VivirLatino

With so many eyes on Arizona post the passing of SB1070 in Arizona, there is less talk about the possibility for comprehensive immigration reform and the violence, both from the State and it’s residents and how they are connected.

Take for example the recent beat down by Seattle police officers caught on tape, complete with anti-Mexican slurs.

Trigger warning : the video contains violence and slurs

The fact that the man beat up in the video had nothing to do with the crime reported (a robbery with Latinos involved) is besides the point. If the police had beat up and used anti-Mexican slurs against the “criminals” would we, those who consume media feel a little better about it, think somewhere in the back of our minds “well, they had it coming”?

The point is that laws like SB1070 and the current Comprehensive Immigration Reform framework put out there by Senator biometric Chuck Schumer works from the default position that immigrants, painted broadly as Latinos, painted broadly as Mexicans are criminals. It works from the framework that we need to prove ourselves worthy of humane treatment via speaking proper English, paying fines disguised as taxes, getting to the back of the line. Resistance to this, asking for legalization and/or basic human rights is seen as ungrateful and as an unwillingness to play the political game we asked to swallow in the name of political efficiency.

I am happy to see the boycotts and the civil disobedience in response to SB1070 just as I am happy to stand on a corner of my hood with my hija just talking to my vecinos about what this means for ALL of us. Pero I am bothered by the treatment of what happened to this man in Seattle, the disrespect towards the lives of our hermanos and hijas, and the accolades paid to Democrats for moving forward on a CIR plan that takes its lead from Arpaio. I am bothered that too many being credited with leading the movement talk about all of these things as if they are separate. As if one monster isn’t feeding the others and are all being led by the same master.

The other evening walking to casa mala, I saw four NYPD officers teasing and fucking with a Latino man who was visibly drunk pero really wasn’t bothering anyone. Of the busy crowd in Corona, NY only three people stood by to watch, not saying a word, just letting the police know we were watching. Those people were another Latino man, my three year old, and myself. When the cops finally had had enough fun and sent the man on his way, the other adult witness looked at me shaking his head saying in Spanish ” they have nothing better to do than harass those who are doing nothing but surviving”.

We need more witnesses and we need to do more than survive.