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The New Zapatistas
http://www.sdreader.com/php/cityshow.php3?id=C081403B
By Carla Remondini
Seventy miles south of the frenetic border town of Tijuana, Ensenada may seem an unlikely place in which to find supporters of Zapatismo. Along
Avenida L?pez Mateos, dozens of stores selling traditional arts and crafts, restaurants, caf?s, and bars make this place look like a peaceful haven
and a carefree hangout. Tourists who drive through the border between the United States and Mexico and those who arrive on cruise ships anchored in
the Bah?a de Todos Santos stroll self-contented and unaware of a political phenomenon that has recently shaken the Mexican state and the world.
"Here federal agents in plainclothes want to know what is sold in the stores and what is done to divulge Zapatismo," says a man with a small business
who does not want to be identified. "Unless you are a public figure, if you say that you are Zapatista, authorities harass you."
Zapatismo became international news January 1, 1994, when an armed group called the Zapatista National Liberation Army occupied eight towns in
Chiapas, one of the southernmost states at the border with Guatemala, and declared war on the Mexican army. Crying, "Enough is enough," the rebels
brought to the media's attention the plight of the Mayan indigenous population of the state, impoverished by the lack of education, the unfair
distribution of the land, and the threat to the existence of their culture.
Since that day, the movement has won supporters in other parts of Mexico, including the state of Baja California, where the level of poverty and the
number of the indigenous population (indios, or ind?genas) is much lower than in Chiapas. While in Chiapas the ind?genas number 1,376,000 and amount
to 35 percent of the total population, in Baja California they are as few as 40,000 and less than 2 percent of the state population.
Before the Zapatista movement launched its challenge to Mexican authorities, "I did not care about politics," says Bruno Geffroy Aguilar, a member of
Ensenada's Zapatista National Liberation Front. "I was totally discouraged about a country that seemed to go nowhere. When I realized that there was
no manipulation behind the words of this group, it has been a catharsis. Zapatismo is a path," Geffroy continues, "a bridge to go from here to there,
as in Taoism. It is like a dream to have justice and peace. It is hope. It speaks to the mind and the heart."
Geffroy is sitting in the office of the organization on one of the eight green plastic chairs that make up the room's furniture. His smile is sweet
and thoughtful, his gaze discreet. "The indios were to me the people who ask for money on the street and do not have anything to offer to the world.
Their uprising radically changed me. It made me respect their culture, work in a community... it taught me again to love the world, my country, the
human being, and to see life with joy."
Geffroy is an architect who studied at the Metropolitan Autonomous University of Xochimilco in the Mexican capital at the end of the 1970s, when he
was engaged in the quest for an alternative to socialism. At that time, he found it in the movimientos autogestionados (self-governed movements),
which tried to create small-scale communities that did not recognize any authority imposed from the outside and wanted to govern themselves. After
years of political apathy, Chiapas's bloody insurrection woke Geffroy up, with its uncertain load of victims, varying from 200 to 1000, according to
the reference book El Almanaque Mexicano. Those numbers included Zapatistas, army soldiers, state police, and civilians killed in the days before a
cease fire was ordered. "In El Mexicano I read 800 dead. I could not believe it!" Geffroy said.
In 1995, Geffroy began joining other sympathizers in local caf?s, following the development of the talks between the Zapatista National Liberation
Army, which was granted legal status, and the federal government. Later, the Zapatista National Liberation Front was created. It sought to include any
Mexican citizen in a movement of peaceful, rather than military opposition. In 2001, Ensenada formed its own local division, which is autonomous from
the national organization. Geffroy joined it, finding the new kind of politics that he was looking for earlier in life. Regarding his choice, he
proudly says, "I identify with all rebelliousness."
Sergio Cruz Hern?ndez, a generation younger, is sitting beside him. "We are neither spokespersons for the Zapatista National Liberation Army, because
our means are peaceful, nor for the Zapatista National Liberation Front, because we respond to our local problems. We work among the Kumeyaay, who are
our local indigenous, the factory workers, to make them aware of their labor rights, and the young punks."
