World in View: Chile moves to the right

June 2, 2023

In a stunning reversal on May 7, voters in Chile elected a majority of far-right candidates responsible for drafting a new constitution. The first draft, written by a progressive coalition of elected representatives from below, had insisted on gender equality and Indigenous rights. It was rejected after an extensive negative campaign of misinformation and right-wing media manipulation.

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Queer Notes: January-February 2022

February 7, 2022

Queer Notes on Nobody’s Darling, a new Queer bar in Chicago; the death of Rebecca Juro, radio host and advocate for Trans rights; LGBTQ+ reaction to the election of Gabriel Boric in Chile; and LGBTQ+ discrimination in South Korea.

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Chile’s final break with Pinochet-ism?

January 26, 2022

The decisive victory of the leftist presidential candidate Boric in December’s election put one more nail in the coffin of Chilean dictator Pinochet’s fascist legacy. There is a vast difference between a Left electoral power and the powerful Left movement that has grown in the streets.

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Youth in Action: November-December 2021

November 19, 2021

Young immigration activists confront Sen. Kyrsten Sinema to demand she uphold campaign promises; protests against racially biased enforcement of the student dress code in Richardson, Texas; and the demonstration marking the two-year anniversary of the uprising led by students in Chile.

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Mapuche people fight for their land in Chile

In October, right-wing Chilean President Sebastián Piñera twice decreed a 15-day state of emergency for several provinces which directs the armed forces to provide support for policing and surveillance of the Mapuche people. We include part of the Mapuche people’s declaration.

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Women worldwide, January-February 2021

February 2, 2021

Lenn Keller, a Black Lesbian feminist activist, historian, and documentary photographer, remembered; women sue MindGeek/Pornhub and pressure credit card companies; Chile women win demand for half the seats in constitutional convention; women win reinstatement in First Nation bands in Canada.

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Latin America Notes

November 25, 2020

Chileans voted by 80% to get rid of the 1980 Constitution and begin the process of writing a new one; Bolivia’s presidential election repudiated the right wing that had taken over the government when Evo Morales was forced to flee last year; and in Colombia, thousands of Indigenous people marched hundreds of miles to Bogotá demanding a meeting with the president to protest extreme violence against their peoples.

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Editorial: Catholic Church’s sins laid bare

September 17, 2018

Editorial that takes up the evil that the Catholic Church has imposed on children and women; how movements from below, especially by women, have challenged it; and how future church crimes will be revealed, signaling the beginning of the end of the Catholic Church.

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World in View: Chile abortion rights

September 3, 2017

Chilean women won a limited but important victory Aug. 21., when the Constitutional Tribunal ruled to legalize abortion in three situations: rape, incest, and when the woman’s life is in danger.

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Women WorldWide: September-October 2016

September 11, 2016

A roundup of women’s actions including: Feminists in Chile demanded access to abortion by participating in International Day of Action for Women’s Heath events; Immigrant women in detention at Pennsylvania’s Berks County Residential Center on hunger strike protesting both the Department of Homeland Security’s lies and terrible living conditions; women prisoners in Egypt including lawyer Mahieour El-Massry join Basma Refaat in her hunger strike to demand visitations with her children; women throughout Peru march protesting violence against women and the light sentences given to perpetrators; feminist station Radio Shaista, in Kunduzu, Afghanistan, returns to the air after the Taliban burned it to the ground.

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Queer Notes: March-April 2016

March 12, 2016

The Pride Parade celebration in Mumbai, India; Transgender Girl Scout Stormi’s victorious sales of Girl Scout cookies despite those who would discriminate against her; and human rights group Observatorio de Derechos Humanos y Legislacion inspiring the Chilean Ministry of Health to grant healthcare autonomy to Intersex and Transgender children

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Kissinger’s holocausts

May 18, 2014

People from a dozen or more anti-war organizations gathered in front of the Hyatt Regency Hotel to confront former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, named keynote speaker for the Awards Banquet of the Illinois Holocaust Museum.

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Chile re-inters miners

October 1, 2013

Despite overwhelming evidence against the mine owners, a judge ruled that no one was responsible for the mine collapse in Chile that trapped 33 miners three years ago.

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Thatcher is dead, Thatcherism persists

May 7, 2013

London, England–They gathered openly, in the streets, in the hundreds. They shouted. They cheered. Flags were waved, music was played. Yet this was not just another Belfast parade in the name of Republican pride. Far from death being a solemn occasion, the demise of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the so-called “Iron Lady,” was a [=>]

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World in View: Students awaken Chile

September 19, 2011

From the September-October 2011 issue of News & Letters:

World in View: Students awaken Chile

Hundreds of thousands of students–teenagers, and college students–have taken to the streets of Santiago, the capital, and the cities of Concepción, Valparaíso and Temuco, among others, to demand a decent public education. Hundreds of schools have been taken over. Students have been [=>]

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Chilean miners’ rescue evokes many views

November 12, 2010

From the Nov.-Dec. 2010 issue of News & Letters:

Chilean miners’ rescue evokes many views

It is Oct. 13 and I am visually and sonically inundated with blow-by-blow descriptions of the Chilean miner rescue operation. TV, radio and newspapers have whipped themselves into a frenzy reporting the rescue of 33 miners from a collapsed mine in Chile. [=>]

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