Dear Mexican: My wife and I have an argument going
on about pirates. And since you are the source for all things Mexican.
I’d thought I’d ask: While I know there were Spanish and Portuguese
pirates back in the early 1600s and 1700s, were there ever any Mexican
pirates? Not pirates from Spain who pirated in Mexico, but real, honest
to hay-soos Mexican pirates! Would be interesting to know!
Pirates Pat McGroin and The Right Reverend One Eye
Dear Gabachos: It depends by what your definition of “pirate” is. If
you’re looking for a famous swashbuckler from the days of Blackbeard,
tough tamales: Historians never bothered to glorify the numerous
buccaneers who ransacked Spanish galleons laden with the gold and
silver of Mexican mines off the Mexican coast. The most famous Mexican
pirate was Fermin Mundaca, who operated a contraband empire from the
island of Islas Mujeres off the coast of Quintana Roo during the
mid-1800s — but Mundaca was a Spanish native. Why look back in
the past, though, when so many Mexican pirates exist in the present?
Piratería is as Mexican an industry as tortilla-making
and immigrant-smuggling: The International Federation of Phonographic
Industry, an international organization that fights music piracy
worldwide, estimates Mexicans make more than $220 million off of
illegal CDs, most sold at the nearest swap meet, bodega or taco truck
near you. And before some of you readers start insinuating that such a
startlingly large amount is somehow indicative of the Mexican culture’s
tendency to steal, what would you call file-sharing?
Dear Mexican: Do Mexicans get annoyed that whenever
a Hollywood movie calls for a Mexican character actor, Cheech Marin
gets the job? This is great for Cheech, but must be bad for Mexican
actors struggling to land a good part in Hollywood. Danny Trejo gets
the badass roles, Antonio Banderas gets the leading man roles, and
character roles go to Cheech (in case of a small budget, maybe Tommy
Chong, but he’s cast more for being an old stoner than Mexican). With
the blooming careers of truly great Mexican directors Alfonso
Cuarón and Guillermo del Toro, don’t you think Hollywood should
give some other Mexicans a chance in the limelight? Cheech is already
rich — let someone else have a slice of the pie!
Celluloid Culero
Dear Gabacho: No argument from me, except Tommy Chong and Antonio
Banderas ain’t Mexican!
Dear Mexican: If we stereotype a person by drawing
attention to the fact that someone is Mexican instead of the content of
their actions, why do minority cultures celebrate the very fact that,
say, Mexicans fought for certain types of rights? Aren’t they
stereotyping themselves by doing so? If I did the same thing as a white
person, I’d be considered racist. So, why aren’t you considered racist
as well?
14/88
Dear Gabacho: I’ve contestado many a silly question in
this column, but yours takes the pastel as the stupidest I’ve
yet answered. What Know Nothings such as yourself don’t understand is
that when minority groups struggle for civil rights, they’re merely
calling America on its founding bluff — you know, that whole “all
men are created equal” bullshit. So, when Mexican parents in Orange
County in the 1940s sued four school districts for segregating Mexican
kiddies away from gabachitos, the parents didn’t do it just to
benefit wabs; the resulting lawsuit, Mendez vs. Westminster,
served as a precedent to the much-more-famous Brown vs. Board of
Education. When Cesar Chavez marched and fasted for justice in the
fields, his ultimate causa was the same as European unionists at
the turn of the twentieth century: a fair shake for the working man.
When millions march for amnesty for the undocumented, it’s a protest
against a hypocritical, Byzantine immigration system that entangles all
foreigners, not just Mexicans. Whites fighting for “white” rights only
shows how freaked some gabachos get about realizing that
minorities are actually, finally being treated like Americans. If
trying to battle hate makes me a racist, then here’s a Roman salute to
your face, pendejo.
Ask the Mexican at [email protected],
myspace.com/ocwab, find him on
Facebook, Twitter, or write via snail mail at: Gustavo Arellano, P.O.
Box 1433, Anaheim, CA 92815-1433!
