“Ok guys, I just got a suggestion for a fun game. It is very simple. All of the women throw themselves to the ground and play dead, and we [men] throw ourselves on top and get lively. What do you think?!” *

Who said this at a campaign rally?

Donald J. Trump – current U.S. president who took office in January 2017. Worth an estimated $3.1 billion, Trump has suffered various lawsuits including for Trump University, an online scam. Trump recently settled one of these class action lawsuits repaying victims in New York $25 million.

Or 

Sebastian Piñera– Businessman turned politician and President elect of Chile. Previous term 2010-2014, worth an estimated $2.7 billion, currently undergoing a legal investigation against him and some of his collaborators for alleged corruption.

Don’t know enough about Chile to decide? Let’s explore:

Chile is often hailed as being the Germany of Latin America. Sensible, business-wise and with a stable economy, Chileans pride themselves for being different than their hot-blooded Latin neighbors who often make headlines for deposed leaders (see: Dilma Rousseff, Brazil) and failed dictatorial economies (see: Hugo Chavez, Venezuela). Unlike these developing nations, Chile, in most ways, is on par with the rest of the first world.

Chile has a stable currency. You can keep your devalued Pesos, Argentina and Colombia: Chile has kept a mostly stable Peso since 1999. Your corruption scandals are disgraceful, Mexico: Chile is ranked in 24th place on the Transparency International index, highest of any Latin nation other than Uruguay.

Most notably for the purposes of this clearly-biased article, Chile has an outstanding system of care for women. Much of this progress is attributable to their current President Michelle Bachelet.

That’s right. Chile also elected one of South America’s first female presidents. She served from 2006 to 2010 and a second term from March 2014 to end in March 2018. Her initial fame stems from the fact that her father was tortured and ultimately died in 1974 under custody of the country’s former dictator, Agusto Pinochet.

Bachelet went into exile because of the Pinochet dictatorship, later returning to Chile as a physician, working in a medical clinic that treated victims of torture during the dictatorship. After Pinochet was ousted from power in 1990 she became active in politics, with a unique perspective of the medical and military fields. She served in various posts, becoming the health minister in the year 2002 and becoming the first woman to lead the Chilean Defense Ministry in 2002. She stepped onto the international stage in 2010 becoming head of UN Women.

Her pragmatic policies combined with a human touch has brought to Chile one of the best systems in the world for the care of battered women in the world, providing shelters, protection from abusive partners, childcare and even training to women who need to get back on their feet and integrate again as productive members of society.

These women’s shelters will likely be de-funded once Piñera takes office, leaving battered women back on the street, vulnerable to predatorily behavior by their former partners. One more step toward third world status for Chile.

So one has to wonder, if it was at all related to the great imperialist nation to the North, the United States, that influenced Chile’s recent election of a rape-culture President to office?

While it’s laughable to think Chileans take any cues from the US, it is curious to see how many parallels there are between the two new presidents.

Cue Piñerump

Both independently wealthy, Trump and Piñera pride themselves on their social status, often boasting about how much money they have and how qualified that makes them for the job of the presidency. Trump repeatedly said on the campaign trail how rich he was, and how that suited him to office “I’m really rich…I have total net worth of $8.73bn,” he said. “I’m not doing that to brag. I’m doing that to show that’s the kind of thinking our country needs.”

Piñera is no slouch, in 2011 he landed his helicopter on a highway in Chile. Why? He claims to have run out of gas, laughing off the fact that he just called the police to come give him gasoline. In his mind, public servants are actually just his gasoline attendants. Most insider reports indicate it was a show of power. Hubris. He then continued on to his vacation home in southern Chile.

So what is it that made Chileans turn from Michelle Bachelette to Piñera? Surely it was not the time that he said:

“If a woman says ‘no’ she means ‘maybe.’”

Does that ring a bell for any Americans? Likely it does for the women who have launched cases against Donald Trump for rape or sexual assault. As of October 2017, 12 women had come forward publicly and were swiftly ignored by the US media.

There were other interesting things going on in the fall of 2017, like a tax cut for people earning over $500K per year. Apparently, none of the women accusing Trump earn over 500K, so they don’t matter in our culture. But Donald Trump does.

“I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything… Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.”

That was an easy one. Who forget the infamous Access Hollywood tape that got Billy Bush fired from NBC but somehow left Trump unscathed? He apologized for the statements and later retracted, saying the audio recording was a fake.

That one was too easy, try this:

“If a woman says yes, she’s not a lady.”

That’s right, Piñera doesn’t just make rape jokes, he slut shames. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t – no matter what you say, Piñera thinks he has the right to get into your pants. Not only that, but if you actually willingly agree, he looks down on you; you are less than a lady. You are just an object to be used for his own gratification.

Let’s be fair: he also said:

“Do you know what the difference between a politician and a lady is? When a politician says “yes,” he means “maybe,” when he says “maybe,” he means “no,” and if he says “no,” he’s not a politician. When a lady says “no,” she means “maybe,” when she says “maybe,” she means “yes,” and if she says “yes,” she’s not a lady.'”

Wow. That one took some planning. Fantastically, he puts politicians and women into diametrical opposition- because women can’t be both.

Here again, we see similarities: The cut/copy apology by Piñera/Trump for inappropriate comments, with the excuse that it was just a “joke,” just “locker room banter.”

Another similarity are the female defenders in both countries, propped up to say it’s just boy talk, just banter when Piñerump speaks of touching women sexually against the woman’s will.

Perhaps that’s the saddest of the parallels between our two nations. Chilean and US women, heads down, denying that rape is happening, to our daughters, our sisters, to us. Or we did something to deserve it. That’s it, it was probably our fault anyway.

When will the Americas (notice, that “Americans” covers from Canada to Chile) have enough of Piñerump?

 

* Watch the video in Spanish with captions here: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/2035487-revuelo-en-chile-por-una-polemica-broma-machista-de-Piñera