Talk:Bolivarian Revolution

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[edit] Criticisms?

In some parts of this article, like foreign or domestic politics, there are much more space talking about ideologized and unfounded right wing and neo-liberal criticisms than talking about what Bolivarian revolution consists of and propugnates itself!! What kind of joke is this?! If I look for "Bolivarian revolution" in an encyclopedic article, it's for me to get informed about, not to be repeated, but by skip, a part of the mediatic filter, and the same constant unfounded avalanch of always of lies, demonizations and dirty mediatic war, by manipulating, discontextualizing, misinforming, filtering facts, no comparing with other crap and corrupt politicans the history of the country have known, and instead talking with no foundation about "lack of democracy", as if the previous situation or situation in other countries, like US, would be an exemple of democracy and division of powers. If you want to talk about criticism from the oligarchy, right wing and neoliberal circles, headed by Washington and IMF, who are loosing their interests and huge amounts of easy private capital, please, write all of it down (what they say, not opinion of everyone) in a separate article, like "Criticisms to Bolivarian revolution", that could be merged with "Criticisms to Hugo Chávez" if you see it convenient. But this encyclopedia was conceived to inform people, not to mess them more with empty, low and misinforming biased arguments, based on hiding of an important part of the true, dogmatizing statu quo institutions and provoking an irrational fear about "an uprising dictator", with no or few serious relation with reality. All, because they're afraid of a progressive and honest politician that can really benefit a demographic majority by breaking disequalization and some amount of huge private bussiness of some rich families and lobbies. This is an encyclopedia, not a propaganda magazine. Let's be a little more serious, please. Let's go to objective facts, instead of superposing over them opinion, and specially biased ideologized opinions supported by a crowd of terrified neoliberal lobbies who seek to preserve or recover their privileges by destroying the only honest goveirns history of this subcontinent is starting to know. Hugo Chávez is pretty much an homologue to Allende; learn about him and what happened (not on biased ideologized opinions, please), and you'll understand why this is being no fair when coming to be objective. DeepQuasar 18:27, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Constitutional Violation

"Subsequently, Pedro Carmona, the head of the Venezuelan Federation of Chambers of Commerce, the nation's business federation, was proclaimed president, in clear violation of Venezuela's constitution.".

How was it a clear vioation? I think many would interpret the stepping up of Carmona as adhering to article 350, which states:

"El pueblo de Venezuela, fiel a su tradición republicana, a su lucha por la independencia, la paz y la libertad, desconocerá cualquier régimen, legislación o autoridad que contraríe los valores, principios y garantías democráticos o menoscabe los derechos humanos."

"The people of Venezuela, loyal to their republican tradition, to their fight for independence, peace, and liberty, will disavow any regime, legislation or authority that either goes against democratic values, guarantees, and principles or undermines human rights"

For instance, commanding the activation of Plan Avila , ie deploying and setting the army against a several hundred-thousands-strong demonstration of almost totally unarmed opponents, consciously forseeing and encouraging a massacre, is at least my interpretation of abusing human rights (I'm not saying that Carmona did right in enacting all those improvised decrees under his rule either, but can you put those two abuses in the same light?). What about publicly firing numerous PDVSA employees without warning on national TV? That's clearly disregarding democratic guarantees, and is normally seen as a major event that sparked the opposition demonstration.

I'm not mentioning any other of Chavez's abuses of the Constitution for now.

Piotr —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.136.22.4 (talk • contribs)

Great its your POV vs their POV. Way to go! Perhaps it didnt occur to you that a discussion as to the constitutionality or not of any actions is beyond the scope of this discussion? Hence both that comment is POV and your comment is irrelevant. Jeez! --Cerejota 03:16, 14 July 2006 (UTC)


Is not so much of a POV, the supreme court of justice once absolved the military actors involved on this episode claiming a "power vacuum" that rose to power to Mr. Carmona. It wasn't a coupe d'etate. The violation to the consitution debate can come when analyzing what happened after he was appointed president of the republic.
--Anonymous - 2006.07.18 17:31h UTC-4

[edit] Controversy not represented

I think that this article is badly stacked in favor of Chávez. There are many people who like the man and his philosophy, but he also has many detractors. In its current state, I'm not sure that the article serves the needs of readers.

