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| "But I don't live in Oaxaca, I live here." |
I don't think any of us can shrug our shoulders and say, "I don't live in Louisiana, I live here" or "I don't live in Minnesota, I live here", or "I don't live in Dallas, I live here", or "I don't live in Oaxaca, I live here", or "I don't live in Honduras, I live here", or "I don't live in the Middle East, I live here" as a selfish and self centered defensive reaction to racism, injustice, murder and zealous militaristic criminality - but many of us do. Nor should any of us be the least bit surprised that any type of horrific violent reaction to continuous brutality is a rare event. If we do, if we deny the atrocious realities which surround us, wallowing in oblivious apathetic self-indulgence then we are all doomed.
I stayed up too late last night like many of you watching the Dallas events on the "corporate" media. Here then is coverage and special reporting of current events and a special report on police brutality in the U.S. with deeper coverage of demonstrations across the United States in protest against the recent killings of Alton Sterling in Louisiana and Philandro Castile in Minnesota:
Democracy Now !
Police Brutality
Current Reports, interviews and events:
Democracy Now !
Meanwhile from Democracy Now !"
Honduras: Another Activist from COPINH Killed
July 08, 2016
Headlines
Olivia Zúñiga: "This great defender of Mother Earth was initially kidnapped and we know this unofficially because there is no official version from the government. She was later found murdered with a blunt weapon and this coincides precisely with the consultation that was going to take place on Sunday organized by a human rights advocacy organization called CIPRODEH. As coordinator of an organization I was also planning to participate to say a resounding no to the construction of dams in the Department of La Paz."
Thanks Hillary.
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EDIT/UPDATE: 07/11:
If you have been watching the corporate media's coverage of this last weekend's demonstrations throughout the nation against police violence in the United States, there was no coverage (at least that I could see) of the 07/04/16 murder of Delrawn Small by an off-duty police officer. Here is that coverage with video and interview:
Democracy Now !
As Protests Sweep Country, New video Shows Off-Duty NY Cop Fatally Shooting Black Man Delrawn Small
Edit 07/12: CBS News did have a middle to the bottom of the page report on this event late 07/11, with more coverage today, the 07/12 report includes the video and has been moved up from the middle-bottom of the page more towards the top.
end edit.
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Racism in Mexico....
Of course there is racism in Mexico too and being a tabu subject you will not hear about it from the zillion dollar promoters such as San Diego Magazine (whose latest edition was promoting Popotla Fish Camp)...ever... I really need to add this from the latest edition of San Diego Magazine, a promotion for the Popotla Fish Camp . In truth, there have not been tour buses lined up at Puerto Nuevo for years and years. Problems are, PFC is simply not sanitary, period. I would be very careful parking any distance from the actual camp, even on the dirt road leading to it. Our truck was stolen when we did that. From the late '60's into the 90's we never became ill from eating there, but we know people who have. And, we never even found out about the drug and human smuggling activities at PFC until after 2007. So, look before you leap:
From San Diego Magazine:
Pretend you’re in the Mediterranean
"While the tour buses cram into Puerto Nuevo in the name of lobster, locals flock to Popotla, a small fishing village alongside Baja Studios just south of Rosarito—some 20 miles from Tijuana—for seafood so fresh it might as well be flopping around (and sometimes still is). Makeshift eateries line the few dirt roads that overlook a small beach where fishermen haul their catches out of the waves and slice them up right on the spot.Get there: Take the Tijuana-Ensenada toll road south, exit at the last Rosarito exit, and head south along the free road another five miles. Want to stay? Book a room at the recently remodeled Rosarito Beach Hotel, or rent a whole house at Las Gaviotas."
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Back to the subject.....
Here is Federico Navarrete's new book on racism in Mexico which Mexican people I know claim is too mild of an interpretation. I'm going to paste the translation of the interview from Aristegui Noticias in English for you:
'Racism in Mexico joins other forms of inequality': Federico Navarrete
The historian and scholar, says that contrary to what we believe, in our country predominates intolerance.
(Twitter / Grijalbo).
You raise a number of the problems we as a country are rooted in a deep - rooted racism.
Mexicans have believed the fable that we are not racists. However it is not even racism has intensified in recent years. The media, violence and inequality have increased.
How it relates to the current problems of violence?
