Fresno Famous

regarding walkouts, ethics, and racism...lets go past debate

...I think the thing, for me, is the deeper issue. I think it's excellent that anyone would want to sort out their heritage, embrace their history, and care about their people.
-I do agree that living under the cloud of being deported is not just a cloud, but under a ten-thousand pound weight, -that nobody should have to fear.

My concerns, the roots of it around here I may not completely understand, -would be the double standard.
-If you dislike a people group so much, -why have them as underemployed workers and laborers?
-If people weren't profitting off of illegal labor, -why do people come here?

The elephant in the room, that nobody wants to address is starting to move, and your carpeting is about to get messy... and when this thing really starts stomping, -do you think the low-paid workers who did your sheetrocking is going to want to do it all over again?

Folks want a nice house, a nice yard, cheap stuff, -so that their life is better....
-who makes it, who fixes it, who grooms it,,, -so long as They are benefitting, (the consumers,)is not a real concern.
-foreigners and foreign culture is seen as tolerable, -or a necessary evil, so long as we control it and find it exotic, or still come out with the upper hand.

Ugly as it sounds,,, people, by nature are self interested, self absorbed, and don't mind benefitting from others --if there is something in it for them...
-They will justify someone working under the table, -who is an undocumented citizen and say things like, '..well, they are here, they need money, and I'm helping them when they can't make any money back where they are from...'
-what it really boils down to is: they are getting a service or a product cheaper than if they had to pay (an business that has insurances, licensing, workmans' comp... etc. etc.) --and they want to do something that feels 'sort of nice,' -and not think to deeply about it.
-Press them on it, and they'll get pissed and start talking about how hard they had to work to get where they were at, nobody cut them breaks, -and how the guy working for them can choose not to... (squeeze a little harder, they'll wonder who died and left you God..)

You have to really look deep into the process, --and do a ton of research to make sure that everyone in your life is being properly cared for and not being taken advantage of, -ever- so that the circumstances that benefit YOU are sqeaky clean in an altruistic ethical sense... (How far back in the lineage of a product that we own -before there is an impoverished worker, a six year old at a sewing machine, or worse?) Do we really want to know?

Lets get esoteric,,, Do you own a snuff film??? Probably not... Probably have never seen one... Ever see the first Mad Max movie? Guess what buckaroo... (I think three?) stunt men died in that thing, and they didn't edit it out... -we're not talking some weird 'shadow of a munchkin hanging themselves as they're finding the yellowbrickroad in the Wizard of Oz,' here...
-Ya think anybody in the upcoming rodeo is going to get hurt? Think anybody ever's been sent home to that great range in the sky while riding 'ol' Dynamite,?' --but wait, they're professionals, they are choosing to do what they do, (everybody in a rodeo is choosing to do what they do, -even the animals,) --and besides it's our history and we're paying them... (my bad...)
Ethics are such gooey things, aren't they... And what others do so that our lives are better raises thoughts that just sort of stay there, like a big shiney snail track acrossed your forearm...
Sorry to ruin your breakfast.

-People hate Wal*Mart, --yet they dont' talk about other big box stores.
People talk about the ozone, global warming, and all that ugly 'blood for oil.' circumstance.. -but they won't push for mass transit, ride a bicycle or get a car (or truck,) that sips gas... -And if 'nobody walks in LA,' it's really only the very poor (who have no other choice,) or the 'made wise choices through my broker,' (just loosin a few pounds,) who walk around here...
-People call a restaurant, even pizza take out, and think they are doing the kid a favor by giving him a two dollar tip, --when they don't even consider that, if he has a wreck with his car, -because he was using it in a business venture (delivery) -and the car is written insurance as a 'pleasure use vehicle, -he will likely be dropped by his insurance company... (I drove for a pizza chain back in the day and had an oopsie with a cement abutment that lunched my civic...)
-(and I don't know about here, but where I'm from the average Chinese food restaurant has lots of folks who work slave hours, and don't live in legally ideal conditions..)
-We used to build pools in NJ, and all the panamanian workers had 'brand spaknin' used' Social Security Cards, just bought in Manhattan... years later I had these guys in droves stranded at a major homeless shelter, with totally fabricated histories, -including medical, -a lot who had some pretty fierce diseases... -and because they were undocumented (meaning, not eligible for med.benefits.) -effective treatment was a joke...
-And then there was this undocumented English guy who accidently gashed his leg with a stanley knife when I was part of a flooring crew,,, the boss told us to just leave him on the steps of an emergency room, while we waited around the corner... (Gotta watch, them damn English may just want the colonies back, it could be a plot...-not that folks around here are sweatin' Massacheusetts.)

