Defiance of the Mapuche
Al Jazeera (2018)
Film Review
The Mapuche people are indigenous to the Patagonia region that straddles southern Chile and Argentina. They never recognized either Chilean or Argentinian sovereignty. During the 19th century they were driven off their ancestral lands, which at present are owned by foreign billionaires (the most prominent being Alessandro Benetton, owner of the Benetton fashion empire) and a timber company that is destroying the local ecosystem by farming and clear cutting forests that are unsuited to the Patagonian climate.
Two years ago a group of Mapuche families occupied a small section of Benetton’s land and started farming it. This led to increasing paramilitary violence by both governments, involving house- to-house raids, beatings, extrajudicial assassinations and imprisonment based on trumped up terrorism charges.
A series of peaceful protests against government violence only led to increasing government repression. This, in turn, has led to direct action sabotage in which more than 50 timber trucks have been set on fire.
The Most Revolutionary Act 
Reblogged this on nasirmuhammadconsulting@wordpress.com.
LikeLike
My heart was breaking for those people even as I watched the video and the white man in the video who referred to them as “just Indians,” I wanted to just reach through the video screen and place my hands around his damn neck and you know the rest.
And so once again, another Indigenous group is getting what ALL Indigenous groups have gotten; a heaping helping of ass kicking from those who ‘govern’ them and from corporations who steal their land and other natural resources right from underneath them and destroy their livelihood, run them off and make a huge profit off misery and suffering. Meanwhile, those people who are trying to fight back are getting unholy hell knocked out of them and it is all sanctioned by the state. When will the world’s innocent population catch a damn break??!!!
LikeLike
Yes, indeed, Shelby. The film depicts a pretty awful situation. The one silver lining I saw in the film is that Mapuche activists continue to be undeterred by government terrorism – that they’re still organizing and fighting back.
LikeLiked by 1 person