Mexicans burn puppets of Bush and Calderón

During the Easter Holy Week in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico, a celebration is held in front of the municipal palace where puppets are burned. Families from all over the city and countryside attend. Although it was festive, very serious political themes were expressed. The video is 5 minutes 28 seconds.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Mexico
• United
• States
• immigration
• foreign
• policy

[cheencheenvideo]

Sorry this was so long! I just had to express my thoughts, and it's okay if you disagree. By the way, I checked out your YouTube page, and you play the bass very well. Keep up the practicing! Maybe you will be famous one day.

[cheencheenvideo]

The current economic policy is already creating instability for the lives of many people down in Chiapas. This is why many of them are protesting and even suggesting armed rebellion. I personally am a pacifist and oppose any form of violence, so I hope that violence is avoided on both sides and that changes can be made peacefully (through peaceful protest and education, for example).

[cheencheenvideo]

If the U.S. and Mexican governments truly want to curb this trend, they should drastically change policies so that farmers can remain in their communities and make a living. The current policies are set up so that transnational corporations can build big megaprojects over indigenous land, and then there is a ready pool of cheap labor for their sweatshops.

[cheencheenvideo]

People definitely should enter the U.S. legally. However, people in desperate situations do desperate things. They can't pay the high fees to enter the U.S., and often aren't allowed to enter at all, and would rather make an hourly wage than get paid the Mexican minimum wage (44 pesos a day, from what I understand), which is not enough to live off of.

[delorean88mph2003]

Chiapans are more related to Central Americans than the rest of Mexicans. And it is also that they intend to bring the political instability that plagues most central american countries into my great nation.

These protests can escalate into guerrillas. like they did in 1994. Mexico cannot afford a dirty reputation for having an unstable region!

[cheencheenvideo]

Hi. Thanks for sharing! I wrote a long response expressing my thoughts on the issue in the general commments space for the video, because it wouldn't have fit in the response section. You can read it and respond again if you want. Either way, keep playing your bass! You're good at it.

[cheencheenvideo]

This is why the people down there are so distrustful of the government and of the form of capitalism it practices. I think that capitalism may work down there, but the rights of people to work on their land and maintain their communities have to be respected.

[cheencheenvideo]

The communities are sent to live somewhere else where the land is not suitable for their sustenance, and the power that is produced from these dams and wind farms is mostly used to provide tourist attraction areas. Thus, the displaced people don't even receive electricity from the project that has displaced them. This has happened in Oaxaca, in the Yucatan, in Chiapas, and other places.

[cheencheenvideo]

It also goes a lot deeper. For years and years many indigenous people in Mexico have been dealing with government officials passing laws to break up their communal lands, such as PROCEDE. Without explaining to communities what the consequences are, they approve projects like wind farms and hydroelectric dams, which displace whole communities (due to flooding, for example) who are dependent on the land for farming or fishing.

[cheencheenvideo]

The rebellions in 1994 were in part a response to the passing of NAFTA. People in the south knew how this would negatively affect them. And they were frustrated with being ignored when it came to economic policy, much in the way people are frustrated with the Bush administration here in the States.

[cheencheenvideo]

If capitalism is really supposed to work, farmers should be able to fairly compete, but NAFTA does not allow it. As a result, famers can't make a living, so they sell their land and travel up north to find work.