UN Denounces Racism in Mexico

Prensa Latina
Mexico, Dec 11

The Mexican chapter of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights revealed on Tuesday that indigenous women in the states of Guerrero, Chiapas and Oaxaca suffer sexual, work, educational and health discrimination.

A statement by UN representative Louis Arbour recommended the adoption of legislative, administrative, budgetary and judicial measures to overcome this situation.

Arbour explained that racism and sexism are great work loads for indigenous women, as well as is immigration of women to farm fields in northern Mexico and the United States and the abandonment of widows and minors.

Cases of sexual abuse or physical mistreatment by teachers, as well as discrimination in indigenous school shelters, have been reported among the child population, he noted.

The UN body added that regarding health, this population segment is also hit by malnutrition, mother and child mortality and an increasing presence of HIV AIDS.

Here’s Jill Friedberg again with some insights on the teaching of indigenous children in Oaxaca:

“The demand for rezonification, one of the demands by the teachers during the strike in 2006, was not about where teachers are sent to teach. The rezonification was essentially a cost-of-living demand that would change the salary “zone” for Oaxaca, so that teachers salaries would catch up to the increasing cost of living. [Note: Teachers in Oaxaca City are also living in a city where foreigners have driven up the cost of living]

The assigning of teachers to teaching positions is very complicated in Oaxaca. The Section 22 of the teachers union has a say in who teaches where. And the section 22 has a certain amount of control over IEEPO (the state department of education). That said, not all decisions about who teaches where are decided by the Section 22.

It seems to me that it used to be that teachers were more likely to be assigned to communities where they spoke the same language as the community. But why that has changed may or may not have to do with a state attempt to reduce the ability of teachers and communities to build alliances, by sending teachers to communities where they don’t speak the language. I think it has more to do with the hardships of teaching in rural communities.
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An email from Jill Friedberg…filmmaker and frequent visitor to Oaxaca…on some of the inner workings of the 2006 teacher strike until now:

When there are plantons (encampments), marches, etc. each delegation and sector within the Seccion 22 of the teacher’s union does something that looks a lot like role call (all teachers within that delegation or sector are on a list…those present get their names checked off the list, those not present do not). Over time, the amount of time that individual teachers spend at marches, plantons, etc. adds up in what the teachers refer to as “puntos,” (points) and the more puntos you have accumulated, the better your chances of getting the teaching job in the city that you want, or of getting promoted. A lot of teachers within the Seccion 22 are very critical of this puntos system, for multiple reasons:

1) it’s not fair, because a lot of teachers (especially single mothers) have legitimate reasons for not being able to attend marches and plantons
2) it’s a “lefty” version of the corruption that existed before the seccion 22 “democratized” the union
3) if people are down with the struggle, they shouldn’t have to be coerced into participating.

On the other hand, some teachers argue that it’s not a lot different than the kind of mechanisms that some US unions use, when they go out on strike, to make sure that members aren’t scabbing. If you are assigned to a picket line, you need to be there with the rest of the union members. Going out on strike isn’t about getting the day (or week, or month) off, it’s about participating in the strike / struggle. In other words, if the Seccion 22 goes out on strike and holds a planton, it’s not fair that some teachers are sleeping in the streets, while others are relaxing at home, when the gains of that strike go to everyone. That’s the argument in favor of the puntos (point) system.
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You can read a discussion of the sad state of affairs in Oaxaca on the Yahoo Oaxaca Study Action Group discussion site:

An American expat in Oaxaca reports on the failure of the government to address the needs of indigenous peoples…a majority of the population:

“The Second National Congress on Indigenous and Intercultural Education was held in Oaxaca this week, with a colorful array of men clad in the short pants of Chiapas authorities moving among women in jeans or long skirts or crowned with beribboned braids. Lots of kids were present in the outdoor events like the sample classes held in Carmen Alto plazuela (never mind that the governor is once again renovating, the found space). I have photos which I will get around to archiving on the OSAG site.

