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It's interesting and nice to see how progressive and creative El Salvador has been. Some failures are perfectly understandable when one is willing to try new th

It's interesting and nice to see how progressive and creative El Salvador has been. Some failures are perfectly understandable when one is willing to try new things. Their approach to crime is another thing that comes to mind that was lambasted and ridiculed by the "international community" and "experts". Yet in the space of a single decade they went from murder capital of the world to safer than New Zealand (in terms of homicide rate), which is just staggering. I love that they are innovating and experimenting and trying their own things, and don't let the stuffy pompous status quo hold them back.

BryantD 2y ago
Note that their official homicide numbers no longer include bodies found in unmarked graves (as of 2021), people killed in conflicts between police and gangs (as of 2022), and people killed in prison. These are arguably reasonable decisions but unless you backfit the old numbers, you don't have the real trend. I suspect that the trend would be impressive either way, you'd just lose the "safer than New Zealand" line.
- starspangled 2y ago
  Well there's no need to suspect, homicide rates were dropping like a rock before 2021. Perhaps faster than has been achieved by any other social reform on record.
EA-3167 2y ago
This is... a strange and jarring thing to read. My kneejerk response was that yes, they are innovating and experimenting with oppressive and corrupt governance, but that is ultimately uncharitable. A more balanced response is that while you may personally think of Bitcoin as progressive (I can't imagine why) you certainly can't claim that Bukele's El Salvador is progressive. You may like the gang crackdown, you may appreciate the suspension of habeus corpus, but you can't claim that's a progressive position.
- starspangled 2y ago
  I don't think "bitcoin" is progressive, bitcoin is a technology. I think the idea of trying a decentralized electronic currency is progressive. Whether they implemented it well or should have seen the problems with using it as a currency is one thing, but in the idea of trying something new sure I think it was good. I don't think it caused grave harm to try. And I certainly can claim that their policies on crime are progressive. They are prioritizing the rights of the many law abiding people who have a fundamental human right to live unmolested and unterrorized by criminals. I think that is very progressive and quite a radical departure from the status quo. I don't think I have ever heard "human rights advocates" and UN types opine and lament the human rights of people who have to endure this type of criminal society and I think it is brave and progressive to fight for them. I absolutely understand that it has required concessions and weakening of rights in other areas, and I don't say that is a good thing, but everything is a tradeoff right? If they continued conservative status quo the tradeoff would have been other peoples rights continuing to be violated. Just because it's not "progressive" as exactly defined by an elite ruling class in the "international community" and think-tanks and academia, and the leftist intelligentsia at large, does not mean it is not progress in social reform and improvement for the greater good. To the actual people who have to live in El Salvador, approval for Bukele's reforms are staggering. I'm sure a lot of the "experts" who assured everybody they would never work are upset about it because they have a lot of egg on their face now, but fortunately the country has a bright young progressive leader who cares about the people more than the elitists say.
  - archagon 2y ago
    That’s all well and good until innocent people get caught in the net. How many thousands of young people are worth incarcerating indefinitely and without legal recourse for the benefit of society at large? Would you throw your own child into the pit if it meant that the happiness and safety of your town was ensured? In the extreme, why not just make every crime carry a death penalty? Would that society be perfect by your measure? (And that’s before we start dissecting the bribery and corruption of those who wield this power.)
    - 2y ago
threeseed 2y ago
