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| RE: final word on mexican posts is a HOAX |
| Cars & Trucks, Etc. : American : Eagle |
| 03/15/06 |
This news story can't be the final word on Mexican posts, because Mexicans and Mexico are not mentioned even one time. This story is mostly about people that have immigrated from the Dominican Republic, plus a few from Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Peru, and it's all about Latinos vs. Anglos, living in eastern U.S.
This story does not address the cultural imperialism of Mexicans that refuse to assimilate, this story does not mention the millions of Mexican criminals who begin their criminal careers by violating immigration laws, this story does not mention the link between Muslim terrorists and Mexicans beginning with the pathways established by Mexicans infiltrating our borders, this story does not mention the huge financial impact on California and U.S. law enforcement, flooding prisons, the gangs, schools, medical and welfare systems and the ultimate corruption of California political life by Mexican illegals and the American degenerates that employ them and make up excuses for them.
This story does not mention "Mi Azteca America", channel 42.
This story also does not mention that charming habit of Mexicans to use public restrooms and throw their shitty asswipe on the floor or toss it in trash cans placed next to toilets by Anglos tired of telling them to assimilate, rather than flushing it.
This story also has Latino's claiming they are strict with their children, a huge deception from my perspective, because here in Mexifornia, Mexicans let their kids play on the floors of restaurants blocking the aisles and annoying the other customers. I've seen that repeatedly.
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final word on mexican posts
Reply to: pers-140292641@craigslist.org
Date: 2006-03-08, 7:05PM PST
http://www.eagletribune.com/specials/buildingbridges/20010727/FP_001.htm
Latinos too hot, Anglos too cool?
By Kathie Neff Ragsdale and Fernanda Santos
Eagle-Tribune Writers
Ask an Anglo about Latino culture, and you're likely to get a description like this:Latinos play their music too loud, wear their clothes too tight, litter the streets, flaunt their sexuality and crowd their apartments with noisy relatives.
That's not culture, that's stereotype, Latinos are apt to respond.
Reverse the question and a Latino might characterize Anglos as people who hoard their affection, overorganize their lives, let their children raise themselves and shunt their elderly off into nursing homes.
Claptrap, Anglos would doubtless reply.
But such are the notions that separate many of Greater Lawrence's Anglos -- the descendants of the white, European immigrants who settled the Merrimack Valley -- from the latest arrivals to the Immigrant City, the tens of thousands of Spanish-speaking people who have made Lawrence the most Hispanic city in New England.
Beyond such stereotypes lie the real cultural differences -- the ones that need to be understood if the cultural divide between the Merrimack Valley's Anglos and Latinos is ever to be bridged.
What are those differences?
César Sánchez Beras, Lawrence High Spanish literature teacher and published poet, says Hispanic culture tends to be expressive and upbeat in character -- and easy for Anglos to misunderstand.
"We (Latinos) are the product of a mix of races," explains Beras, who came from the Dominican Republic in 1995. "Five hundred or 600 years ago, what is today Latin America was a vast piece of land occupied by Indians, but then came the Europeans and the Africans. The Europeans gave us our culture and language; the Africans, our music and dance; and the Indians, our innocence and candor. When you mix it all, you have what is called the Latino personality."
That personality, he acknowledges, can be a point of conflict between Anglos and Hispanics in Lawrence. What some Latinos see as manifestations of their expressive cultures, some Anglos see as nuisance.
"I for one am not too appreciative of the Hispanic culture," one Anglo woman e-mailed The Eagle-Tribune when readers were asked for their views of the cultural divide between Anglos and Latinos. "The word 'loud' comes to mind ... loud voices, loud music, loud colors, loud cars."
Many Latinos agree that Latinos, particularly those from open-air Caribbean countries where summer is year-round, talk more loudly, gesture more and are generally more outgoing than most Anglos.
"Most Latinos grew up listening to loud music, speaking loudly, expressing themselves very openly," Beras says. "When they come here, they keep on repeating this behavior until they learn how to tone it down, how to come to a point where they will still be Latinos without disrespecting Anglos.
"It's a cultural expression and if the person is not educated enough, he won't understand that here there are different habits and rules. ... You have to understand that most people who come here because they had economic problems in their country, they had nothing there, including a decent education, so it's hard to adapt."
Other Latinos say the complaints about loud music have more to do with Anglo insecurities.
"Don't tell me that loud music is a cultural matter. It angers me," says Alma B. Couverthié, 29, a Puerto Rican who is an organizer for Lawrence Community Works. "Loud music is a matter of education and age. ... And I think that Anglos don't like when we listen to our music loudly because they can't understand the lyrics. I wonder if they would complain if we were listening to loud Frank Sinatra?"
"Anglos are usually quiet people, their environment is orderly and tranquil, so they find it strange and uncomfortable to be around Latinos, whose habits are the complete opposite," says Pablo Urbaez, 59, a native of the Dominican Republic who is on the board of directors for the North Common Neighborhood Association
Latinos also note that not all Hispanic cultures are high-volume. In Argentina, Uruguay and Chile, Beras says, people tend to be much more quiet and reserved. "I think it has to do with the weather," he says. "In cold places, people stay inside for a good portion of the year so there's less interaction, less opportunities to open up to strangers.
Leonor Sánchez, who came from Peru in 1972 and is now president of the United Peruvian Association of the Merrimack Valley, says that people from her country tend to be "very quiet. ... We're a very calm culture."
If some Hispanics agree that they are too outgoing for Anglo tastes, they also say they find Anglos too reserved, too cold -- critical and unwelcoming both in their demeanor and their gestures.
When Pedro Payano started teaching at Lawrence High School several years ago, for instance, he was confused when many of his Anglo co-workers seemed to keep their distance from him.