Led by the Coalition of Indigenous Teachers and Promoters of Oaxaca (CMPIO, by its Spanish initials.) it’s been a long process of self-definition for preservation, and equal rights and justice. The front page of Noticias on Sunday /today, Oct 28) emphasizes their demand for equal rights.

Oaxaca is a state with 16 different language groups, many of them on the verge of disappearing when CMPIO stepped forward to promote bilingual education. Last July 30 I visited a workshop for teachers which focused on how grandmothers can renew their vanishing languages with their grandchildren: the in-between generation of parents were mono-lingualized by the state education system. Fernando Soberanes, present at that CMPIO event, said that the range of languages and experiences in all of Mexico is mind-boggling.
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During the teacher strike and ensuing rebellion in Oaxaca in 2006, tear gas cannisters dropped out of helicopters and found all over the city were manufactured in Jamestown, PA. And it is rumored that Mexico’s PFP (Federal Riot Control Police) are trained at the School Of The Americas. During the take-over of Oaxaca City by the PFP on November 25, 2006, nearly two thousand people, including many who were never involved in the rebellion but simply at the wrong place at the wrong time, were arrested, beaten and incarcerated without being charged. Nearly 25 people were killed in night-time raids last year…a couple in plain daylight during the marches. The women have marched against the killings, arrests and rapes. Many are still missing. The “dirty war” continues.

So when President Bush announced Monday in Washington that he will ask Congress to approve a $500 million package to help Mexico fight drug cartels, the largest international anti-drug effort by the United States in nearly a decade, human rights groups were alarmed.

The Washington Post reports that the much-anticipated Mexico aid plan, which is included in the president’s $46 billion supplemental budget request for war funding, would pay for helicopters, canine units, communications gear and inspection equipment, the State Department said.

The program also would include training and technical advice on vetting new police officers, and case-management software to track investigations in a nation where drug kingpins have infiltrated many state and local governments and infighting among drug traffickers has cost more than 4,000 lives in the past 22 months.

The aid packages are part of what the Bush administration hopes will be a multiyear, $1.4 billion initiative.

Bush administration officials have praised Calderon for deploying more than 20,000 soldiers and federal police officers to fight drug gangs, but human rights groups have complained about use of the military after a series of rapes and rights violations in which security forces were allegedly involved.

Joy Olson, director of the nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, said Monday she is concerned that the Bush administration did not say which Mexican agencies would receive aid money.

“If they are allocated to civilian control structures, the funds are more likely to have a positive effect in strengthening the rule of law and civilian institutions,” Olson said. “If funds are sent directly to the receiving countries’ military forces, the plan could undermine civilian control of the armed forces and weaken efforts to strengthen civilian public security institutions.”

Many in Mexico and elsewhere suspect the aid will also be used to put down rebellions by Mexico’s poor who are fighting for better education and against the illegal confiscation of ejido land (owned by the people) by multinationals for mining and other activities.

Expect many more human rights abuses in Mexico in the future.

I refer to the “U.S.” instead of “America” in the title because if there is one thing I have learned in the last year it is that Mexico, Central and South America is also part of the Americas.

There is an interesting article in the LA Times this morning about where Mexicans come from by Gregory Rodriguez, a columnist for the opinion pages, director of the California Fellows Program at the New America Foundation and author of the just-published “Mongrels, Bastards, Orphans and Vagabonds: Mexican Immigration and the Future of Race in America” that will be released on Tuesday October 23.

“Mexicans,” Rodriguez says, “mythologized a tale of the violent and tragic conquest of Mexico by Spain to explain their birth as a people: the story of the Spaniard Hernan Cortes and his indigenous translator and mistress, Doña Marina, a.k.a. La Malinche.

As Mexicans came north to the United States, that long history of mestizaje was also brought to bear on another cultural force, Anglo America. One scholar, Roberto Bacalski-Martinez, has described Mexican American culture in the Southwest as “incredibly ancient on the one hand, and surprisingly new on the other. Indian, Spanish, Mexican and Anglo elements have gone into its formation, and they continue to affect it. In each case, the introduction of new elements began as a clash between two peoples which eventually resulted in a newer, richer culture.”

