Next Friday (5/28) Caravan from Chicano Park to Convergence in AZ against racism

There will be a caravan of San Diego people leaving from Chicano Park on Friday, May 28 at 5pm. If you would like to join us, please fill out the Information Form (http://bit.ly/aeN8Ak) and email it to the following address: brujita8106@yahoo.com. This form allows organizers to match up people with vehicles and to arrange for housing. If you are under 18, please fill out the Parent Permission Form (http://bit.ly/c7P6c1) and email it to the same address. If you don’t turn in the info form by May 25, you can still show up on Friday to Chicano Park but we cannot guarantee spaces in cars and you will have to figure out your own sleeping arrangements in Arizona.

The San Diego contingent will have its own security and will be marching behind the May 1st Coalition banner (the people organizing the Caravan). The Coalition is asking that everyone marching with us wear a red shirt during the march so that we will have an idea of who is with the San Diego contingent. The next May 1st Coalition meeting is this coming Tuesday at City College in Room B103 (building in front of McD’s) from 6-8 pm.

Habrá una caravana de gente de San Diego que saldrá del Parque Chicano el viernes, el 28 de Mayo a las 5pm. Si te gustaría unirte con nosotros, por favor llena la forma de información (http://bit.ly/aDyggZ) y mandala a la dirección siguiente: brujita8106@yahoo.com. Esta forma ayuda a los organizadores a asignar a l@s personas con vehículos y para asignar un lugar en donde quedarse. Si eres un menor de edad, llena la forma de permiso de padres (http://bit.ly/chxhpm) y mándala a la misma dirección. Si no entregues la forma de información antes del 25 de mayo, todavía puedes venir el viernes al Parque Chicano pero no podemos garantizar un espacio en un carro y tendrás que buscar tu propio lugar en donde quedarte en Arizona.

El contingente de San Diego tendrá su propia seguridad y marchará atrás de la manta de la Coalición del Primero de Mayo (la gente organizando la Caravana). La Coalición pide que todos l@s que marcharán con nosotros lleven una camiseta roja durante la marcha para que tengamos idea de quien esta con el contingente de San Diego. El próximo mitin de la Coalición del Primero de Mayo es este próximo martes en la City College en el salón B103 (edificio frente a McDonald’s) de 6 a las 8 pm.

Arizona May Caravan Information Form English
Forma de Informacion para la Caravana a Arizona en Español
English Parent Permission Form for Caravan
Español Forma de Permiso de los Padres

Monday, 5/10, 6:30 pm @ the Free Skool – Film screening with director and food!

The City Heights Free Skool and Subversive Action Films Present:

Screening of The Chicago Conspiracy followed by a conversation with the director

Monday, May 10, 6:30 pm

4246 Wightman Street, SD Directions/Map

cityheightsfreeskool@riseup.net

Come hungry! We will be serving the famous burritos de jamaica con frijoles de la Casa Snowdrop. Donations for travel costs gladly accepted!

The screening will be accompanied by a photo exhibition of social struggle in Chile. The Chicago Conspiracy is a documentary based in Chile that explores the legacy of the Pincohet dictatorship and the current political conflict. The Chicago Conspiracy is response to neoliberalism, militarism and authoritarianism.

Check out the trailer!

http://www.subversiveactionfilms.org/the-chicago-conspiracy/

The Chicago Conspiracy is a documentary three years in the making. The project was filmed in Chile, and the story extends into the Mapuche indigenous lands of Wallmapu. The concept for the film was born with the death of a former military dictator. We celebrated in the streets of Santiago with thousands of people after hearing the news: General Augusto Pinochet was dead. His regime murdered thousands and tortured tens of thousands after the military coup on September 11, 1973. We celebrated both his death and the implication that the political and economic system which put him in power might itself be mortal. We began this documentary with the death of a dictator, but we continue with the legacy of a dictatorship.

The Chicago Conspiracy takes its name from the approximately 25 Chilean economists who attended the University of Chicago and other prestigious universities beginning in the 1960s to study under the neoliberal economists Milton Friedman and Arnold Harberger. After embracing Friedman’s neoliberal ideas, these economists returned to assist Pinochet’s military regime in imposing free market policies. They privatized nearly every aspect of society, and Chile soon became a classic example of free market capitalism under the barrel of a gun.

The military coup was a conspiracy initiated by the upper classes in Chile and assisted by their international counterparts. The military’s action and its support from the CIA was executed on the pretext that the president at the time, Salvador Allende, a reformist and supporter of the democratic state, was actually a militant Marxist revolutionary. They claimed his government included a secret Plan Z that would establish a system similar to communist Cuba. The military has never successfully proven the existence of this plan.

The Chicago Conspiracy is a new vision of the military coup that does not focus on the story of the Allende government. Even before Allende’s election, there were armed revolutionary organizations throughout Chile, such as the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR). During the course of Allende’s rule, some factions believed that a reformist government would never bring an end to the capitalist system. This was the main group to lead an armed defense against the military once the coup was initiated. As the dictatorship took hold, the number of nationwide armed organizations grew to include MAPU-Lautaro and the communist Patriotic Front of Manuel Rodriguez (FPMR) in addition to the MIR.

The Chicago Conspiracy begins on March 29, 1985. On this day, two young brothers and militants of the MIR, Rafael and Eduardo Vergara, were gunned down by police as they walked through the politically active community Villa Francia. Recent investigations by the Chilean government have proven that the brothers were targeted by police; like so many young people before them, they were murdered by politically motivated assassins. Their community responded by creating a day of memory and protest, the Day of the Youth Combatant. Their older brother Pablo Vergara was later blown up in the southern Chilean city of Temuco in 1988.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about today. Following a national plebiscite in 1988, Pinochet ended his rule in 1990. The political classes in Chile only allowed the country to vote an end to the dictatorship out of growing fear of armed insurrection. 1990 brought a democratic government to Chile that continues to further the same neoliberal economic policies that were put into place by the dictatorship. Throughout the film, we follow the social discontent that exists to this day. We explore the legacy of a dictatorship.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about the students who fight a dictatorship-era educational law put into place on the last day of military rule. Over 700,000 students went on strike in 2006 to protest the privatized educational system. Police brutally repressed student marches and occupations.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about the Day of the Youth Combatant. March 29 is not only about the Vergara brothers–it is a day to remember all youth combatants who have died under the dictatorship and current democratic regime.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about the neighborhoods lining the outskirts of Santiago. They were originally land occupations, and later became centers of armed resistance against the military dictatorship. A number of them, such as la Victoria and Villa Francia, continue as areas of confrontational discontent to this day.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about the Mapuche conflict. The Mapuche people valiantly resisted Spanish occupation, and continue to resist the Chilean state and the multinational corporations who strip Mapuche territory for forestry plantations, mines, dams, and farming plantations. The government has utilized the dictatorship-era anti-terrorism law to jail Mapuche community members in struggle. Two young weichafes(Mapuche warriors), Alex Lemún and Matías Catrileo, were recently killed by Chilean police-one in 2002, the other in 2008.

contact@subversiveactionfilms.org