-Life is not only but a dream, it's also about 'risk and letting others be responsible for themselves...' (-hear hear, harrumph.)
---and who can argue that?
More like, All this mess, and we just can't wash the blood off our hands, no matter how much we try... (But we want the 'nice Shakespeare,' in the 'Nice Park,' not the stuff that makes us, you know,,,, think.)

It is nothing more than slightly deeper levels of justification and fulfilling legalities, (to the best of our knowledge.)

--The deeper issue I see, is the view of other cultures as 'those people.'
I hear about Hmong regarding donut shops and gangs... I don't hear about them as neighbors and as a people...
I hear about 'illegal,' Mexicans as taking over the place like ants... I don't hear about them as people...

Folks need to face some facts... hell, be proud of them if you need to, (this place is a hot-bed for self-esteem and stances...)
---Unless you see these people as people, -unless you see their culture as something that is cool and to be celebrated, unless you see them as -as worthy as your own people are...
---You are using them, you don't really care, -but so long as they don't get in your way ----or, better yet, benefit you somehow by their actions, -life is good --and you're for them...

How about this...
-would you want your mother working under any of the conditions and circumstances that some of these people LOOK FORWARD to from their native country? (and that's if their country exists anymore...some of them have been bombed away, -or taken over by warring groups..)

It may be a simple rule of thumb, but if you don't want your parent, your sibling, your partner, your cousin, your kid, --working in a situation like what you know someone is working in...
-If you don't want someone you care about living in a situation,
-If you don't want someone you care about having to go to THAT kind of doctor, or grocery store, or living each day with THAT thing on their mind...
---and you are IN the position to redirect and help them --but you don't???
You get to rightfully boast that you are using them and capitalizing on them.
You are a pimp.
-or you're lying about being so.

Now kids are idealistic.
They can be riled up, sometimes are riled up by adults,,, and, sometimes adults rile kids up because they know that kids will be able to get in under the radar,
-won't face the same laws that adults do... (kind of a sinister perspective, but I've seen it happen... I've had ten year old kids chant 'attica-attica,' while throwing a fire extinquisher at my head, -when they were supposedly be being told about their history as african americans...
-the kids were pissed about being told that it was bed-time, by the way, my co-worker wound up in the emergency room...)
-So, who's to say that this isn't (sort of,) that?

Maybe the kids are doing it because they think it's cool.

Maybe they aren't so well informed...

However, I think that fear is justifiable if they were going to loose family to deportation...

And
it's NOT the kids that have established this double standard.

It's the ADULTS, who both set up and put up with illegal employment situations,
-then the adults complain that there are too many of 'those,' here,, and what a drain 'they are.'

If there was no reason to be here, nobody would have been coming around to begin with...
This is a farming community... but farmers didn't want employees, they wanted 'workers,' and 'laborers.'
This is an industrial community,,, factories and blue coller bosses didn't want employees and craftsmen who got benefits,,, they wanted someone to get the job done,, (as cheaply as possible.)

We just want our cars washed, and our lawns cut... and we don't want to think about it... (after all, we're paying good money.)

We created an opportunity to benefit us, and we said that they could be a part of it,
-so long as they played by our rules...
They played by our rules,,,
-but our rules didn't call them equal, our rules didn't let them win as hard as they were working,,, and our rules only allowed 'so many of them to play at one time...'

Whether it was us, our parents, or our grandparents, or great grandparents... our rules weren't fair...
Our rules mistakenly thought these people were just farm animals, who should be happy at the chance just to labor, and be paid piss-poor wages.

How long did the folks around here think such an imbalanced and fundamentally disgusting and skewed set of standards would hold up?

If people are afraid -of these individuals and groups,
Maybe they should be.

Folks out here have created a monster...