Personally, I agree with Chávez's purported ideology, but also suspect that he is sometimes vain, paranoid, and/or knuckleheaded. He once cut off oil supplies to the Dominican Republic because of his bizarre belief that then-President Hipólito Mejía was involved in an assasination plot.

--Defenestrate 22:37, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

There is historical precedent for Chávez' claim. Late Dominican dictator Trujillo was well-known for his hatred of — and assassination attempt against — then-Venezuelan president Betancourt. —Sesel 06:49, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
How about moving relevant parts of the Politics section in Venezuela under a Controversy section here? It would be a good place to start and would clean up the Politics section up a bit. Spaceriqui 05:08, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Venepal

"The example of Venepal has inspired many of Chávez's supporters to call for a completely socialist planned economy. Some within Chávez's political party believe that nationalizing the economy would incur retaliation from the United States, nonetheless the Bolivarian Revolution is quickly developing into a socialist movement." - I'd like to see some sources to back this up. My understanding of the mainstream of the movement is that it is more about a old-style (50s-70s) European social democracy (i.e. control of key companies and sectors) than a "planned economy" in the Soviet sense, which is what is generally implied by that term. Rd232 20:42, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dear God! Jesus an Activist?

I wish more information on the following found on this article: "Chávez also asserted in his September 2005 speech at the Bronx's Latino Pastoral Action Center that Jesus of Nazareth was a radical activist who purportedly emphasized and sought redistributive social justice and democratic socialism"

    • The *exact* remarks are available in the Hugo Chavez article, under the "Personal life" section. There, you will see what he stated for yourself. Also, that quote is cited and footnoted, so you can check up on the source yourself. Regards, Saravask 06:40, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] archive of "(Lead-up to the Revolution)"

The following material was probably written by a newbie and is under threat of deletion, so i've put it here for archival purposes only. i didn't write it, i'm only quoting it. Clearly it sounds more like an essay than an externally referenced encyclopedia article... Boud 10:49, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

begin quote

 ===Lead-up to the Revolution===

During the sixties the world as a whole saw a general shift towards redistribution of power and wealth favouring the underprivileged sectors. During the seventies and eighties profits of large corporations fell due to better labour organizations, nationalist policies of Third World countries, increasing taxes, and better state regulation. During the first decades of the Punto Fijo regime, Venezuela enjoyed increasing equality and general improvements in the standard of living. Employment rates increased and better education allowed Venezuelans a great degree of social mobility. They increasingly viewed themselves as a society that was inclusive, racially democratic, and egalitarian. The late seventies saw a decline in these trends. The debt crisis of 1983 hit Venezuelans especially hard because they expected growth and progress, not devaluation of currency and a deterioration in living conditions. It is estimated that in the decade after the debt crisis poverty in Venezuela nearly doubled. The fluid society of the sixties and seventies no longer existed and social segregation increased. The upper and middle class came to see the lower class as an enemy. Such a decline in society led to an increasingly ineffective, corrupt, and unresponsive government. Demonstrations, such as Caracazo, showed Venezuelans' discontent with the governing bodies. This disillusionment led, in 1998, to the election of Hugo Chavez and his Movement for the Fifth Republic political party. (Venezuelan presidential election, 1998)

end quote

[edit] Serious POV, "Advertisement" and lack of citations

I have attempted to work on individual sections, and will not put a POV tag on the entire article, if editors involved in the article can begin to work on referencing some of the statements which have been included in the article. It currently reads like an advertisement for Chavez, and contains a number of POV and unreferenced statements. Sandy 12:52, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

then wouldn't the proper tag be for citations, not for POV concerns? --MateoP 17:09, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
by the way, if you think certain parts of the article read as POV, why not simple rewrite them into neutral? --MateoP 17:09, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
I didn't want to get started on re-writing as I have a lot of travel on the horizon, and need to focus when my travel is completed. I found some of the sections needed cleanup, some needed citations, and others were POV. Different sections needed different tags. If you feel I've tagged them incorrectly, please feel free to re-tag in my absence, as I will be traveling for a bit. Sorry ... life never stands still  :-) Sandy 18:08, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm the one who wrote the section on Racism and had my citations but I know I probably did it wrong (yea I'm somewhat new to this) and someone removed it. I'm not too technologically inclined and would appreciate some help doing the citations. --Mouna 2 01:44, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Challenges to the Women's Movement

