I was honored this week to write a guest post for our friends over at the BoBo Files. I chose to write about the fiasco in California on Cinco de Mayo. The following is that article.
Five youths attending the Live Oak High School in California were threatened with suspension for showing up to school wearing t-shirts and/or bandanas depicting the American flag. That’s correct. They were threatened with suspension for displaying the symbol of their nation.
According to the school officials, wearing the shirts and bandanas depicting the American flag on Cinco de Mayo was disrespectful and incendiary to the children of Mexican heritage who attend the school. One of the Hispanic students said, “I think they should apologize cause it is a Mexican Heritage Day … We don’t deserve to be get disrespected like that. We wouldn’t do that on Fourth of July.” A Mexican Heritage Day?
Every year, the Cinco de Mayo display goes up at a near-by grocery store highlighting the Corona beer, Doritos, and other “Mexican” party supplies. And every year, I wonder what people in the United States are actually “celebrating.” Cinco de Mayo honors the day that the Mexican Army defeated the French forces at the Battle of Puebla. This surprising victory is similar to the victory by George Washington and our Revolutionary forces over the British Army at Princeton. While neither battle won the war, they were key moments in their battles against (what was then) the Superpowers of their days.
Another thing that these two events share in common is the lack of any official celebration of those wars in their home countries. In the United States, we remember battles such those from Lexington, Concord, and Antietam (from the Civil War) more than Princeton, but those remembrances pale to that of the Fourth of July – our Independence Day. The same is true in Mexico. Cinco de Mayo is not nationally observed unlike El Grito de Independencia, or Mexican Independence Day.
So, if Cinco de Mayo is such a minor day of remembrance in Mexico (it is primarily celebrated in the Mexican State of Puebla), why should the Hispanic student feel so much disrespect? The student referred to it as a “Mexican Heritage Day.” It is, since it was a remarkable victory by the underdog, but does that mean that citizens of the host country (the US) have to set aside their own national pride to mark an event from a foreign country?
Honoring special days in the United States that immigrants bring from their nation of origin isn’t new. Since we are a nation of immigrants, it is only natural that our cultures will blend. For example, the nation stops and celebrates St. Patrick’s Day every March 17th. St. Patrick was a Catholic Bishop who was instrumental in introducing Christianity to Ireland during the 400s. With the mass immigration of Irish Catholics to the colonies, and later the States, the tradition of honoring this Saint was brought with them and adopted by the local population to create the festive holiday we enjoy today. Even the Protestants (who fought against the Catholics for years) in the United States participate in the event.
Non-Mexicans in the United States celebrate Cinco de Mayo in the same way. Most Americans do not know the history of the event, but find it entertaining because of the history of the culture the holiday comes from. This is why the stores sell so many cases of Corona’s and bags of Doritos.
Maybe this should be a lesson taught to the Hispanic-population at Live Oak, as well as the school officials. When you move to the United States, you add your culture to our melting pot, and not the other way around. The respect that the Hispanic student was looking for was misplaced on his part. He should respect the culture (not to mention national pride) of his host nation, and as such appreciate that the five youths in this case were not chanting down nor threatening them over the Mexican holiday. For the school officials, they should host a school-wide presentation teaching all the students on what Cinco de Mayo symbolizes and place it in context with the openness and tolerance the United States offers to immigrants.
I’m glad to hear that the School District has issued a statement expressing their disappointment over the actions of the school officials. Maybe this will ensure that future non-Mexican students will not be threatened with suspension for wearing patriotic attire in the future. One could always hope.
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Well said!
Certainly one can always hope, for “hope springs eternal….” However, don't expect it. Rather than taking a balanced approach or view the foolish American Electorate is always being duped by its leadership into going to the opposite extreme! For example:
Rather than Racial and Ethnic Equality upon principle, we adopted Racial and Ethnic Preferences based upon minority status. Of course, this precludes that millions of Americans are either: neither, or both.
Rather than Sexual and Gender Parity by law, we have accepted State Mandated Gender Bias and Extreme Hetero-phobia. Both of which, are destructive to the stability of our homes.
Rather than punishing and holding bad students accountable in our schools, we have turned our educational institutions into prisons. And yet, we wonder why they're dying to drop out and escape at 16?
We punish achievement in every conceivable way, while rewarding: criminality, failure and sloth… yet we are surprised by increasing levels of: Corporate Scandal, Middle Class Dysfunction, and Increasing Poverty – around our great nation?
The Sad Truth is that the average American is blind and it is they who elect our vision-less leaders. “The Blind, Leading The Blind” is a recipe for disaster – but what can you do? They all have perfectly good eyes – but they are too lazy to actually use them! Even amongst the millions of Americans having woken up, only a handful have opened their eyes…. It's as if they think that by just being awake makes a difference.
You really must open your eyes… Look around you… Take it all in. Notice the destruction and devastation all around you… See what ignoring our leaders [ultimately] leads to. Observe them closely… Who they are… Whom they associate themselves with… What is their [specific] agenda? Then and only then will you notice The Truth. The Republicans and Democrats are the very same political entity and they are both working for someone else!
You will notice all sorts of interconnections: The schools they attend, the clubs they go to, the organizations they share, and the way they get along – so chummy] off of the cameras. It's like watching wrestling. They act one way in front of the cameras, or when putting on a show, and completely different at home. Moreover, the closer that they work together to forward their agenda – the more hateful the rhetoric that they will use to make us think they're not colluding – when they truly and obviously are!