Poverty
is not a consequence but a resource. A good one to second class politicians.
There’s this sort of pushing on
mantra we’re used to hear from anything and anywhere that encourages happiness
among the poor. Chavez did it well from a TV constant broadcast and, in time,
poor became proud. I’m not against it, I’m not. I think it is accurate for the
poor not to feel miserable. We all understand misery implies unwilling; not
cheering at all, at anything, of course. There has to be some purpose, some motivation
to go and hang on, but it doesn’t mean poverty is a free ticket Disney Park
stay because it is not. We’ve been told for years that our situation is how it
is, due to the politics of some other countries, and somehow – despite there’s
always a joy because we’re free – it affects us all because our economy depends
on them.
It
might not be entirely false; we do depend, but this is neither why we’re poor
nor why we’re supposed to be proud of, and I want to talk about this pride: if
you feel proud of being poor – because the government makes you believe so –
you just stop trying to improve your situation. If you believe there’s no need
to move from where you are, because it’s ok living in a rancho, you just won’t
push yourselves hard anymore, and what’s the deal of it? It is everyone’s
problem, right? It is, it’s true, but the moment you accept it, you open
yourselves up to the speeches of the politicians, and that moment is going to
seal your perception for good. From now on you won’t question, hesitate or
complain. From now on you believe… like the inquisition did. This time not in
the name of God, but in the name of the revolution.
Pride
did not come by chance, it didn’t. This pride is the result of many years of
rejection, that’s why many people went for it, embraced it, because they were
tired of seeing how chances were set up to others and not to them. To those,
the political speeches brought hope, and hope is powerful, especially when
you’re poor. We let it happen, we let hope became pride without warning,
instead, we fooled at it, criticized it. We set the distance that politicians
took as a road, and the road led them to victory, and poor became deaf to
middle class… now middle class joined the poor without the pride, therefore
this poverty is not resourceful to the chairmen, this poverty is a pretext.
At
the end of the thinking, poverty is the goal and they’ve pretty much achieved
it.
