Thread

There are many foreigners who think Venezuelans are stupid, that we don’t understand that the U.S. has interests behind what it did. Of course we understand—no one does anything for free. We’re happy not because this is a perfect solution. Maybe it means trading one set of problems for another, maybe it won’t even bring real change. But I can assure you it’s better than the situation Venezuela was in. Have you wondered why there are no longer as many news reports or complaints about what’s happening in Venezuela? The military used to check people’s phones. If they saw anything against the government, you would be jailed. If someone saw that you posted something against the government, you would be jailed. Even if a neighbor saw you posting stories against the government, they could go to the police and you would be jailed. You could simply be in the wrong place at the wrong time and be imprisoned under charges of “terrorism.” Many young people are in that situation today, many of them even disappeared, with no information given to their families. In prisons, people are subjected to everything from torture to rape—young people who in reality committed no crime. There are countless political prisoners in what is considered the largest torture center in Latin America. Many people from outside try to explain to us that this isn’t a dictatorship, but when someone proclaims himself president after losing an election and then disappears, imprisons, or kills anyone who says otherwise, that is a dictatorship. I only lived under the governments of Chávez and Maduro. At first, the biggest problem was insecurity—I lost family members to crime. Later, I lost family members because of the government. By the time I left, the military scared me more than criminals. That’s what dictatorships feel like: you’re afraid, you’re trapped, and you can’t speak. We don’t care how—it’s a freer Venezuela that we want. We know there’s still a long way to go, but we also know there was no other way for Maduro to no longer be in power. We went out to protest, and many people ended up dead—people my age and even younger. Every democratic path was tried. We won the elections and proved it, and still it didn’t matter. He proclaimed himself president and killed or disappeared anyone who said otherwise. So don’t come tell us how the U.S. “screwed us over with the bombing,” because if this is something we have to go through to get rid of Maduro and his people, then we will go through it. There will surely be other problems ahead, but it will be better than how things are now.