But, as far as monster's go, I dunno, this one doesn't seem so bad. (Just a bunch of people who are demanding a fair break...)
This is not Godzilla on Tokyo.
King Kong does not have a thing for your sister.

The richter scale in the valley is not charting plate, nor fault activity.
It's not the rumble of a bunch of sneakered highschoolers who speak Spanish, waving mexican flags... It's not all those NewYears tennis balls bouncing down at the fairgrounds, It's not fullsized Chevies hopping, nor a million nitrous' Honda fart pipes.

It's just a bunch of white folks shaking...

Lets just hope that, in their quest for equality,
-the newest pilgrims floating to this country,
-are nicer than the previous ones... because the previous ones, (us,) sometimes kinda suck.

--um, er, that reminds me, before we turn in, -did anyone remember to leave the reparations out for what we owe the Japanese or Indians yet? -there's been a note on the 'fridge forever... been so busy lately,,, damn.

'metal heart, you aren't hiding, metal heart, you aren't worth a thing... I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see...' (CatPower)

Thanks Kids

So much condemnation of these kids for walking out to protest H.R. 4437 being debated in the Senate. I agree, these kids were not as disciplined as those who marched with Gandhi, King or Chavez. I might suggest that our expectations could be a tad high. Many people I have listened to on this subject over the past week claim the kids knew nothing about what they were protesting against. I disagree. As an advisor for the MEChA Club at Bullard High School, the kids know much more than we adults think they do. They watch the news on Spanish-speaking TV stations with their family members. They call their friends at other high schools on their cell phones and text-message information in a very efficient way. Nearly all the MEChA members at the meetings we held last week have either family or friends that are here without proper documents, and these kids are scared that law enforcement will come into their homes and take these people away. These are real fears and powerful emotions too easily dismissed by many adults.

I grow so tired of hearing people condemn these kids, as if we sat around reading Jean Paul-Sartre and Albert Camus as soon we got home from school because we knew the value of an education. We need to remember where our heads were at age 15 or 16, or even last month for that matter.

I applaud these kids for showing an enthusiasm and joy that I haven't seen in any of the political protests I have been to in a while. We must admit, their actions certainly stirred the debate on extremely complex issue of immigration.

More coverage on the walkouts and police/FUSD backlash

Mike Rhodes has posted some good coverage of the walkouts on the Central Valley Indymedia site, including coverage of the backlash by the Fresno Police and Fresno Unified School District administrators Wednesday through Friday.

http://www.indybay.org/centralvalley/

helping us to take a bite out of the three R's

the above is a tremendous letter.

I agree with the comments,,,
It has been said that Inspiration without Persperation is just hot hair and a lot of talking... whereas Persperation without Inspiration is just B.O.

First, it's spring... and the sap is running full tilt... I sort of wonder if even the strongest willed student could resist the call of any wild on such a day, especially in a town where identity is such a volatile issue.

Having just moved here within the year, I am personally mortified at the polarized attitudes that I find in a lot of folks in this town... There are a lot of people who will just flat tell you '...that they don't like Mexicans, how illegals are a drain to the system, and refuse to see them as people and anything other than a threat to society... They stay away from Central and South Fresno, and hang out only with the ones that 'aren't bangers...'
-I've been around a lot of Latinos who are aware of this, and, having been kicked in the ribs, act accordingly,,, but usually respond (if at all,) with a quite pronounced pride, clothing, cars, and behaviors that stick up for where they are from... What is sad is, just like any minority who really isn't interested in fighting with others, just wanting to get through the day, you see them hurt and shit on just because they are standing there... It's actually heartbreaking and humiliating... as a white person I am embarassed that someone who looks like me still thinks and acts like that towards anyone...

This valley has a hate problem.

Maybe not everyone in it does, -but overwhelmingly, there is far from a sense of viewing people from other colors as welcome and loving them for who they are... (I'm amazed at how the lower class and non-white are talked about as barely human by so many in candid conversations.)

Worse, nobody really HAS to deal with anyone if they don't want to... They can stick to themselves, or they can stick with their own groups,,, and they don't have to change their minds and (quite frankly, repent,) of hating someone who is just as valid as they, themselves are...

