Chile, The Revolution of The Indignados
The dignity of a people fighting against a lacerating inequality
11 January 2020 — (Wall Street International)*
The Chilean revolution | Photo from Wall Street International.
In 1960 Chile was shaken by the largest earthquake ever recorded before. Its magnitude was 9.6 degrees on the Richter logarithmic scale, which has a maximum of 10. On October 18, 2019, Chilean society exploded as it had never done, unleashing social energy accumulated by decades of injustice and abuse summed up in two words: inequality and dignity.
October 18 will be marked as the start day of changes that nobody knows how they will end yet, but of which there is full awareness that they must be structural and conclude with the approval of a new Constitution, expected for almost 40 years by a significant part of the population. This is how Chileans will end their 2019.
We are facing an unprecedented phenomenon, which will be a subject of study for a long time because the State was challenged starting by government, parliament, political parties, judges, police and a long list of institutions that have been surpassed by a gigantic mobilization of people in all cities of the country.
The demonstrations went hand in hand with serious episodes of violence that have included looting of stores and supermarkets, destruction of public and private facilities, burning of churches, 27 people killed, 357 with eye injuries of which 23 have suffered injuries or loss of vision, along with police abuses that include undressing and sexual abuse. All of this has been described by international and Chilean organizations as serious human rights violations.
In addition, dozens of police officers have been injured, including two female police officers burned by Molotov bombs in clashes with groups of hooded individuals who erected barricades, and countless attacks performed by criminal mobs at police barracks in the peripheral neighborhoods of large cities. After more than 2 months of the protests, the marches, attended by thousands of people, have not stopped.
It is true that they do not mobilize the million and a half that met in one of them during the first weeks, but they have not stopped. Not a single flag of political parties has been seen, only Chilean and Mapuche flags, but an infinite number of slogans and creative phrases that show deep discomfort for all authorities, as well as for the existing political, economic and social system.
Sociologists define with the term “anomie” the contempt for norms, social rules and institutions in a society. That is exactly what it seems to have happened in broad sectors of the Chilean population, especially in the youngest, who stopped respecting political parties, parliamentarians, armed forces, police and the Catholic Church, among many others, whose approval rates among citizenship have collapsed.
This is shown by the polls where President Sebastián Piñera appears with 13% support and 79% rejection. 85.5% say they will vote for a new Constitution, 76.9% support the social movement, while 64.9% believe that the marches should continue, and 41% say they have participated in one of them. In relation to violence, 71.8% of respondents express that violence is a reaction to frustration and discontent.
Pensions, health and education are the main demands, which does not mean that there is no long list of others, which highlights the condemnation of abuses and business collusion to set prices in a supposedly free market.
