This video is my response to the murder of Alex Pretti by federal agents in Minneapolis, and my thoughts on how to protect one another in the face of state terror.

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6 comments in c/50501@piefed.social view that post
[–] 2 points 9 months ago (5 children)

Can you elaborate on this liberal trap in Chile?

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  • [–] [S] 9 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (4 children)

    The linked documentary covers it in more detail, but essentially their civil disobedience and general strikes had put the Chilean government in a position where they were virtually at the mercy of the protesting civilians. When violence failed to work to stop the general strike, the government took the role of appeasing them, and promised to vote on a brand new constitution, as well as make a prominent activist the new president/prime minister (I can't remember the specific role).

    This succeeded in getting everyone to go back to work, as they thought meaningful reform would occur. Instead, the vote to implement a new radical leftist constitution was voted down after the billionaires ran an ad-campaign to discredit it, which was enough to mobilize the less educated masses to vote against their own interests, similar to how Fox news is able to manipulate US Republican voters to do the same.

    In the end, very little meaningful change happened, but by then the momentum of the resistance movement was lost in the months of political runarounds, and thus the status quo was maintained.

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  • [–] 2 points 9 months ago (3 children)

    Thank you for the synopsis. I guess I just take issue with calling billionaires liberal. Perhaps liberals voting for the axe might count

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  • [–] [S] 3 points 9 months ago* (2 children)

    Ah, I didn't mean the liberal party or billionaires of Chile when saying liberal reform, I meant that they were tricked with the promise of liberal reforms, instead of continuing a more radical revolution.

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  • [–] 2 points 9 months ago (1 child)

    I think one of the big problems with a radical reform is not knowing what the goal or outcome should be. Like working towards an unknown. I'm not sure a militant approach to acheiving full "communism" is attractive to most people. Especially if the path there involves destroying everything

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

    You may be reading into my use of the word revolution a bit. I strongly recommend watching the documentary before making an assessment of what was happening.

    During the strike there were large grassroots democratic assemblies (similar to the ones during Occupy Wallstreet) that discussed and debated what the path forward should be. There was a somewhat coherent shared vision of what the outcome should be, and demands that needed to be met. Some of it was funneled into the failed constitution.

    There was no 'burn everything down' mentality, it was instead a simple rejection of the exploitation that had effected so many lives there, and of the violence used against them by the state for peacefully striking. There were many Anarchists in the movement attempting to steer it more towards a Spanish Catalonia situation, but ultimately the assemblies decided to trust the government's word that they would listen and change, as it would give an easy end to the struggle instead of the more difficult path of keeping the strike going until the government simply caved due to them being economically at the mercy of the strikers.

    The issue was an unfortunate lack of prefiguration within Chile. In Spain in the 1930's, Anarchists carefully created extremely strong unions, and more importantly, educated the populace en masse over the course of 80 years for them to all be on the same page collectively to reject government promises, and instead enact what they had learned on how to peacefully transition to an Anarchist society, which from all accounts and evidence we have, worked extremely well before the fascists and stalinists destroyed them.

    The people of Chile, on the other hand, were still in the mindset that the government could be a benevolent force if just the right people were in charge. Hopefully they learn from that experience for the next time.

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  • 1 comment in c/progressivepolitics@lemmy.world view that post
    [–] 3 points 9 months ago

    He is very realistic about resisting and the danger of doing so. Good stuff.

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