The book is a reaction to the unacceptable situation of violence and violation of human rights in Mexican society. We have not valued racism in its proper dimension. In Mexico people are not assaulted or killed by their skin color, but it creates a situation of invisibility of the majority of the population. Not part of the public discussion or have space in the media. The darker aspect indigenous people and is associated with poverty, retardation, they are attributed negative traits or are seen as troublemakers. The first to demonstrate this over and over again is the government itself, but as a society have been unacceptably indifferent.
Faced deaths of indigenous people, peasants, migrants.
Yes. We have become accustomed to poverty. A significant number of Mexican migrants living in the street. Recall that three years ago in Guadalajara, a motorist discovered a blonde girl begging, was a storm on social networks and claimed that he had been kidnapped. A white person begging seems unacceptable; however, if they do millions of people with dark skin and we do not care.
What attributes that we have not overcome this kind of ballast?
We like to boast receptive and tolerant but I think that Mexican society must assume its true face. We discriminate against women, sexual minorities, who are not Catholics, who speak indigenous languages; it is discriminated right and left. We live in a brutally unequal increasingly fragmented society in which the government has not the slightest commitment to the welfare of the population nor with their physical safety. The media have an absolute racism, completely exclude their screens and advertising to 80% of Mexicans.
Could we note that this impacts on systematic racism?
Racism in Mexico joins other forms of inequality. It is difficult to know whether the exclusion of quality education or lack of public services are the result of racism. Class discrimination is mixed with the absence of democracy and human rights. The sum of all this generates a harmful cocktail. Recent sociological studies show that in Mexico, of, although not absolute almost almost systematically, people with dark skin color is poorer, have less education, worse jobs and live in most precarious situations that people with skin whiter . There have radicalized social mechanisms that society.
Here we can speak of a shared responsibility between government and society.
The Mexican government is deep and absolutely negligent in meeting their most basic obligations. No offers education, health systems, security and quality public services. As a society we must become aware of what we do. If racism is so insidious it is because begins at home, in schools and parties. Privacy extends to public life. Studies show that people automatically think that a person with white skin is richer, honest and respectable person with a dark complexion. In the speech that has been built against the National Coordinator of Education Workers racist elements abound. They are inveighs by a series of stereotypes: they are primitive states, troublemakers, lazy and ignorant, regardless of their cultural and social realities. If we want to overcome first need to recognize and then fight racism.
Why the media also have not taken the initiative to fight it ?
I've spent years asking why advertisers systematically exclude people who have the physical type of 90% of the population of Mexico. So far I have not had a clear answer. Is it simply because they are racist, pure and simple feel that tans are ugly? Some indeed believe. Or do you have studies showing that the brown people of Mexico do not want to buy the products they buy their similar? Private broadcasters are brutally racist, even though the award is public do what they want and lack any sense of social responsibility. That is, they are racist because they can and because nobody has told them not to be. In the background they think that being white, are prettier and better than the brown people.
Overall strengthened stop a racist tendency. We see it with Donald Trump, the latest events in the United States, Brexit, the revival of nationalism in Europe and aversion to migrants.
Racism has always been a global phenomenon. Migratory movements have led to its resurgence in recent decades. Mexicans we should take care not to be part of this new wave. It is true that the Mexican racism is less violent than the US. Here there has been Ku Klux Klan, nor to lynch people by their skin color; but instead, here an elite marginalize 90% of the population, in that sense we become more like South Africa, where the white population, 10% of the total population, excluded throughout the twentieth century blacks of power and of democracy."
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We were in San Diego yesterday visiting some friends in City Heights at their cook out, then over to Eastlake. From what we could see there were no demonstrations against the police violence in those areas - but I was able to put "Boycott Driscolls" signs in a few stores which are carrying Driscolls berries. The executions continue in our region, will be back with those updates.
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| Feel free to make copies and circulate in the U.S. stores which are carrying Driscoll's berries.: Walmart, Vons, etc. I just quietly slipped copies over the Driscoll's berries on display and walked away. Thanks to Lizzy in NY for making and sending us copies - Lizzy is an artist who creates and produces progressive political stickers and more. |
Bernie Sanders is supposed to actually endorse Hillary Clinton tomorrow. We'll watch what effect that will have on his millions of followers.
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