> nice to see how progressive and creative El Salvador has been Alright so let's have a look at these progressive/creative approaches: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_El_Salvador https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_El_Salvador (a) Mass arrests of anyone who merely had a gang tattoo, (b) Jailing of children, (c) Security cameras everywhere, (d) Inhumane treatment of prisoners. Trashing human rights is always effective but hardly creative nor progressive.
- starspangled 2y ago
  Human rights of victims of these criminals were being routinely trashed and ignored before Bukele's reforms, so that's just not a trump card. His progressive reforms have significantly improved society for the greater good and has stood up for human rights that were being trampled, it is also against the conservative status quo thinking of how to deal with crime, so it very much fits the dictionary definition of progressive. Just not the elitist status quo definition of the word (ironically, they are conservative by at least some definitions).
  - pcthrowaway 2y ago
    > it is also against the conservative status quo thinking of how to deal with crime How are tough on crime policies "against the conservative status quo"?
    - starspangled 2y ago
      The people who are seen to be the experts and authorities in social theory and practice in their ivory towers in the UN and academia cling to their outdated and falsified ideas of what works and what doesn't and refuse to change or accept new things. Firstly, they are adamant that "tough on crime" policies do not work, they were adamant that Buekele's reforms would not work. Now sure there are probably ways they may fail and situations where they don't apply, it has now been proven by counter-example that they are wrong. They still refuse to accept it. They now address their little El Salvador embarrassment by claiming it has caused calamitous violations of "human rights". This is a sneaky tool they use to win a debate and end the conversation, but when you look behind the curtain, really they are the ones who defined what human rights are and what is important for society, and they make no attempt to really weigh any of the multitide of very complicated issues as a whole. They just pick some human rights and some classes of people and say they were violated and that's the end of it. They would have the poor people of El Salvador live with gangs running rampant and murder rates hundreds of times higher than the rich areas of the wealthy countries they live in, and it would be worth it if only it could prevent one accused criminal having their human rights violated. It's just absolutely ludicrous, especially when you see the outcomes of these policies and they're still raging against Bukele for them and refusing to admit they don't have all the answers. That is why they are conservative. Again, not conservative in their definitions, but conservative according to the dictionary. They hold to their views and work to maintain the status quo in terms of social and governance theories and practices. Again I don't disagree with having strong individual rights against the justice system, and "tough on crime" policies sure can be pushed where they are not effective for political gain. But it's not black and white, it is many shades and countless inter-related moving parts. Very limited powers of police and very strong rights for accused in a justice system is a wonderful thing to have. In a society stricken by violence and crime and ruled by gangs and on the brink of collapse, it is not always possible to have without violating more rights of more people. And if El Salvador continues long enough and keeps making progress reducing crime and breaking gangs and lifting people out of generational crime, they will actually eventually would likely to be in a much better position to implement stronger individual rights against the justice system. What is actually important in a society is how they choose to be governed, their right to self-determination, including what rights they decide should be important and how those should be weighed and traded off among one another. Not some fixed, rigid decrees by an elitist ruling class of mostly foreigners with their lists of rights developed decades ago by and for different countries, missing many rights, and no real framework to make adjustments or make value judgements between conflicting rights, they are just used as a hammer to shut down debate that is awkward for their conservative and outdated views.
