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Friday, February 27, 1998

Remembering history of oppression

RAZA: Chicanas/os must commemorate long past of subjugation, resistance

By Elias Serna

As the state and media collaborate to manufacture consent for the war against a criminalized Iraq, results show the public's growing trust in a presidency that is "allowed" to cross national borders on missions of conquest. The president is now suddenly supported in declaring devastating wars while his domestic critics are spitefully commanded to "just let the president do his job." Public opinion is actually license to carry out imperialistic aggression globally.

Here in California, the majority of voters (most of whom are white and aging) also support deployments and propositions - no matter how wicked - that will maintain white privilege and "cultural sovereignty" over "conquered lands and people." The ethnic war here, however, targets some of the most politically powerless people: Latino children.

This February marked the 150th anniversary of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed by the Mexican government upon defeat and surrender of almost half its territory. Despite the murderous arrogance of the expanding empire, Mexican diplomats litigated fervently for the cultural and property rights of Mexicans who would be living in what is now the United States' Southwest, also known as "Occupied America" or, to use an indigenous name, Aztlan. To this day, Chicanos and other Latinos have had to fight to protect their rights and ways of life.

As a matter of fact, this month also marks the numbering of Proposition 227 (anti-bilingual education), the latest racist proposition aimed at the Raza community and young people in particular.

As some brothers from Dominguez Hills wrote not too long ago, "The white man has not yet proven that he is not our enemy." It is indeed difficult to disagree with this statement. You see, I have a lot of love for my people, but when I face hate every day as I walk the streets, pick up a newspaper or go to school, I have to fight it for my sake as well as those who walk after me.

It is an act basic to human survival. As a matter of fact, the battle for our very assets and distinctions continues and has been at the heart of this 500-year-old struggle to resist the European colonization of our minds and souls.

Reactionary Euro-Americans typically attempt to evade the fact of colonization or attempt to claim that racism is over, and we can now all be "colorblind" (notice the key word is "blind"). In the blinding whiteness of mainstream media, however, Chicanos are invisible, and stereotypes are evidence that some groups need more assimilating and policing than others.

In the recent multi-faceted attacks on the Raza community, the targets have tended to be children. The issue has revolved around culture, and the solution lies in policing (the prison complex) and assimilation (i.e. the destruction of culture). This cultural battle boils down to subjugation in the interest of a white capitalist culture.

As events in Chiapas, Mexico, and the criminalization of youth of color in California have demonstrated, killing our people is a business. Let's face it: Terror is a business. Corporate fat men profit and our communities endure the conditions necessary for the new expansion of capital. Colonization has found new grounds in the '90s.

While supporters of the misleading initiative sponsored by millionaire Ron Unz recruit followers, students, faculty and community members are increasingly looking to the position Chicana/o Studies takes in this climate of fear and aggression. Again the political battle line is drawn between who controls culture and who is affected by these decisions. The latter are increasingly young Raza and people of color.

Like bilingual education, Chicana/o studies was initiated during the high point of the Chicano movement and has since been viewed as a threat by white-run institutions (i.e. the UC Regents). UC administrators are currently accused of distorting history, downsizing Chicana/o studies and other ethnic studies programs, and pursuing a rigid "follow the leader" (or benefactor) faculty buy-off.

Two weeks ago, a turbulent meeting occurred between Chicana/o studies students and the director of the department over the firing of a popular counselor and the departure of two Chicana/o studies librarians. A student stood outside holding a few tattered sheets of paper and pointing his finger to it announced to people walking by, "Look! It's just another broken treaty! They've never signed a treaty they didn't keep!"

The document was the contract then-Chancellor Charles Young signed in June 1993 with hunger strikers after they had fasted for 14 days. After 26 years of denying Chicana/o studies' growth into department status, the Chancellor succeeded in not relinquishing the term "department." However, the "Center for Interdisciplinary Instruction" has all the markings of a department (permanent staff, faculty, hiring and firing power).

The core conflict was the survival of Chicana/o studies beyond UCLA. Los Angeles has a tendency to set precedents. Shutting down the Chicano studies library and dismantling the major at a flagship university like UCLA would have sent green lights across the Southwest to attack all those pesky ethnic studies "liabilities."

In spite of university administration's audacity to hold out for 14 days while Chicano students sacrificed their bodies, media attention and political pressure forced the Chancellor to agree to the students' demands. The large community and labor support were the keys to this victory.

The situation was an intense lesson in dealing with powerful elitist organizations that attempt to maintain racial and class privileges that have been passed down for over 500 years. The victory also brought more responsibility and a sense of ownership to the Chicano community in the shaping of its cultural destiny.

In spite of - and also because of - the anti-Latino political climate today, we must look to the historical role of our culture and the resistance and organization we as a community have put up in defense of our culture.

The time has perhaps come for Raza to change our attitude about ourselves - that there is no apologizing for who we are, no turning back on our human rights to culture and no turning back the clock. A new sun is upon us and our culture of resistance and affirmation must lead us forward.

Instead of losing a language, let us look to expand our culture. Bilingual education programs should be bolstered and improved, and perhaps it is time for all young Chicano and Raza youth - not just those who manage to attain an increasingly elitist higher education - to know their own history and receive more accurate and informed lessons about their culture. Instead of losing our language, we should offer our young people courses that speak directly to their experiences with curriculum that is directly drawn from our history.

Instead of eliminating bilingual education, maybe it's time we introduce Chicana/o studies to all people and especially to the people who need it most: Raza youth in middle schools and high schools.

Much like the assimilationist campaigns of the 80s (English Only, "the Decade of the Hispanic") the current racist political attack on Raza children is bound to produce more problems and turmoil than solutions.

The community and those who stand by the oppressed in their quest for liberation will and must do as much as they can, just as their ancestors have done over centuries past: organize, resist and fight with whatever means necessary for the lives of our youth and those who will come after us. Instead of attacking the future of California, why not let the indigenous cultures live, breathe and learn freely?

Chicano culture is unique, intense and indigenous to the long and complicated history of these lands. So the next time you display your rich culture and someone sneers that they do not speak Spanish, simply respond, "It's not my problem."

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