SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
In Mexico, organised crime reaches everywhere, even into the smallest village - except for one small town in the state of Michoacan. Led by local women, the people of Cheran rose up to defend their forest from armed loggers - and kicked out police and politicians at the same time.
...
Early on Friday 15 April 2011, Cheran's levantamiento, or uprising, began. On the road coming down from the forest outside Margarita's home, the women blockaded the loggers' pick-ups and took some of them hostage. As the church bells of El Calvario rang out and fireworks exploded in the dawn sky alerting the community to danger, the people of Cheran came running to help. It was tense - hotheads had to be persuaded by the women not to string up the hostages from an ancient tree outside the church.
...
The municipal police arrived with the mayor, and armed men came to free their hostage-friends. There was an uneasy stand-off between the townspeople, the loggers and the police. It ended after two loggers were injured by a young man who shot a firework directly at them. And Cheran - a town of some 20,000 people - began its journey towards self-government."It makes me want to cry remembering that day," says Margarita. "It was like a horror movie - but it was the best thing we could have done."
The police and local politicians were quickly driven out of town because the people suspected they were collaborating with the criminal networks. Political parties were banned - and still are - because they were deemed to have caused divisions between people. And each of the four districts of Cheran elected representatives to a ruling town council. In many ways, Cheran - a town populated by the indigenous Purepecha people - returned to its roots: to the ancient way of doing things, independent of outsiders.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Gaaark on Monday October 24 2016, @11:57PM
Plus, seeing as how the US is electing either a scary clown (but with fun balloon animals!) or a criminal who is untouchable, the info on how to overthrow a government may be useful to Americans.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:29AM
I was thinking the same thing when I wrote it and forgot to write it. :)
True ground up political change like this always fascinates me.
Much like the socialist revolution in spain in the 30's (before it was crushed with the help of germany et al) it is an interesting way for people to participate and effect real change. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Revolution_of_1936 [wikipedia.org]
The woman stopping the shaved chimps from hanging people (and thereby insuring its immediate demise) is also an important lesson/metaphor/warning for any such movement.
The shaved chimps exist everywhere in great numbers and have the mental capacity of a chimp - much like the original poster. They will fuck things up for everyone because all they care about is advancing their standing in the chimp hierarchy as their lizard brains tell them to do.
You not only have to kick out the corrupt shaved chimps at the top of the top-down hierarchy, you have to destroy that hierarchy and replace it with something else (e.g. Bottom up decentralized democracy) while actively preventing all the other shaved apes from bullying their way in.
Not something that anyone has managed to do long term AFAIK. Still. Maybe one day...