Ozumba...Or, More on Violence in Mexico

Recently I was looking at videos onYouTube for the town where I did some of my dissertation research. Ozumba is a great little town - religiously a bit of an odd duck, but as a community it is quite a place to visit (like any of the medium sized market towns in rural Mexico). Clearly most of the videos were a celebration of community civic/religious culture and probably as important to Ozumba "ex-pats" as to the town itself. That's when I found:



Ouch. Again, my concern on violence in Mexico has less to do with organized crime and more to do with the insidious form taken in the video (and the same concern I have for violence in the US or anywhere else): Violence of hate between two parties as entertainment for others. US snuff films, torture-porn, Mexican tabloids...this is the violence that concerns me more than the clash of two cartels. Even TV violence, that generates up to 40 acts of violence an hour doesn't disturb me as much as this personal expression of lust for blood. What distinguishes the psychopath from the rest of society is the inability to feel compassion or sentiment for other people as people. They see them only as objects that revolve around the personal sphere of the psychopath, deserving of care or attention only when they fit the needs of the psychopath. Understandably, the materialist US society generates more psychopaths than Mexico, but this video reminds me that the crumbling of community in Mexico and the link to personal violence is very real.

The ABCs of DHS...All BS, or, Homeland Security - the Sitcom

ABC has what looks to be a perky little program about the Department of Homeland Security slated to air this week (fittingly, produced by the guy that brought us "Big Brother" on CBS). I'd like to see the what odds Vegas bet takers are laying down that the following get little air time:

1) Corruption by US border agents.

2) The US threat to Mexico via arms smuggling.

3) The internal US border points that suspend the US Constitution.
(Thanks to MexConnect for pointing that one out)

4) Firing whistle blowers from Border Patrol.

5) Suspending property rights for a border fence.

6) Homeland Security Child Rapists.

7) The general "waste, fraud, and abuse" found in DHS.

The OTHER Violence in Mexico

As the narco-violence in Mexico grows, my students are expressing extreme distress about our upcoming trip to Mexico City and Oaxaca. Aside from pointing out to them that 2 people an hour are murdered in the US, I pointed out a statistic that worries me a little more. Last year at this time the Calderon administration discussed a fairly disturbing number: 80% of women murderd in Mexico are killed by a family member, and 30% of women assaulted felt the attacker did it out of love. At the same time, Calderon mentioned that the traffic of humans - not just for migration - is the third most profitable crime in Mexico, with 80% of the victims being young girls and women.

I hate that my students watch the news and have a "Barbarous Mexico" moment, one that will probably stop them from going to Mexico and learning more about it in a way that could help them contribute to it as fellow citizens of the world. Well, a way beyond stopping their own possible recreational narcotics habits and funding the cartels...but I guess that is best left for another post.