I can hardly wait to read this book which has been said to offer an unprecedented account of the long-term cultural and political influences that Mexican Americans will have on the collective character of our nation.

Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico and former United States ambassador to the United Nations says “In the midst of a narrow, polemical debate on immigration, Gregory Rodriguez has written a generous, sweeping, prodigiously researched, and judicious history of Mexican Americans that helps us understand their long-term influence on American society. Smart, fun, and eminently readable, Mongrels, Bastards, Orphans, and Vagabonds explores five centuries of cultural collisions and convergences, and dares us to imagine a new way of thinking about the future of America.”

In my perception, on the one hand, Mexicans purport to celebrate their indigenous history…but on the other hand the racism based on color in that country is systemic. The dilemma: how to love the conqueror’s blood in themselves. And then what happens when they migrate to this country?

Timely.

My friend Max waxed recently about living in Oaxaca City.

“For the life of me, I can’t figure out why most Oaxacans aren’t deaf. I mean, take Charlie the drummer over there:

Charlie got deaf playing rock and roll, in band after band, for decades. After all those years of having huge pounding speakers near his ears, he ended up with speakers in his ears: he has to wear a hearing aid when he wants to listen; a lot of the time, he’d just as soon tune out.

Us old folk, who have been hangin’ in Oaxaca for a while, but are still sensitive to loud noise, have for the most part figured out how to avoid much of it (if you think you’ll be able to dodge all of it, you just don’t know Mexico). Some of us own a bit of acreage out in the Etlas, with a good-size house on it. Others opt for separate bungalows in compounds – with or without gate – in residential suburbs. Still others are in townhouses, apartments or bungalows in the center of one of the downtown blocks, far back from the traffic.

The less fortunate among us, either because we made bad choices or just can’t afford the Gringo luxury of peace and quiet, have to live with the noise. There are only two advantages to this: after a while, you stop noticing it so much; and you can still grumble about it to anyone who hasn’t heard your story before (or the forgetful folk who have). Usually they lodge with families, or in a family compound, or small apartments in working class neighborhoods. These are the ones most likely to hear the ‘Courtyard Music.’

Courtyard Music is a blend of two or more loud radios tuned to different stations, shrieking kids, barking roof dogs, and people yelling back and forth at each other. This is a more or less constant accompaniment. The bass line; the left hand on the piano.

The melody constantly changes. Motorcycles are revved up. People wander in from the street and stand in the courtyard hawking 5 gallon bottles of water, tortillas by the handful, tanks of propane gas, and other more exotic items. There may be a carpenter’s shop in the courtyard: sawing and nailing provide the percussion. One poor unfortunate lives next door to a recycling center where they do cans and bottles.

From time to time there will be a wedding or a birthday party, accompanied by a three piece, amplified electric band adept at the three traditional Oaxacan party music modes: Marriachi, Tex-Mex and Oompah.

A musically inclined friend who lives in a noisy, two or three hundred year old courtyard with a big extended family, a dozen kids and four neurotically barking poodles, has become resigned to this aural environment after two years there. He has this to say:

“Sometimes the courtyard music is just annoying – if you’re trying to sleep or think deep thoughts. Sometimes, it all comes together, the children’s singing and laughing blends with the vendors cries and all the rest into a kind of counterpoint that is as complex and beautiful as anything Bach or Villa Lobos could do. Sometimes…”

Of course, this is someone who is clearly a little crazy. Not that he wasn’t a little weird when he got here. Probably, it was the courtyard music that drove him around the bend.”

Marches in Oaxacas continue to call attention to the occupation of 128 schools by section 59 and the PRIistas, the continuing incarceration of political prisoners and prisoners of conscience, and to commemorate the assassination of APPO and teacher sympathizers by the local and federal police in October of 2006.

October 18: 16:00 leave Fuente de los Siete Regiones and march to zocalo
October 27: 7:00 Santa Maria Coyotepec
8:00 march leaves from office of Procuraduria Gral. de Justicia and Callicanto, Santa Lucia del Carmen and goes to zocalo
October 29: October regional marches
November 2: political cultural “jornada” and I don’t know exactly what that means
November 25: teacher-popular march