Cruz graduated in communication science from the University of Mexicali, where he participated in student meetings organized to discuss Zapatismo. He
sympathized immediately, partly because the indigenous have never been to him a useless, foreign population. As a young boy, he used to accompany his
father, a physician, on his visits to the local indigenous communities.
Cruz, who now goes to the organization's meetings with his wife and small child, distances himself from the average youth he was before he became a
Zapatista. "On the weekend, I would just get drunk with my friends. I may still do it, but now I have something more than that, an alternative point
of view."
Neither Geffroy nor Cruz is ind?gena. They belong to the largest ethnic group in Mexico, mestizo, a Spanish term that defines those who descend from
the interracial union of Spaniards and ind?genas. The Mexican intellectual Enrique Krauze, in his essays written in January 1994 and contained in
Tarea pol?tica (2000), has called this phenomenon of assimilation as the "historic miracle" that has spared Mexico racial rebellions. He adds that
wherever ethnic divisions persisted, as in the case of Chiapas, insurrections broke out. While Krauze finds the resolution of the plight of the
ind?genas in their assimilation, Geffroy and Cruz oppose it with constant resistance. As Geffroy puts it, "The indigenous element is the conscience of
the Mexican people, that hidden element that when it stands up is heard in all the country."
The indigenous minority of Chiapas has been able to connect with different movements of opposition, in and outside Mexico. On the domestic front, it
has bonded with those exasperated by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which until the year 2000 had ruled the national government for more
than 70 years. Internationally, it has found supporters among those opposing the economic policies of free trade, which culminated January 1, 1994 --
the same day the Chiapas insurrection began -- with the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
"The NAFTA is a death sentence for the Indian...an international massacre," stated one of the declarations of Subcomandante Marcos, the military
leader of the Zapatista National Liberation Army and a mestizo known also for writing poetry and short stories. This position has attracted to the
region movements and individuals that oppose globalization and are dissatisfied with capitalist societies.
On the other side of the border, one such organization is Schools for Chiapas, which helps Zapatista Mayan communities receive basic education. "I am
just back from Chiapas. I have been there six months," says Peter Brown, executive director of Schools for Chiapas, speaking from the computer
laboratory of Johnson Elementary School in Emerald Hills, where he teaches. He has been going to the region since the late 1970s, when the only
attraction was the Mayan pyramids. He admits he did not pay much attention to the discrimination of the ind?genas, apparent even to the eyes of a
tourist. Since 1994, though, his involvement with the Zapatista cause has grown, first by founding San Diegans for Peace and, from the late 1990s,
Schools for Chiapas.
"In 1996, we traveled to Chiapas and saw that the demand for schools and health care was fundamental." The situation was disastrous: less than 3
percent of indigenous children in the state complete the sixth grade. In an interview to Medea Benjamin issued in First World, ha ha ha! The Zapatista
Challenge (1995), Subcomandante Marcos described the state of Chiapas's schools. "Here there are no schools to go to. And if there is a school, the
teacher almost never shows up because it's too far. If you are a teacher in one of these remote villages, you must walk along muddy paths for days
just to get to the school. And you must teach children who are falling asleep in class because they are so weak and hungry. Or the children don't show
up because they have to go and cut wood or do other chores."
Following the 1996 Accords of San Andr?s between the Zapatista National Liberation Army and the federal government, which recognized the right of the
indigenous to organize and administer autonomous schools, Brown began raising funds and leading groups of volunteers to build schools for the
Zapatista Autonomous Rebellious Education System .
