Monday, December 16, 2024
The strangers among us
The strangers among us - American Thinker https://t.co/gbkxPRIeem
— Silvio Canto. Jr. (@silvio_canto) December 16, 2024
My friend Allan Wall brought this my attention. I'm not surprised that Mexicans don't like strangers in their cities who speak various languages. Check this out from Lauren Villagran at USA Today:
Marta Castillo is angry about immigration. There are too many migrants in her town, she said, and they don't speak the language.
“We’ve been invaded,” she said, standing outside a restaurant where she works. “I changed my opinion (about them), because I live in a place where we didn’t see any of this. But now everywhere there are people who aren’t from here.”
Castillo is Mexican. She lives in Mexico. Like a growing number of her fellow citizens, she has become increasingly negative about the migrants who have poured into her community -- despite living in a country where millions of people have ties to someone who migrated to the United States.
As President-elect Donald Trump prepares to return to the White House, he is demanding Mexico do more to crack down on the tens of thousands of migrants in Mexico who are headed for the U.S. border. He may find support in an unlikely corner -- among Mexicans themselves.
It wasn't long ago that most Mexicans could say they had family or a friend who had gone to "El Norte" to work or escape violence and insecurity. But the changing demographics of migration -- first the rise in the number of Central Americans, then Haitians, then Venezuelans, then people from all over the globe -- has hardened some Mexicans' views.
Seven in 10 Mexicans believe migrant flows into their country are "excessive," according to a survey by the nonprofit Oxfam Mexico published in 2023. More than half of respondents said they believe migration has a negative or no positive impact on the economy or culture, and 40% say migration in Mexico should be limited or prohibited.
People from all over the globe -- that's the difference.
My conversations with Mexican friends confirm that this article is correct. They sympathize with people looking for a better life but resent the chaotic caravans bringing hundreds of people. It gets more confusing when they speak a different language or come from different cultures such as Haiti.
I guess that it proves that Mexicans are no different than we are. They want order not chaos.
P.S. Check out my blog for posts, podcasts and videos.
"Gone with the wind" and American history
A few days ago, someone wrote a column suggesting that the movie Gone with the Wind should go away like the Confederate flag.
Is the movie racist because it tells the story of the Civil War from a Southern perspective?
Or because it shows scenes with the Confederate flag?
I don't think so, but calling everyone and everything racist goes on just a bit too much in our country today.
Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind was published this week in 1936. It is the story of a Southern woman caught up in the Civil War, from the days of plantations and chivalry to the bloody war and its aftermath.
I read the book and have seen the movie often. I never felt that it was racist or pretended to be.
It is the story of a family living in the South.
How can you tell the story of a plantation owner (and family) without bringing up slavery?
Gone with the Wind brought the U.S. Civil War to millions around the world who read the various translations of the book.
The story also confirms that many Southerners were very passionate about states' rights. (I should add that the Founding Fathers were also very passionate about states' rights, a fact that gets overlooked in the way that we teach U.S. history today.)
My introduction to the story was hearing about it from my grandmother, who read the Spanish version in Cuba – i.e. Lo que el viento se llevó.
She told me about the plantations and all of those things that made the South different. She also told me how Cuba also had slaves to work in the sugar plantations.
Before we go PC crazy and start deleting books and symbols, let's remember that novels often teach a lot of history.
For example. Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls introduced many English-speaking readers to the Spanish Civil War of the late 1930s. It presented the brutal nature of a civil war, where families fight each other and armies bomb their own people.
Gone with the Wind is part of the American story. Let's count to ten before we start erasing symbols and burning books.
A little early stuff from The Brothers Gibb
Bee Gees: Rare Precious & Beautiful Bee Gees/Reprise https://t.co/8gQe9rToyv via @amazon— Silvio Canto, Jr. (@SCantojr) October 20, 2016
Bee Gees: Rare Precious & Beautiful Volume 2..... https://t.co/9R4l9mzk7G via @amazon— Silvio Canto, Jr. (@SCantojr) October 20, 2016
Music from the very young Gibb brothers!
"Spicks And Specks"...Bee Gees.... https://t.co/rhSErgtaWD via @amazon— Silvio Canto, Jr. (@SCantojr) June 20, 2017