Re: To Vita from Zapata regarding Hitler and back from Bill

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: Actually, I am going to surprise you and agree with you.  Those Americans who moved into Texas knew full well they were moving into Mexican territory, and were required to swear allegiance to the Mexican government, respect if not convert to Catholicism, and become Mexicans.  They accepted that when they went there seeking land.  That they later decided to recant and take over the land they had been given and seek US citizenship is an outright betrayal from the Mexican aspect and they were indeed in rebellion against the legal government.  Was Santa Ana a liberator....or an oppressor?  Both probably.  But the Americans were wrong.  If they didnt like the conditions, they shouldnt have accepted them, and they could always have left.  It did provide a convenient excuse to add another natural boundary to the growing United States, and eventually lead us to the West coast.  For my mind, I'd just as soon we had let Mexico keep California!!!  (sorry Jo!)

: Bill R

: : If I've got a beef with anyone its would be with the US (calm down Bill).  The US engaged in encroachment on the Mexican borderlands after the Louisiana Purchase and such...

: : The US war on Mexico (1846-1848)--unjustly started when Pres. Polk claimed that American blood had been spilled on American soil, despite the fact that the confrontation between US and Mexican forces occurred in Mexican territory which the US claimed was theirs--resulted in the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.  This treaty allowed Mexican nationals to choose to move into Mexican territory or to stay with the agreement that Mexicans choosing to become US citizens were to maintain rights to their lands, language, religion, culture, etc.  Of course, history has proven this to not have been the outcome.  

: : Nonetheless, I am not out to fight for reparations which I know that the US government has absolutely no intention of making.  Instead, I know that the cultural battle for Chicanos and Mexicans in the US continues.  That is why I do what I do as an educator and organizer in the communties in which I work.  I don't waste time arguing with politicians about what SHOULD have been done with the Treaty; even the UN wouldn't touch it when Rais Lopez Tijerina and members of the Raza Unida Party brought the treaty up as an example of the US failing to follow international law.

: : I seek to work with and in my community (Chicano community) to develop its cultural, linquistic, economic, and educational infrastructure.  Rather than seek solutions from the outside, people like myself seek to develop solutions and paradigms from the inside out.

: : I think our discussion is relevant as more of a debate of ideas rather than reality.  I think that most of us contributing to the board realize that the possibility of such reparations actually being made are not only slim but unrealistic.  The energy wasted on such efforts is better spent organizing and teaching.  Nevertheless, it is a needed discussion.  As I said in one of my first posts on this board, NOT speaking about such things is a way of condoning them.  In addition, not speaking of them is one of the major causes of historical amnesia and in turn oppression.

: : Thanks for the continued dialogue.

: : Sinceramente,

: : Zapata


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