"There is no statewide curriculum; there is experimentation," he says, "but there is inclusion of diversity, the effort not to recreate the problems
of the larger society, and above all there is the teaching of Mexicanness. It is a very patriotic movement." In the article "Teaching by Obeying:
Something New Under the Sun," published in December 2001 in a Spanish-language periodical, Brown stated that the Mexican public education system does
not recognize the diplomas awarded by the autonomous schools. These are run by volunteers who are not called "teachers," but "education promoters" to
emphasize the difference with the official teachers sent by the government and the democratic approach of these instructors. "Ruling by obeying" had
already been one of Marcos's most popular mottos.
It was in July 1998, while building the first autonomous middle school in Chiapas, that Brown was seized by Mexican authorities and expelled from the
country, which garnered mention in John Ross's book The War Against Oblivion: Zapatista Chronicles 1994?2000 (2000). He was readmitted only in 2001.
Brown, who now lives half the year in the U.S. and half in Chiapas, hardly changes his composure while remembering that event. "At first I did not
know who they were. At that time I was wanted by paramilitary forces. They had my picture on some 'wanted' flyers."
Besides arguing that the school was illegal because it was not authorized by the government, Mexican authorities showed particular interest in a
picture taken at the inauguration of the school. Brown laughs: "The picture was misinterpreted. I had such a long beard. I did not even look like a
teacher." That was hardly the problem. The masked man who handed him the school's education plan was later identified by the Mexican government and
Associated Press as a comandante of the executive organ of the Zapatista National Liberation Army.
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Family Guy
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There is an element of defeatism in this whole separateness movement. It is noble to attempt to protect your culture and way of life in a rapidly
changing world.
However, if the result is teaching Mexicanness in a ramshackle, sparsely attended school full of starving children deprived of adequate health care
you are doing your culture an injustice.
Demand equal rights. Demand your just due. Demand education and healthcare. But filling the minds of young children with the pipe dreams of a failed
socialist ideology while delivering nothing but squalor, resentment and anger is to me the greatest injustice.
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Margie
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Alternative Education
"Demand equal rights, demand your just due, demand education and healthcare", is exactly what the Zapatistas are doing !!
The young children's minds have been filled for years with pseudo-nationalism, and the pipe-dreams of a failed two class so-called Mexican Democracy
ideology. They already are deprived of adequate education and health care.
Viva Zapata! Viva Los Zapatistas!
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MrBillM
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Zanny Zapatistas
No matter how bad the news may look on a given day, we
can always count on the Left-Wing Revolutionaries for a
good laugh. These loony movements have ZERO chance of
going anywhere other than down to bloody defeat, but they
just never seem to get it.
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JESSE
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Zapatistas have turned into just another group that feels the Mexican goverment is worthless, well, we all do. They are no longer news in Mexico at
all.
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mr.jack
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Zapatistas
They are news enough for the Ensenada Officials to hassle them. Even if there is not a bloody coup going on, it was because of them that amazing
strides were made for Indian rights. Poco a poco,
but the main thing is, once you start an idea, it moves forward on it's on volition,
if their ideals have even become semi-mainstream, which I don't believe they have yet, it is a good thing. They have affected the consciousness of the
Mexican psyche, and that's one of the best ways that revolutions can be won. Needless to say, they have won the hearts of the indigent people in
Chiapas and many other areas. The word gets out, and people remember who killed their relatives and friends, and they remember who defended them.
This is what frightens the CIA and the Mexican Government, to this day.When people are finally afforded dignity, they are very possesive of it, and
hard pressed to give it up.
Thank you, Zapatistas, for opening up the floodgates, and for your bravery against a repressive regime.
[Edited on 4-26-2004 by mr.jack]
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thebajarunner
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the more things change, the more they...
remain the same, just ask El Presidente ZZorro...
ah well, crooked cops and drug officials off to the carcel,
always was, always will be, it seems.
wish it could change, probably won't,
not in our lifetime, anyway.
Baja Arriba!!
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MrBillM
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Like I said, Lefties are always good for a laugh.
Their embracing of all these indigenous modern-day
Luddite causes are truly amusing. There is not one
country on Earth where they have met with success.
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Margie
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Well, you didn't do your homework, Bill.
