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Guy Courchesne · Joined: 10 Mar 2003 Posts: 9650 Location: Mexico City

Or should I say, the General is celebrating his first day in hell today. May it be eternal and provide for the justice not found while you were alive.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6167237.stm

Hector_Lector · Joined: 20 Apr 2004 Posts: 548

Hurrah!

sickbag · Joined: 10 Jan 2005 Posts: 155 Location: Blighty

What a shame.

This amused me from that BBC article: 'He went on to become one of South America's best-known military rulers of the 1970s and 80s.' Almost reads as if it's something to be proud of.

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 4:53 pm Post subject:

Hard to know what to say. It would be crass to celebrate an old man's death, and insensitive to his family, many of whom may have done nothing wrong.

And yet, how many deaths did he celebrate, in the years that he stomped upon the democratic will of his country...

Difficult to know what to say.

Justin

Guy Courchesne · Joined: 10 Mar 2003 Posts: 9650 Location: Mexico City

MELEE · Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 6:04 pm Post subject:

Like Justin, I'm not sure what to say, but not because of an old man dying or his family or anything like that.
There are so many thoughts running through my heart and mind.
Way too many things actually, ranging from
GOOD RIDDENCE
To What a Shame, that he didn't get what was coming to him on this earth, that is.
Why did this happen now? what to make of it? unfinished business? What's next for Chile and my Chilean friends?

I believe that we will find out if there is life after death when we die, and not before, so I don't know if he is in "hell" or not. But I do know that Chile, at least the Chile I know and I was last there in 1993 so maybe it's changed, is a country in need or reconciliation. A country that needs closure and needs to come to terms with the past, it does not need the past to be simply swept under the rug as so many people seemed to want to do.
I was a student there in 1993. The focus of my studies was how were Chileans moving on. It was the end of the transitional president's term, and I observed the first regular post-Pinchet election and I talked to many many people about their lives in the 70s and 80s. I was extrodinarily lucky to get to meet people from all political spectra, from people who bare the phsyical and emotional scares of torture and loss of loved ones, to people who think the left "made up all that stuff" about disappeared people and think Pinochet saved Chile from the Commies. I talked to very old people and students as young as 17 ( born under the dictatorship). I made a good friend, who was my age, and had just returned to Chile with his mother, they had escaped to Canada after his father disappeared in 1973 when he was 18 months old. We explored the country together, only it was his and he was meeting it for the first time. I was from a country that played an important part in why he had grown up in exile. It was an amazing educational experience that changed me forever. It was actually a little too much for 20-year-old-me and my mother would probably say myself am scared by it.
I would love to hear from people on the ground in Chile. What are you observing now, what are people saying, anything. I never imagined that 13 years would have passed without me returning to that enchanting place, but I guess I'm easily enchanted and in the end I gave my heart to Oaxaca. But I do long to return to Chile some day, if only for a short visit.

pirateinpanama · Joined: 04 Feb 2003 Posts: 93 Location: Panama City, Panama

Regards to Hitler, Stalin, Capone, and all the other human trash sent straight through the gates of hell !
Twisted Evil

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:21 pm Post subject:

And save a (very hot) seat for your old buddy, Kissinger.

Aramas · Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2006 1:00 am Post subject:

At least they'll have a fair selection of heads-of-state, CEO's, missionaries, clergy, saints and popes for company. I wonder if they'll be touting an after-afterlife-life?

I'm sure Reagan has been keeping a spot warm for him - and Maggie Smile

RyanS · Joined: 11 Oct 2005 Posts: 356

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 3:58 pm Post subject:

I think you and I share some political ideals, Ryans.

But before we are leftwing or rightwing, before we are teachers, or lawyers, or activists, of fascists, or military dictators, or anything else...

...we're human beings. Sons and daughters and mothers and fathers. The real human stuff is ALL of us, not just the ones I happen to agree with.

And I know enough about the loss of loved ones to not wish it on anyone. Not fascists, nor classists, not even the merely extremely misguided.

Make no mistake. Pinochet was a bad, bad, son of a bitch. If I'd had the chance to shoot him in �74, from a purely moral standpoint, I hope I would have had the guts. (The greatest good for the greatest number of people and all that.)

Which doesn't make me incapable of feeling sympathy for his family's loss. It's important to keep in touch with this, as it's one of the important things that makes us different than him.

Best,
Justin

RyanS · Joined: 11 Oct 2005 Posts: 356

Whatever, Im happy he�s dead. Salud. But the Chilean government today is still a continution of Pinochet�s policies and protects Genocidal people like Fujimori who sterylized 200,000 indigneious people along side countless disappearances and other crimes against working people and those in poverty.

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 6:42 pm Post subject:

Fight them, by all means.

Many many many people lost their lives under Pinochet's regime. And those truly responsible have never been brought to justice.

But does letting your heart fill with rancor and hatred help your cause, or theirs?

All the best,
Justin

RyanS · Joined: 11 Oct 2005 Posts: 356

Im no hippy I do not love my enemy

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Tue Jan 02, 2007 3:35 pm Post subject:

I am certainly no hippy. I never said I loved Pinochet. Or his family. Or you. (Though you sound kind of sweet!)

But the ability to have compassion for other human beings is important to me. Even if I disagree with them, and oppose them.

Human beings don't stop being human, just because they suck.

And in any case, though I've never said "love your enemy" on this forum, is loving your enemy a "hippy" virtue? Was the guy who is usually credited with saying this a hippy? Would he agree with the values of so called hippies today?

Please discuss.

And happy new year,

Justin