the_af 2y ago
Regardless of whether you think of them as successful or failed, I don't think you can see El Salvador's policies as "progressive".
- influx 2y ago
  How is it "progressive" to allow public safety issues to disproportionately impact vulnerable populations?
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - aredox 2y ago
    Is Omelas "progressive"?
- next_xibalba 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - aredox 2y ago
    Bukele has emprisoned a large part of the population for the rest of their life in concentration camps. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250128-no-way-out-grim-conditions-in-el-salvador-s-mega-prison-for-gangs https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250128-no-way-out-gr... If he was killing them directly in gas chambers instead of letting them rot in prison, the population would be as safe, if not safer, forever. Would that still be "progressive" for you? Would you have supported Jonathan Swift's "Modest Proposal" too, at the time? Or sterilizing poor people? I mean, those are perfectly logical suggestions that would work, wouldn't they?
    - next_xibalba 2y ago
      These people have made the affirmative choice to join gangs that terrorize law abiding citizens. Their choke hold on El Salvador has prevented others from living safe, prosperous lives (not to mention the countless people they've killed). Removing them from society is progress. The amount of utils gained by the large majority far outweighs those lost by these criminals. And frankly, it's a false equivalence anyway bc they're, y'know, criminals. > Would you have supported Jonathan Swift's "Modest Proposal" too, at the time? Or sterilizing poor people? I mean, those are perfectly logical suggestions that would work, wouldn't they? You have erected a startling number of straw men in your response. I'll ignore them. We should do things that both work and benefit society. We should not do things that don't work. Here's a short an non-exhaustive list of "progressive" things that don't work: restorative justice, tolerating crime, allowing the destruction of the commons by the mentally ill and addicted, allowing criminals to be free and wreck society due to legal technicalities, bureaucracy, and corruption. And thus, as I wrote previously, the word "progressive" seems to have fully inverted. Things that enable or create progress are called regressive, while things that are actually regressive and destructure are called progressive.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
stevenwoo 2y ago
They just offered to accept any criminal of any nationality (including American citizens) from the USA for a fee. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/us/politics/el-salvador-prisons-marco-rubio.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/us/politics/el-salvador-p... It's creative but hard to see as progressive, importing the idea of a for profit prison system from the USA.
- starspangled 2y ago
  Yes I am certain that not everything El Salvador does is progressive, even before reading this link. Some people called Obama progressive and he definitely helped destroy Libya and Syria, ordered the extrajudicial execution of a US citizen under presidential immunity, droned poor brown people living on the other side of the planet, let Citi group pick his cabinet, etc. Nevertheless, the progressive things that Obama did do were still progressive.
  - notthemessiah 2y ago
    El Salvador is a gang-infested shithole because US interventionists backed those who would later lead gangs to stop a left-wing revolution. The Salvadoran government often targeted civilians, and massacred peaceful protestors. Then after the civil war, the same US-backed mercenaries and soldiers who had engaged in massacres and violence came back home, they employed the same terror techniques to build up the gangs and gain power for themselves, exploiting all the displaced peoples, especially the Lost Children of Central America who were kidnapped and raised in the gangs.
    - aucisson_masque 2y ago
      What's your point? That's what the usa did to the entire south and middle America.
    - starspangled 2y ago
      > El Salvador is a gang-infested shithole Far less so now, because they refused to listen to the dogma preached from these experts and institutions (significantly coming from those associated with or funded by the US), about how they should run their country.

