Jose Luis Ramirez, 28, lives in San Felipe, Yaracuy, Venezuela. Every week he tells about his life in Venezuela, in this exclusive Chile Today column. Today no. 3, about the Tyrant and the Chicken
At dawn, many people are already in front of different markets and stores, standing in long lines. Sometimes the lines are two blocks long. The aim? Try to buy food for their families. For many of them it isn’t important what they are going to buy. Plenty of them don’t even know if they will be able to buy. The reason for the long lines is the scarcity of needed products. That is why so many people even stay overnight on the streets.
In that way people don’t think of anything else but food. If you go out and take a look at the people, you may see how they seem to be on autopilot. No one seems to care about the fact that Venezuela is sinking. People’s minds are focused on staying alive. The government’s strategy is to reduce options in a certain way so that when they offer a minimum relief, the people just feel “happy.” There is a story related to socialism that comes to my mind every time I see people standing in line.
´You see how people seem to be on autopilot´
The story goes like this. There once was a socialist tyrant who had to face the public outrage due to the misery and repression they were suffering. When visited by his henchmen, the leader explained how they should dominate the people. The man put a chicken outside on a very cold morning. He started plucking the poor animal with no mercy. After that, the man threw the plucked chicken away. His companions thought the animal would run away, but surprisingly it didn’t. Because of the blister cold, the plucked chicken just got close to the tyrant, the same one who put him in his horrible condition.
The oppressor explained his partners that the same goes for the people. By cutting off the people’s possibilities to have the most basic resources, a nation becomes weak and easy to control. The name of the tyrant was Stalin and in a figurative way the chicken was Russia. Is there any similarity with Venezuela? The lines in front of the half-empty supermarkets speak for themselves… Maybe we haven’t tasted the worst, but there is one thing I am pretty sure about: we are already near the bottom!
Missed last weeks Views from Venezuela? Read it here:
Views from Venezuela – If you get sick, you won’t be able to eat
Editor-In-Chief Boris van der Spek is the founder of Chile Today.