist structures and policy,, and a level of corruption that makes Chile look like a parent-teacher association... why are we so bloody patient[?

had started to freak me out, I meant

Probably the only chance people can really gain wins. This and the riots in Ecuador have given me joy

why aren’t we in the US rioting?

I (a non-American) tried raising this question in rolling US politics threads a couple of times and was met with hostility. There's always an exceptionalist excuse.

I would think because of guns and people being so imprisoned by their shitty health insurance (or lack of) and being so trained to be overly concerned about property destruction.

It's a shade funny though that the metro in Santiago has magnitudes better service that the NYC MTA. Like trains comes often, on time with countdowns, stations are mostly large and well taken care of...

It was pretty nice to see the media here covering older people being vocally supportive of the students and later shots of the elderly in their wheelchairs beating on their pots in solidarity.

Amusing to think that the Second Amendment may in fact be preventing US citizens from rebelling against their tyrannical government.

Your point about property destruction is interesting btw. As far as I can tell, it is indeed a far bigger deal in Anglo-Saxon countries (loosely speaking, of course).

Whenever people say violence and they only mean property destruction or setting trashcans on fire, I am like "oh fuck off."

i also think americans are overly distrustful of their neighbors but pretend they are of the government.

I have no idea how one would go about rewiring them short of a science-fiction utopia dystopia.

The first night here when everything was being set on fire we both said "chileans do not fuck around."

so this is still going strong!

for spanish speakers: i enjoyed this short (11 minute) podcast about the situation

yeah there is a huge (the largest?) demonstration going on right now. Students at one of the major universities sent out an email that they voted to be on an open ended strike and I think the truckers are protesting the highway tolls (highways are privatized).

It's unfortunate about the amount of looters but I get it. One of the hotels by plaza italia was totally fucked up the other day.

I was reading somewhere that the firefighters think it's better to be volunteer only because it makes them run better and members take it more seriously. I don't know if that is just spin or not though.

oh yeah the whole bomberos being voluntary thing and the consequences of that with all the burnings had skipped my mind :/

I had been wondering if they would have a demand to the government for salaries but then I read about their pride in being volunteers...and I just don't know. We do have an automatic monthly donation that goes to them.

46 years after US-backed forces led by Pinochet kidnapped, tortured and murdered communist singer Victor Jara, tens of thousands were singing his music yesterday in the streets of Chile: pic.twitter.com/ewr3oUUMrf

— hmmm (@yke_hmmm) October 26, 2019

“Neoliberalism was born in Chile and will die in Chile” pic.twitter.com/Gaa90j8zdH

— UptownBerber (@HishamAidi) October 28, 2019

where are all the usual ILX suspects with their usual Strong Opinions on civil unrest in the S American zone? I know, pointless fucking question.

A Chilean orchestra gave an open-air performance of "El pueblo unido, jamás será vencido!" ("The people united will never be defeated") in Santiago.

The song was written in 1973, only months before the violent coup by dictator Augusto Pinochet, who assumed power in September. pic.twitter.com/EYgn7U1XA3

— redfish (@redfishstream) October 28, 2019

some songs never age.

Piñera having a wee cabinet-shuffle today as if that's going to fuck all.

"to do fuck all" even

We might need to have a general global civil unrest thread.

Holy shit.

Tonight’s protest in Chile. pic.twitter.com/hVDyGw9POF

— Joshua Potash 🆘 (@JoshuaPotash) November 9, 2019

my spouse's colleagues and students have all been asking us gringos how we feel about the protests and if I am scared. He is like "oh she has an isreali gas mask with hydration tube."

Our street has been getting a lot of action because we live 2-3 blocks from the tallest building in SA which has a 6 floor mall in it, so it's been mostly closed for a couple of weeks and the police are defending that thing like it's full of virgins and puppies. So throngs are constantly being teargassed and chased onto our street. The whole block is full of teargas and our nice doorman (doormen here are usually just older men in cardigans) is watering our front garden and not even flinching when kids are doing reacharounds to fill their water bottles.

This is Leonardo Farkas, second place in the latest Chilean presidential poll; a businessman and philanthropist, known for his telethons raising money for handicapped children; who has said that if elected President "every Chilean would get their own house" pic.twitter.com/SP7Bz54Trh

— Populism Updates (@PopulismUpdates) July 16, 2020

lol sending the solar orbiter to image scan the blinding light from those gleaming pearlers. Without knowing anything about him my first impression is he sounds like he might be good?

aka Charlie Mullins of the Andes.

For someone who looks remarkably like Alf he's sure donated a lot millions to good causes.

100% this guy eats cats

maybe not so bad after all then!

Here's @BernieSanders, in 2003, talking about the American backed military coup that ousted Allende, and installed Pinochet, who oversaw the creation of a new, anti-democratic Constitution

Today the people of Chile voted it out 78%-21%#PlebiscitoChilepic.twitter.com/sRvu8nKhRz

— People for Bernie (@People4Bernie) October 26, 2020

Big day.

Good to see high turnout as it's been in the toilet in recent elections.

Unsure how a new constitution will be able to deal with Chile's massive issues and egregiously unequal society but we shall see

Oh actually participation dipped since I last checked. Average for elections since mandatory voting was scrapped in 2012. 50% turnout

After Chileans elected members of a constitution-writing body, Chile's stock market goes into a nosedive. Investors fear radical changes ahead.

— Frida Ghitis (@FridaGhitis) May 17, 2021

really crappy participation again. terrible elections day for the right, which is good., obv. just seems to be a lot of cynicism about the political process in general from people who supported the estallido social

https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/18/a-new-chile-political-elite-rejected-in-vote-for-constitutional-assembly?

Looks good.