Indigenous groups throughout the world have been highly successful. Case in point, little Bougainville, check it out, and also here are some other
sites that may interest you, there are tons of them, go to the net :
Bougainville
www.eco-action.org
www.nationalreview.com
New Zealand
Indigenous Media Network Members
www.indigenousmedia.org
Intellectual Property Rights and Indigenous Peoples Rights by Maui Soloman
www.inmotionmagazine.com
Australia
EOO- Indigenous Peoples
www.ekas.org
Tanzania
www.faulty.fairfield.edu
Worldwide
Presenters - Indigenous Peoples and Racism Conference
www.racismconference.com
*********************************
Like Martin Luther King said, "How long?....Not Long ! "
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MrBillM
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Progress
We differ in our assessment of their ability to achieve their goals.
Of course, they have had some success at gaining recognition of their
Human rights, but they have not been successful at achieving the goals
of slowing development and the involvement of International Corporations
and monetary interests in their respective countries. Like the Khymer
Rouge, they desire to turn backwards against what most of the world
considers progress. Those that attempt to do that will simply be burned
in the process as they have been in Nigeria, Indonesia, Brazil and else-
where. I note that the majority of the instances cited are chiefly in
Former Crown Colony nations, which is their good fortune. In other societies
in this world, they aren't treated so benignly, but that's OK. After all,
they should be proud to die for what they believe and, if progress demands it,
die they must.
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Margie
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Hi Bill.
I just feel that your argument minimizes
the impact of Indigenous groups on their particular society.
Bougainville is holding the whole world at bay, and people like Chico Mendez, by his actions, have indeed slowed development and the involvement of
International Corporations and monetary interests . So, to say that they are all failures and laughable isn't fair and certainly not accurate.
Afterall, it has only been within the last 40 years that these groups have become vociferous.
The argument that on the one hand, they can't slow development, and on the other,they desire to turn backwards against what most of the world
considers progress seems a cracked dichotomy.
The Khymer Rouge is a bad example, because their agenda was of a political nature, and had nothing to do with indigenous rights.
Your view is interesting and gives room for thought, time will tell how effective these groups ultimately will be and their sustaining impact on
mainstream societies.
[Edited on 4-27-2004 by Margie]
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MrBillM
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Bougainville ?
I give in. Up until I found out that Bougainville was holding
the Whole world at bay, I didn't think that the Aboriginal
insurrections had much hope, but the significance of Bougainville
simply cannot be ignored and their inspiration, I am sure, will
spread across the world like wildfire, though that metaphor may
be inappropriate, considering the oceans.
Actually, although the Khymer Rouge was an extreme example, I don't
think it was so off the mark. All such movements have a political
component and they exemplified the utopian dream of retreating from
progress back to a simpler, agrarian culture. It was ruthlessly
brutal, but that is always the result when you're trying to force a
populace to move in a direction contrary to the desires of the major-
ity. The Russian revolution was much the same. Lenin ordered the
deaths of masses who voiced objection to his goals. The numbers who
died in that agrarian revolution dwarf the Holocaust and WWII.
For all of the Aboriginal groups who ask for nothing more than their
equal rights in the existing society, I say more power to them. It
is seldom, though, that they desire only that.
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Margie
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Bill, Your first paragraph made me chuckle, I know, it seems a bit quirky but Bougainville is an exception to your statement that all of these
movements fail.
(I'm paraphrasing)
The Kymer Rouge wiped out the agrarian
'class'. They were motivated by greed and power.
Stalin did likewise you're right.
I think the danger here is to lump together indigenous and environmental
groups and overly generalize and paint them all as Stalinists/Leninists.
