Ask a Mexican!

My wife and I have an argument going on about pirates. And since
you are the source for all things Mexican, I 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!

Pirates Pat McGroin and the Right Reverend One Eye

Dear Gabachos: It depends on 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 to the past, though, when so many Mexican pirates exist in
the present? Piratería is as Mexican of an industry as
tortilla-making and immigrant-smuggling: The International Federation
of the 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?

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 it 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 (or in
case of a small budget, maybe Tommy Chong, but he’s cast more for being
an old stoner than a 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!

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 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 you do (as a white person), I’d be
considered racist. 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 20th 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.

When whites fight for “white” rights, it 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 themexican@askamexican.net.

This article appears in May 21-27, 2009.