by Jerome du Bois
When Catherine posted "Coda Illegal" below, she told me, "Watch. The first person to comment objecting to our work will be someone who's got money from this program, who has used illegals in the past, and who plans on using illegals in the future, for this project."
Well, for the record, we've only received two comments so far on the piece. I deleted the second, since it was irrelevant and stupid (as was the predictable followup: "knew ya couldn't take it." Dingaling.)
The first came from Chris Duran, proprietor of Icon Studios, just off Grand Avenue and quite near Beatrice Moore's many bailiwicks. He's been down there at one studio or another for years. This was his comment:
Being brown is not illegal. Not every brown person who works a labor intensive job is illegal. Interior mexico is not dilapidated or in need of yanque remittances.
Posted by chris at April 30, 2005 03:56 PM
Now, the first two statements are just inane and irrelevant, since we made no such claims. We speculated. Being brown is not illegal. Being a Mexican without papers in the US is illegal. Some brown people who work labor-intensive jobs are illegal.
And Catherine's speculation is not unreasonable, either. I've worked a lot of blue-collar jobs in this city in thirty years, laboring side by side with illegals.
But it's the last sentence that I find interesting. Mexico currently receives, from legals and illegals working here, $13 billion in remittances. This Google page shows some references.
So, Chris, as a Cinco de Mayo suprise, call up Vincente and tell him to cut that unnecessary $13 billion from the annual budget, and see how long Mexico lasts. From Victor Davis Hanson's excellent Mexifornia:
Forget that the country is as poor as India and as chaotic as Zimbabwe, and far closer to us than either. There is something about the Mexican government that lies at the heart of the immigration mess-- especially its passive-aggressive attitude toward the United States and its intellectually dishonest approach to the immigration problem. . . .
At the heart of the problem with Mexico are class, race, politics and economics. Simply put, Mexican elites rely on immigration northward as a means of avoiding domestic reform. Market capitalism, constitutional government, the creation of a middle-class ethic or an independent judiciary will never fully come to Mexico as long as its potential critics go north instead of marching for a redress of grievances on the suited bureaucrats in Mexico City. . . .
To restructure the economy of Mexico, democratize the political system and legalize the courts would be to empower the Indians of the rural and mountainous hinterland, and thereby keep millions of them home as a vocal force for further change, rather than push millions and their problems northward. "Safety valve" is an inadequate term to indicate how useful a mass outflow of the poorest is for the Mexican status quo. This, after all, is a society sitting on a demographic time bomb of almost 100 million with a population growth rate of 2 percent per annum --and no feasible way of providing jobs, health care, social justice or personal safety to a nation half of which will soon be under the age of twenty-five. Without the promised land to the north, there might well loom either political revolution or African-style famine and plague. (Pp.26-28.)
Sounds dilapidated to me. And what's with the "yanque" reference? And that's what's most curious about this comment: the author.
I knew Chris Duran for several years, and worked for him for several months, in a semi-skilled, "labor-intensive" capacity (throwing metal around mainly). The point is, I know he's as Yankee as apple pie, but he sure doesn't look it, and if he showed up, with his complexion, at the peep-gate of some Mexico City castle, it wouldn't matter how big his SUV, they wouldn't even talk to him. And these are the people he's defending. It baffles me.
Posted by Jerome at May 5, 2005 10:00 AM | TrackBack