El Salvador crackdown breaks the gangs – at huge cost to human rights
www.theguardian.com
War on gangs by populist leader Nayib Bukele has produced extraordinary change, but ‘the cure could be as harmful as the disease’

So Mr. Bitcoin President of El Salvador has deployed a massive wave of incarcerating violent gang members to combat endemic violence in the country, but also at the cost of civil liberties and also not addressing the root causes of the gang violence in the first place.

Of course, El Salvador has been among the most violent countries in the world in terms of murder rates and violent crimes so something had to be done, but I'm not convinced that this crackdown will do anything but kick the can down the road.

Thoughts? Also, apologies for the Guardian link it was the first summary to come up when I searched it :ohnoes:

  • Shinji_Ikari [he/him]
    ·
    a year ago

    Its like taking asprin for cancer.

    Sure if you have cancer, a couple asprin for pain might help, but it's not treating it.

    Reversed, you might still need some asprin even if you're treating the cancer.

    But at the end of the day

    Just imagine if you knew friends and family that were killed by gangs, if you had a gun pressed against your head on more than one occasion, if you had sisters or friends who were raped out in the open and nobody could stop it from fear of retaliation.

    Yeah, some people should be given the wall for non-political reasons. This site will sometimes over-correct to violent justice for the Capitalists but baby gloves for everyone else. Some people are just as cruel as the Capitalist, but with a non state-approved method of building and expressing power. I wouldn't feel good with living next to basically ex-bandits if they were "rehabilitated". Same with a cop with a long rap sheet of abuses. What is the difference between a cop enforcing state violence for a pittance pay, and a gang member enforcing gang violence for a pittance pay.