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wilderone
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MrBillM: your comments are the epitome of defeatism, and, of course, the antithesis of zapatismo. The zapatistas and other indigenous cultures of
Mexico simply want to live their lives on their land the way they have been for centuries, with equal rights within their country. This want to be
able to sell their coffee at a fair price. They do not embrace the facade of "progress" (whatever that is), and in the face of "modern" economics and
respect for the environment (shouldn't we all recognize respect for the environment in all "progress" of the future??), their ways are, indeed, making
progress. For example, the indigenous of Chiapas have begun a Mother Seed project to protect thier hundreds of varieties of corn; there have been
scores of new schools built in the past 3 years; NGO's from all over the world, with their dedicated constituents, are vital and unwavering in their
support. Part of the problem, too, is multinational corporations who have blood on their hands as they attempt to acquire oil land. (Find and watch
the film, "Zapatista"). I have been to several zapatista communities and have never met such pure hearted, courageous, strong people. I'm 100% on
their side; I see their progress and it remains to be seen who "wins." If you want to learn more (or help), see: schoolsforchiapas.org.
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MrBillM
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Defeatist ?
OK, I'll make this the last comment on this issue. I had actually
meant for the previous one to be my last word, but the "defeatism"
comment interests me.
I'm not being defeatist. My viewpoint is on the winning side so far.
I was completely in agreement with the methods used by the Mexican
government in Chiapas. Ditto that for El Salvador, Honduras, Peru
and others. If I had been living in the U.S. in the late 1800s, I
would probably been a big fan of General Philip Sheridan and his
approach to the aboriginal problem. That might define me poorly in
your world, but it's certainly not defeatist.
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Margie
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Oh, *****gasp!****, Bill!
Wasn't General Philip Sheridan the one who coined the phrase,'the only good Indian, is a dead Indian',?
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MrBillM
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Well, Ok, perhaps his rhetoric was a little over the top.
Actually, I think the devil was in me when I wrote that
line. It doesn't reflect what I believe. I have an Navajo
Indian friend who used to run around with a bumper sticker
on his vehicle which said "Custer Died for your sins". I
ran one off on the computer that said "Phil Sheridan was right".
We're still friends.
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Margie
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Hi Bill, you tickle me. Two questions: Are you sure your Indian friend didn't put a little voodo on you, and, aren't you really Bill Maher incognito
trying to stimulate us into refective thought?
Here's a joke for you:
Knock, knock
Who's there?
Formaldehyde.
Formaldehyde Who?
Formaldehiding places the Russians are coming!
*********************************
Wilderone, could you share more of your experiences working with the Indians in Chiapas with us, it sounds very interesting, thanks!
*********************************
And Bill, if the devil made you do it, you might want to join the Church I'm starting, The Church of the Surf That's Happening Now. Our philosophy
will be that we live to surf, and surf to live. We will surf, pray for surf, and party!
*********************************
[Edited on 4-28-2004 by Margie]
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MrBillM
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Margie re: Churches
Sounds like a great idea. Unfortunately, my surfing days are over along with
a lot of other activities due to a degenerating spine. There was a time, though,
when I thought there was nothing more important than surfing (well, maybe girls)
so I can relate to your philosophy and wish you success.
Used to get up in the early a.m., surf for an hour or so, and then go to work.
As far as churches go, I took a line from the movie "Bull Durham" and each year I
put a bumper sticker on my truck that reads "Our family spends our Sundays at The
Church of Baseball".
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Margie
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Sorry about your back, Bill. I know that can be extremely painful. Mike needs a knee replacement, and I have had lazer surgery on mine. Guess we're
all getting to be old farts.
There is an excellent 'witch-doctor' just a bit north of Maneadero, I'm serious.
Has anyone out there had any luck with
with Cordycens sinensis? It's the mushrrom that the Chinese Olympic
team takes. The best buy is through http//www.pharmanexusa.com, CordyMax 120 caps, 1050mg. There is a Hawaiian company which grows it organically,
Hawaiian Health Products at http://alohamedicinals.com/.
The FDA has not approved it yet. However, the studies are in on Glucosomine, no liver damage side effects, and it does help your joints.
Hope you feel better, Bill.
[Edited on 4-28-2004 by Margie]
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