Thank You Hugo Chavez

Hugo Chavez 1954-2013

Someone asked me to comment on the death of Hugo Chavez and what I thought it meant in the bigger scope of the changes that are happening in the world today. While this is not a political venue, politics and government play an important role in shaping the world as we know it and Hugo Chavez was, in many ways, a force for change in a global political system that exists solely for its self promotion and enrichment. I won’t comment on the nature of his policies because I don’t live in Venezuela and I know that what is in the news probably doesn’t fully represent the actual environment. And while I didn’t like Hugo Chavez’ politics, what he represented and the control with which he dominated the country, I have to admit that he did a great job as a teacher. Our best teachers are not always the great, wonderful, loving and kind people who make us feel good. Our most powerful teachers are those who do just the opposite and we can either rise to the empowerment challenge or cower in silence. We’re at the cusp of a new paradigm for the earth and those in power probably won’t go away quietly but here’s our challenge, we can’t learn the lesson when we are cursing the teacher. And Hugo Chavez, like many despots, dictators, and bullies, was a great teacher, who taught empowerment by being an example of disempowerment. He had his reasons for speaking the truth, possibly for self protection, but speak he did and he was a force for change that wasn’t going to be  ignored. There were things I liked about Chavez and his willingness to speak the truth was one of them.

Yes, he was brash and domineering, loud and forceful, arrogant and opinionated to the point of self-righteousness, and was known for his outrageous politically charged commentary, much of it against the US government and its Latin American policies. While he was blasted for being a prickly thorn in the soft backside of the world political stage, we had to wonder whether there was any truth to his comments. He would have not been given so much attention had he not been president of an oil-rich country with vast resources, and highly influential in Latin American politics and policy-making.

On one hand it was easy to dislike him because he was portrayed as controlling, dictatorial, and overbearing, someone who was likely to say the most uncomfortable, politically incorrect things at the most inconvenient times. He was even, at times, portrayed by the media as stupid, mentally dysfunctional and unstable. Yet on the other hand, I admired him for speaking the truth even though he was blasted as a liar. I recall the words of Joseph Goebbels when I think of the attacks against Hugo Chavez for his comments against the United States and its policies,

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

Who was lying and who was telling the truth? I believe Mr. Chavez has long told the truth and that is why his presence will be sorely missed. We need more people willing to tell the truth in the world, people in power with a presence on the world stage. While his comments always made us uncomfortable, we silently cheered him on because he really didn’t care who was offended or bothered by what he said. I think there were times when  he was ‘talking through his hat’ but other times when he knew that he was speaking to an audience that had been deafened, blinded and dumbed down for far too long by lies so outrageous that they had to be accepted as truth because the alternative was to acknowledge a truth that was too painful and difficult to accept.

Those who choose a lifetime in which they bear the mantle of power, in which they serve the public interest by exposing the real truth of the accepted truth,  or the acceptable truth, do so knowing full well that the price of that mission will include stinging criticism, ridicule, judgment, and potentially, death. They know that there will be no rest for them, that their life will never be ‘normal’ and will be lived in the shadow of the light they bear. And when their journey is over, the light will be extinguished, perhaps without gratitude, thanks, appreciation for their courage or the implementation of the changes they wanted to see and for the acknowledgement of the truth they so wanted to reveal.

We are alarmed by the deaths of people like Hugo Chavez, who we allow to be our face of courage and truth-speaking in the world, and wonder what will happen to us now. Who will be willing to step up and tell the truth? I think that we wonder, like little children, who is going to take care of us or look out for us? We no longer need that because we have to learn to take care of ourselves.

For far too long we have been willing to believe whatever we are told and as long as we have enough food to eat, our cable TV works and we have gas in our car, we think that all is well in the world. People like Chavez remind us that while we’re in our comfy living room, watching our 225 channels on TV, someone is stealing the foundation from under our house. Our teachers leave us because they know we no longer need them, an awareness that isn’t always simultaneous. Rather than mourn the loss of a light, we need to acknowledge that we are strong enough to carry on its legacy. Every student must one day become their own teacher. 

I hope that whoever takes Hugo Chavez’ place will be as courageous, eager and willing to tell the truth as he was. And if not, that there are others who will pick up where he left off. In a world of manipulated truth, the real truth sayers are denounced as liars while the liars-in-fact are heralded as having the answer to all of our problems. We’re on the cusp of another shift in the world’s geo-political makeup and I know that we need more people like Hugo Chavez, whom we can criticize for many things, but not for not speaking the truth.

copyright (c) 2013 by Jennifer Hoffman. All rights reserved. You may translate, quote, copy and link to this article as long as you include the author name and a working  link back to this website