This single-paragraph section is very fuzzy and does not cite references. It's connection with the rest of the article is not clear at all.JRSP 16:31, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ref converter bot

Someone ran a ref converter bot. I've been trying for hours to figure out what's wrong, can't find the problem, don't know how to fix it, but all named refs are getting listed double. I give up. Sandy 00:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

whew, it wasn't the bot, it was a problem with footnotes gone crazy, but I lost several hours messing around with it. Sandy 20:06, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Racism

I as a Venezuelan find the discussion about racism strange. Racism is definitely a disgrace, but comparatively speaking I find racism in my country is less acute than in any other country I know of or have visited. Almost everywhere else dark skinned people are worse of than white onces, be that in the USA, in Europe, in Asia, even in Africa. Foremost I might need to say: My ancestors were black, Indian and some European, my family definitely looks like the median Venezuelan. If you want to write about racism as an issue, you should do so about every single country in the world. It is true that black people tend to be poorer, but that has less to do with any meaningful racism in the last decades or so, but with the whole heritage: if you have parents with a good education, you tend to be better off. For decades now people in Venezuela could reach any job more easily regardless the colour of their skin than elsewhere. You mention Hugo Chavez is called "ape". So are blond people. Actually "mono titi", a very light-haired monkey (almost yellow), is a slang word for "blond person". The "mono" alone is to say someone is "silly" and not of any given colour, at least in Venezuela.


You are right; they discuss racism as if where US racism, but it's not

I'm backing you here. Racism?...give me a break. Of course dark-skinned people are sometimes used to portray criminals...it is not just meanness from the media, it is a statistic fact. Think about it, lets put our subjective thoughts aside: most robbers come from the lower strata of the social ladder and most of the people in the lower strata are not white. Plus, I've seen plenty of white and "mulato" people playing criminals and maids on Venezuelan shows. The "monkey" argument regarding the President Hugo Chávez is debatable, he is compared to a monkey, not because of the "animal quality" but because of the "behavioural quality". --Espazolano 23:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Chavez a Libertarian Socialist?!?

The article states that:

"Chávez has listed a number of ideological streams that he sees as having contributed significantly to Bolivarianism. Most notable of these are the ideas of Noam Chomsky and his libertarian socialist and anarcho-syndicalist sympathies. Bolivarianism's vehement opposition to corporate state globalism may also derive from Chomsky's writings."

I would really like to see a citation for this, else I'm going to have to assume this is totally false. Nationalization of Industries and a strong state are inimical to the ideas of libertarian socialism, and rather a machination of state socialism. Chavez may be influenced by Chomsky's anti-imperialist writings, but it is unlikely Chavez shares Chomsky's libertarian convictions.

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Normal chavez tarima 6 abn.jpg

Image:Normal chavez tarima 6 abn.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 17:21, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Thatcher's Speech

Margaret Thatcher's so-called Sermon on the Mound in Scotland expressly articulated these anti-liberation theology sentiments by attempting to offer theological justification for capitalism. In it, she claimed "Christianity is about spiritual redemption, not social reform".[1] Thatcher's speech, however, was widely interpreted as being politely rebuked by the Church of Scotland, being described as 'a disgraceful travesty of the gospel' by one clergyman present.[citation needed]

I removed the above sentences from the article because although I think it is VERY interesting, it seems off point. These sentences were attempting to illustrate the conflict between Chavez and evangelicals. However, Thatcher's' remarks were not a criticism of Chavez or his use of Jesus to promote socialism. On the contrary, Thatcher was criticizing a whole bunch of other people who use Jesus to promote capitalism. So, while interesting, I think this example misses the mark, and the end result is distraction and confusion regarding the actual topic at hand: the Bolivarian Revolution.

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:ChavezPeace.jpg

Image:ChavezPeace.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 20:01, 13 February 2008 (UTC)