BryantD 2y ago

Note that their official homicide numbers no longer include bodies found in unmarked graves (as of 2021), people killed in conflicts between police and gangs (as of 2022), and people killed in prison. These are arguably reasonable decisions but unless you backfit the old numbers, you don't have the real trend. I suspect that the trend would be impressive either way, you'd just lose the "safer than New Zealand" line.

starspangled 2y ago
Well there's no need to suspect, homicide rates were dropping like a rock before 2021. Perhaps faster than has been achieved by any other social reform on record.

EA-3167 2y ago

This is... a strange and jarring thing to read. My kneejerk response was that yes, they are innovating and experimenting with oppressive and corrupt governance, but that is ultimately uncharitable. A more balanced response is that while you may personally think of Bitcoin as progressive (I can't imagine why) you certainly can't claim that Bukele's El Salvador is progressive. You may like the gang crackdown, you may appreciate the suspension of habeus corpus, but you can't claim that's a progressive position.

starspangled 2y ago
I don't think "bitcoin" is progressive, bitcoin is a technology. I think the idea of trying a decentralized electronic currency is progressive. Whether they implemented it well or should have seen the problems with using it as a currency is one thing, but in the idea of trying something new sure I think it was good. I don't think it caused grave harm to try. And I certainly can claim that their policies on crime are progressive. They are prioritizing the rights of the many law abiding people who have a fundamental human right to live unmolested and unterrorized by criminals. I think that is very progressive and quite a radical departure from the status quo. I don't think I have ever heard "human rights advocates" and UN types opine and lament the human rights of people who have to endure this type of criminal society and I think it is brave and progressive to fight for them. I absolutely understand that it has required concessions and weakening of rights in other areas, and I don't say that is a good thing, but everything is a tradeoff right? If they continued conservative status quo the tradeoff would have been other peoples rights continuing to be violated. Just because it's not "progressive" as exactly defined by an elite ruling class in the "international community" and think-tanks and academia, and the leftist intelligentsia at large, does not mean it is not progress in social reform and improvement for the greater good. To the actual people who have to live in El Salvador, approval for Bukele's reforms are staggering. I'm sure a lot of the "experts" who assured everybody they would never work are upset about it because they have a lot of egg on their face now, but fortunately the country has a bright young progressive leader who cares about the people more than the elitists say.
- archagon 2y ago
  That’s all well and good until innocent people get caught in the net. How many thousands of young people are worth incarcerating indefinitely and without legal recourse for the benefit of society at large? Would you throw your own child into the pit if it meant that the happiness and safety of your town was ensured? In the extreme, why not just make every crime carry a death penalty? Would that society be perfect by your measure? (And that’s before we start dissecting the bribery and corruption of those who wield this power.)
  - 2y ago

threeseed 2y ago

> nice to see how progressive and creative El Salvador has been Alright so let's have a look at these progressive/creative approaches: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_El_Salvador https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_El_Salvador (a) Mass arrests of anyone who merely had a gang tattoo, (b) Jailing of children, (c) Security cameras everywhere, (d) Inhumane treatment of prisoners. Trashing human rights is always effective but hardly creative nor progressive.

starspangled 2y ago
Human rights of victims of these criminals were being routinely trashed and ignored before Bukele's reforms, so that's just not a trump card. His progressive reforms have significantly improved society for the greater good and has stood up for human rights that were being trampled, it is also against the conservative status quo thinking of how to deal with crime, so it very much fits the dictionary definition of progressive. Just not the elitist status quo definition of the word (ironically, they are conservative by at least some definitions).
- pcthrowaway 2y ago
  > it is also against the conservative status quo thinking of how to deal with crime How are tough on crime policies "against the conservative status quo"?
  - starspangled 2y ago
    The people who are seen to be the experts and authorities in social theory and practice in their ivory towers in the UN and academia cling to their outdated and falsified ideas of what works and what doesn't and refuse to change or accept new things. Firstly, they are adamant that "tough on crime" policies do not work, they were adamant that Buekele's reforms would not work. Now sure there are probably ways they may fail and situations where they don't apply, it has now been proven by counter-example that they are wrong. They still refuse to accept it. They now address their little El Salvador embarrassment by claiming it has caused calamitous violations of "human rights". This is a sneaky tool they use to win a debate and end the conversation, but when you look behind the curtain, really they are the ones who defined what human rights are and what is important for society, and they make no attempt to really weigh any of the multitide of very complicated issues as a whole. They just pick some human rights and some classes of people and say they were violated and that's the end of it. They would have the poor people of El Salvador live with gangs running rampant and murder rates hundreds of times higher than the rich areas of the wealthy countries they live in, and it would be worth it if only it could prevent one accused criminal having their human rights violated. It's just absolutely ludicrous, especially when you see the outcomes of these policies and they're still raging against Bukele for them and refusing to admit they don't have all the answers. That is why they are conservative. Again, not conservative in their definitions, but conservative according to the dictionary. They hold to their views and work to maintain the status quo in terms of social and governance theories and practices. Again I don't disagree with having strong individual rights against the justice system, and "tough on crime" policies sure can be pushed where they are not effective for political gain. But it's not black and white, it is many shades and countless inter-related moving parts. Very limited powers of police and very strong rights for accused in a justice system is a wonderful thing to have. In a society stricken by violence and crime and ruled by gangs and on the brink of collapse, it is not always possible to have without violating more rights of more people. And if El Salvador continues long enough and keeps making progress reducing crime and breaking gangs and lifting people out of generational crime, they will actually eventually would likely to be in a much better position to implement stronger individual rights against the justice system. What is actually important in a society is how they choose to be governed, their right to self-determination, including what rights they decide should be important and how those should be weighed and traded off among one another. Not some fixed, rigid decrees by an elitist ruling class of mostly foreigners with their lists of rights developed decades ago by and for different countries, missing many rights, and no real framework to make adjustments or make value judgements between conflicting rights, they are just used as a hammer to shut down debate that is awkward for their conservative and outdated views.