HighSchoolers aren't stupid... visceral, overloaded with emotions and passions, easily swayed, yes... (this is a good thing and a bad,,, but it is what it is...)
-but they can smell something bad as easily as the rest of us,,, and they don't always know how to respond the correct way, (which is part of being a large kid...)
Walking on cars and rooftops is wrong. Vandalism is wrong. (period, done, no contest.)
I do feel completely that protesting and civil disobedience, when done non-violently can be very effective, (-and have done so for over 35 years when it's called for...) -but the real effectiveness is to completely understand what you are protesting against, -as well as how to go about doing so,,,, -not to mention IF the protest will really have a clarifying effect, -or just make a bigger mess... It's far from an exact science.

But there is a real problem, and (though most of what the kids were doing may have been riding a social wave,) they are reacting to something much larger, and that is the prejudice of this town, and our better-bred 1958 cousin to the east...

This place has a very strong 'us and them,' mentality.
It has a very strong 'winner and looser,' mentality,,, and the opinnions are weilded like stone swords, --that just don't break...

I'm from New York. We have harsh, fierce, and aggressive built into us that has to be deactivated and removed as soon as we enter Pennsylvania, (just so we can order coffee without accidently clubbing someone to death,) and I'VE noticed how prejudiced this place is...
-And, as a Christian, I have to look at my fellow believers, and admit that the churches are no better, ignoring people and freezing them out, pretending that they aren't there, and ghetto-izing is the behavior of the third reich, not those with Christ in their heart.

This is what happens:
In life, when people know that they are disliked and distrusted because of their skin and culture, it builds and can cause a lot of anxiety...
Never rectifying the situation, never tearing down those walls and holding someone of an different race as a fellow human being, and as family,
--and then just moving away to hang with your own, just hardens the injury into something that is felt all the time, sets off homeland defence detectors, -and is felt with any oncoming weather...

The 'upper hand,' of the society in this town are building and creating this problem,,, -and are funding and fueling this war, --even if it is by ignoring it and not addressing it.
(It doesn't excuse the bad behavior of those who choose to act so,-regardless of their race or income level, but we really need to look at why people are reacting this way,,, instead of just getting upset that they are reacting.)

Kids are kids... highschoolers can be revved up and sent across the lawn, just like dogs, -after squirrels that aren't even there...
-or they can chase after what is there, more fueled by instinct and nature, having not yet learned to be stifled and stare-freeze the wall higher and thicker...

I don't know if this can be reversed, or if the virus will have to run it's course, it needs to be identified, talked about, and deliberately addressed. Otherwise, things are going to get much worse, these situations will increase in fury and damage, -and, as is the code, those already being spit on will be handed the blame.

misspent energy

Certainly immigration is an major issue and the legislation that regulates it influences our community. Bills that may change immigration policy should be scrutinized. However, the protests by local students were not as commendable as Famous would like us to believe.

First, the walk-out at Fresno High was not exactly "peaceful". Students running and jumping along the hoods and roofs of parked cars was destructive, irresponsible, and off-topic.

I watched the protests on Monday and Tuesday and "organized" is the last word I would use to describe them. I asked several of the students who marched past my office why they were protesting and they simply responded "México! México!" Sorry, but the issue is larger than that. An El Salvadorian student also chanted "México! México!", apparently unaware that the proposed legislation does not target Mexico or Mexican immigrants but would effect ALL immigrants, Latino or otherwise.

Yesterday, I spoke with a high school English Language Development U.S. History teacher whose students skipped class to protest. He was upset that his students did not remember their lesson on how a bill becomes a law. A majority of the Senate and the President do not support HR4437 and it is extremely unlikely that it will ever become law. Maybe by staying in class the students could better improve their civics and history knowledge, language arts, and debate skills.

If "these protests are evidence that many are succeeding" academically, why are so many ignorant of the real issues and the democratic process behind them? Unfortunately, it is so much easier and exciting to join a mob and holler through downtown than it is to think critically and independently, and truly effect positive change.

Civil disobedience, peaceful protests, and public demonstrations have their place. But when the protesters are underinformed and underorganized, their efforts are easily perceived as just dilinquent yelling. And maybe that's what a lot of it was.