For my entire life, I have identified myself as a Chilean. Every single time that I am asked, “Where are you from?” I don’t think about it twice; I respond, “I’m Chilean.”
In the past month, my country has experienced one of the biggest social protests. The protests originated from the inequalities that exist within the country with regards to education, health, politics, and more. By no means do I intend to give a one-sided argument about what is occurring in Chile. Instead, I wanted to share a little bit about how it felt to watch my country burn in flames from the outside.
On October 18th, I received a call from my family in Chile telling me that they were safe. At that point, I was very confused about why they would feel the need to even inform me of their safety in one of the safest countries in Latin America. That same week, the Chilean president, Sebastián Piñera, raised the fare for public transportation by four cents (USD). The implications of rising fares were enormous. Most of the citizens that utilize public transit make minimum wage and the increase in fares was a significant burden.
However, the real issue began after 30 years of built corruption in the country. As the most developed Latin American country, Chile has the second largest income inequality. After the dictatorship, the Chilean citizens struggled to create a voice within politics. It didn’t help that a large percentage of the population was a part of the working class and they lived with scarce resources in comparison to the upper classes. For years, education in Chile has been privatized and access to health care is very limited. According to OECD’s Better Life index, Chile ranks quite low. Poor civic engagement and low income are a few reasons why it ranks where it does.
That same night, the Chilean president declared the country in a state of emergency and imposed a curfew for the weekend. The country has never implemented a curfew since the darkness of the dictatorship 30 years ago.
Photo by Jorge Fernández Salas on Unsplash
On October 19th, I called my parents and while we were speaking, I could hear bangs go off in the background.
“What is that sound?” I asked.
“It’s the army and the robbers’ gunshots.”
I completely froze. I couldn’t believe that the safest country, my home, had guns on the streets.
At that moment, everything became overwhelming. I began to worry about the safety of my family while I was all the way in Canada. There was nothing I could do. Over the weekend, I was going through my heightened emotions alone until I realized that the reason why nobody knew what was going on was because there had been a media blackout. The local Chilean news broadcasts were all blocked from allowing international access. The only way that people from outside of Chile could see what was going on was through YouTube.
Almost five days after the social outbreak, people began asking me what was going on in Chile. A part of me felt disappointed and upset that despite having access to numerous platforms, very few people were informed on what was going on. The other part of me continued to share more and more posts and content through my platforms in order to raise awareness of all the social uprisings that were occurring in my country.
BBC reached out to one of the Chilean Instagram accounts and asked for as much content of the actual events. That’s when the world found out about what was truly going on in Chile beyond the downgraded “protests in Chile” headlines.
I wanted to share a piece of my mind and my experience as a Chilean observing my country almost burn to the ground in a matter of days. My view comes with a lot of privileges that most Chilean people don’t even have access to. However, no matter how different our social classes are, I believe that everyone has a voice that needs to be heard. No matter where you come from, the truth always needs to be shared and we all need to stand as one.
For more information, you can visit some of these articles.: The roots of Chile’s social discontent. | Dodging Tear Gas and Debt, a Family Struggles in Santiago