the_af 2y ago

Regardless of whether you think of them as successful or failed, I don't think you can see El Salvador's policies as "progressive".

influx 2y ago
How is it "progressive" to allow public safety issues to disproportionately impact vulnerable populations?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- aredox 2y ago
  Is Omelas "progressive"?
next_xibalba 2y ago
[flagged]
- aredox 2y ago
  Bukele has emprisoned a large part of the population for the rest of their life in concentration camps. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250128-no-way-out-grim-conditions-in-el-salvador-s-mega-prison-for-gangs https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250128-no-way-out-gr... If he was killing them directly in gas chambers instead of letting them rot in prison, the population would be as safe, if not safer, forever. Would that still be "progressive" for you? Would you have supported Jonathan Swift's "Modest Proposal" too, at the time? Or sterilizing poor people? I mean, those are perfectly logical suggestions that would work, wouldn't they?
  - next_xibalba 2y ago
    These people have made the affirmative choice to join gangs that terrorize law abiding citizens. Their choke hold on El Salvador has prevented others from living safe, prosperous lives (not to mention the countless people they've killed). Removing them from society is progress. The amount of utils gained by the large majority far outweighs those lost by these criminals. And frankly, it's a false equivalence anyway bc they're, y'know, criminals. > Would you have supported Jonathan Swift's "Modest Proposal" too, at the time? Or sterilizing poor people? I mean, those are perfectly logical suggestions that would work, wouldn't they? You have erected a startling number of straw men in your response. I'll ignore them. We should do things that both work and benefit society. We should not do things that don't work. Here's a short an non-exhaustive list of "progressive" things that don't work: restorative justice, tolerating crime, allowing the destruction of the commons by the mentally ill and addicted, allowing criminals to be free and wreck society due to legal technicalities, bureaucracy, and corruption. And thus, as I wrote previously, the word "progressive" seems to have fully inverted. Things that enable or create progress are called regressive, while things that are actually regressive and destructure are called progressive.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

stevenwoo 2y ago

They just offered to accept any criminal of any nationality (including American citizens) from the USA for a fee. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/us/politics/el-salvador-prisons-marco-rubio.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/04/us/politics/el-salvador-p... It's creative but hard to see as progressive, importing the idea of a for profit prison system from the USA.

starspangled 2y ago
Yes I am certain that not everything El Salvador does is progressive, even before reading this link. Some people called Obama progressive and he definitely helped destroy Libya and Syria, ordered the extrajudicial execution of a US citizen under presidential immunity, droned poor brown people living on the other side of the planet, let Citi group pick his cabinet, etc. Nevertheless, the progressive things that Obama did do were still progressive.
- notthemessiah 2y ago
  El Salvador is a gang-infested shithole because US interventionists backed those who would later lead gangs to stop a left-wing revolution. The Salvadoran government often targeted civilians, and massacred peaceful protestors. Then after the civil war, the same US-backed mercenaries and soldiers who had engaged in massacres and violence came back home, they employed the same terror techniques to build up the gangs and gain power for themselves, exploiting all the displaced peoples, especially the Lost Children of Central America who were kidnapped and raised in the gangs.
  - aucisson_masque 2y ago
    What's your point? That's what the usa did to the entire south and middle America.
  - starspangled 2y ago
    > El Salvador is a gang-infested shithole Far less so now, because they refused to listen to the dogma preached from these experts and institutions (significantly coming from those associated with or funded by the US), about how they should run their country.