What You Hath Wrought and With Vitriol Sought
SOMETHING MUST CHANGE. When US citizens already suffering from a terrible loss are attacked by other citizens en masse, and for nothing more than having Spanish names, it makes me feel like the past has reared up; days of Civil Rights era struggle, days of anti-Greaser hate, days of Los Vatos Locos and the dangerous fabled Pachuco. La Lucha Sigue.
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SHOULD I BOTHER LINKING to any of the posts where we talk about how the energy of stalled immigration combined with lunatics like Michael Savage combined with the hateful energy of groups like the Minutemen combined with the Democrats’ obsessions with appearing vicious in order to get love from GOP have all resulted in a toxic brew of anti-Latin@ hate in this nation with very drastic consequences? I mean why? You, being a regular reader, already know all about it and read it almost every day. Then again, maybe someone new needs to find out about all this. I don’t know.
Something needs to change, when US citizens already suffering from a terrible loss are attacked by other citizens en masse, and for what? For having Spanish names! Wow. I feel like the past has reared up, the days of Civil Rights era struggle, the days of anti-Greaser hate, the days of Los Vatos Locos and the dangerous fabled Pachuco. We are still fighting. La Lucha Sigue.
WASHINGTON – The family of a woman killed Monday is dealing with more than just grief in the aftermath of Metro’s deadliest accident in history.
The family of Ana Fernandez says they have been getting hate-filled telephone messages about whether or not Fernandez, a mother of six, was a legal immigrant.
Are there, truly, such people out there? They read a Hispanic last name, read that she had immigrated years ago from El Salvador, read all of this in an article about her death in a public transportation crash, and call her sister and six children to badger them with cable news-esque spittle about their deceased family member’s immigration status?
Today, at least, I do not struggle to contain the barely containable rage I once did to hear things like this, to watch my own nation turn on my own people, be it in the form of the law, the mob, or supposed allies. These days, I harbor more of a deepening anxiety and a quiet wariness. There is conviction and hope. Oh, and there is anger too. Pero I am being careful about how much I add to the mix, and when. Not only do we out here need to stay clear and ready, but there are enough dangerous elements bubbling all around for my liking as it is.
I am, however, prouder than ever of my heritage, my name, my family. You will not beat that out of me or terrorize that away from my community. Nor will the Democrats be able to walk back from what they are helping to bring about. Even if Democrats take to swinging sticks at errant Latinos on the street, they won’t please either the GOP or the hate groups like FAIR.
President Obama and others: you can talk all you want. Know, meanwhile, that only action will push back on this terrible trend of hate and violence unleashed in our nation. Dally at risk.
Posted in Cultura, Democratic Party, Human Rights, Immigration, Latinos, Race-Based/Hate Crime, Raza, U.S.A., White Supremacy
I just read about this over at the WWL. I figured you were already on it, y claro que si
I usually become enraged at far less.
After reading about what this family is going through, my heart is too tattered for anger. Anxiety, si. Wariness también. Pero hope? Where do you find hope? Please tell me, because right now I could use a dose of some real hope as opposed to Hope(TM). I know the anger will come eventually…I’m not looking forward to it.
The backlash against Latinos in general is starting to impact my own family. My uncle is starting to get harassed by the cops whenever he leaves his house lately. He drove my little cousins to school last week, and he was pulled over for…nothing. He had to put up with this white cop calling him “Julio” (which would have been fine except that is not his name), and saying things like “So what kind of Mexican are you, Julio?” (We talked about it and we decided he probably meant “Latino”). He asked all these questions and comments like “where are you from”, “where were you born”, and even “I bet none of those kids have the same mother, do they Julio?”
I am far from patriotic, but my uncle served in the Marines, and he now works as a prison guard. As law abiding citizens go, they don’t get much more law abiding than my uncle. Oh yeah, and then there’s his job…He used to work for the phone company, but they basically ran him off with the constant racist bullshit and giving him the shittiest assignments because “your people don’t mind doing the shit work, isn’t that right?”
Now, he has to watch his back at work b/c of the Aryan gangs AND the fucking white guards who apparently “bond” with them in their hatred of “wetbacks”. I am waiting for the phone call one day soon when my grandmother calls to tell me he was killed at work. Because it’s not like his coworkers are going to have his back if he gets attacked by one of the white gangs.
I decided to stop using my “Christian” (i.e., Anglicized) name entirely. I refuse to make myself less threatening to the nativists out of fear. The more they terrorize us, the more brazenly brown, them more brazenly “ethnic”- the more brazenly ME- I will become.
They fucked up when they decided to lump us all together as “Hispanics”; by doing so, they may have created a catalyst for solidarity among people who may have otherwise remained atomized…segmented…unconcerned for one another. I only pray that the crucible of the nativists’ fear and ignorance will force us to soften, to melt and to meld together to become precisely what they fear…
Pero for now, all I want to do is to cry.
Thank you for your words about what is happening to the Fernandez family.
And congratulations on your many accomplishments and awards. You deserve them all, and so much more.
Elián
I find hope in hearts like yours. And in my own will to live in a world kinder than the one I found.
I love this:
I said something similar in a video I made. Being “Latino” or “Hispanic” does not have to erase our own connection to the specific culture that we connect to or the land from which our families came…but it does mean that they attack us as one, and so we band together as one to be stronger than these errant splinters of hate that keep killing gente.
Stay strong, hermano. Keep the open heart. And your fury, too. You can borrow my hope when you need to.
al rato…