"I said, 'Wait a minute, what's that?' " Payano recounted during a focus group meeting of Anglos and Hispanics sponsored by The Eagle-Tribune. "To me, you touch. ... Us, we talk close and we touch. Not all Latinos, but mostly from the Caribbean, that's what we do. We touch. But here, you don't touch anybody."
Anglos in the group were quick to say that doesn't mean Anglos are hostile and not every Anglo is so aloof. Here's part of the exchange:
Steve Dawe of North Andover: "It's not a lack of respect."
Payano: "No. Now I understand it because somebody talked to me about it. I think that's what we need to understand why you do certain things. It's not because you want to be disrespectful of somebody else; it's because that's the way you are."
Harry Milliken, Lawrence: "I was president of the North Common Neighborhood Association, which is mostly Latino, and I did notice the hugging among all the people in the neighborhood. I have friends that, when we meet, we hug. I think it's the Spanish culture rubbing off a little bit on the Anglos."
Mary Mascola, North Andover: "You know, I just have to say, I'm from an Italian culture and men hold arms when they walk and we always kiss each other, men and women."
Manuel Ferreira, Lawrence: "I find that Italians and Latinos have a lot in common."
Cleanliness and culture
Anglos might be surprised and upset to hear that some Latinos find them not only cold but not as clean as they might be.
"Los Americanos no se bañan (Americans don't bathe)," is a saying heard among some newly arrived Latino youngsters, accustomed to a hot and humid climate where people commonly bathe several times a day.
Latinos are just as surprised and hurt when they hear that Anglos think dirt and litter are part of the Hispanic culture.
Yes, they say, some Latinos are litterbugs, just as some Anglos are, but that's a matter of upbringing and education, not culture.
"What bothers me is that I'm not like that, and I've taught my children not to be like that," says Rafael Jacobo, 46, who came from the Dominican Republic 21 years ago and is now a talk show host for WHAV 1490 AM radio in Methuen.
Jacobo remembers that a few days after he and his wife and four children moved into their home, an Anglo neighbor approached and said, "This is the way we do things here: We don't litter, we don't play loud music, we don't make noise late at night."
"That's exactly why I moved into this neighborhood," Jacobo fired back at his new neighbor.
"I'm sorry to admit to that, but a lot of the problems in Lawrence are caused by my people," Jacobo says, "but I feel that Anglos are wrong for including me, my family and many other Latinos I know in that group," Jacobo says.
It's up to Latinos to speak up against those Latinos who cause problems, he says. "I'm demanding Latinos who feel they play no part in trashing the city to speak up. I want them to raise their voices and show that they're different from those who do trash Lawrence."
But it's up to Anglos, he says, not to paint all Latinos with the same broad brush.
"I work with people who are white, have tattoos and listen to heavy metal. From the way they look, I could draw certain conclusions -- 'This is a guy who does drugs' or 'This is a guy who starts fights,'" Jacobo says. "I'm sure Anglos draw conclusions when they look at me, but I expect that they will treat me for who I am, and not for the way I look."
Others cite another reason for Lawrence's littering problem.
"That happens in every community where you have absentee landlords," says Jennelle Graziano, a Dominican who owns Graziano's Beauty Center on Lawrence Street. "It's not because we're Latinos. People don't take care of other people's property as they do their own."
Graziano, who has a one-hour radio program on WHAV each week, has called on other broadcasters to join her in launching a radio campaign to clean the streets of Lawrence, and says a better partnership between citizens and city officials will help. So will more Hispanic homeownership, she says.
"We're just starting as a community to feel that Lawrence is our Lawrence, that we should take care of it because it is our Lawrence," she adds.
Family matters
While Anglos focus on the noise and the bad habits of a few, many Latinos say, they miss what Latinos see as one of the most important parts of their culture: their strong connections to their extended families.
"The definition of family here in America seems to be husband, wife and children -- that's family," says Bennie A. Espaillat, 43, of Andover, who came from the Dominican Republic in 1974 and now owns Zapatos Aqui shoe store in downtown Lawrence. "With Latinos, family is beyond that. It's the uncle, the grandmother, the sister-in-law. The package is bigger. ... It means financially taking care of one another, just helping one another -- the sense of responsibility."
"Here, people know you by your name and what you do for a living," he adds. "In Latin America, it's your name and who you're related to. There's always a connection to family. It's just the way we think."
Beras says that, even though he's 40 years old and has lived on his own for 20 years, he still calls his mother in the Dominican Republic regularly "to let her know all is going fine here."
"The mother-child relationship doesn't end when the child leaves home," he says. "It's a very close connection that exists forever. And when your parents get old, they are not transferred from home to the nursing home, but from family to family. It's the oldest child's responsibility to care for the elderly parent."
Latinos also tend to be stricter with their children, Espaillat says, and to make more decisions for them in such areas as clothing. "It could be micromanagement," he says with a smile, "but we like to be more in control of those little decisions."
Even so subtle a matter as how to express respect for elders can translate into cultural misunderstanding.
For example, Espaillat and his wife, Mory, always brought up their 12-year-old son, Nicolas, to avert his eyes when talking to his grandmother, or any adult, as a sign of respect. But when the boy started school, Espaillat said, his Anglo teachers would sometimes chide him to "look at me when I talk to you."
Jasmin L. Escoto, a native of the Dominican Republic who is a clerk at Lawrence High School, says having a lot of children is a part of the Hispanic culture, but one that is changing among more assimilated Latinos.
"We used to have a saying something like, if you can fit one, you can fit too many," says Escoto. "Now, the time is different. ... Professional people think before they have kids. It's more the influence of the Anglo culture that tells them to calculate what they do and not to follow feelings and the heart, but numbers. Like, it's better if you have only two or three kids because you can really provide the best for them and can send them to college."
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