Do Mexicans care about education?* Because one disturbing feature of these recent immigration protests have been “walk outs” by Mexican and Mexican American students from schools nationwide. On May 1st–a major international leftist holiday–Mexicans in the US are planning to leave job sites, schools, and everything else unattended. On top of this disconcerting sense of “us vs them” unity, one wonders if the organizers realize (a) this suggests to their kids that school is not that important, (b) it reinforces the culture of low educational attainment among Mexican-Americans, whose drop out rates are the highest of any group in America, and (c) tells the rest of us that these folks will always likely always be poor, unskilled, and their kids will be too.
Is this the kind of future Mexicans living in the US want for themselves and their children, generation upon generation doing low wage jobs, in constant competition with new waves of their erstwhile countrymen, willing to work for even lower wages? In a land where we are not just workers, but also citizens, is the rest of America supposed to be sanguine about profoundly uneducated people becoming more and more numerous? Are we to respect this display of self-satisfied pride in poverty, ignorance, and insularity that enlists school children in primitive displays of raw numbers? While I’ve long spoken freely on these matters, I can’t help but think that ordinary Americans, who are not that political, look at these events and feel more and more uneasy and threatened by this “nation within a nation.”
* Why “Mexicans”? Because if they’re not citizens–and a great number of these protesters are illegal aliens–then they’re not Mexican-Americans. They’re aliens, illegals, Mexicans living in America, foreigners, colonizers, interlopers, etc. The trompe l’oeil displays of American flags shouldn’t fool anyone. Their loyalties, their identity, and their sense of nationhood has little to do with the United States and its history.
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We don’t know how much of this is a function of a “no education” culture and how much is a function of the reason that these Mexicans are in the U.S. in the first place – to earn dollars (1) to send home or (2) that they can’t earn in Mexico. Whatever the cause, I think you’re largely right about the general American reaction to the phenomenon.
Not sure that they, and I say this very generally, care that they are missing work or school. I don’t think that they care much more than trying to identify their impact on our lives.
It will be interesting to see exactly what that impact is…considering that no one really knows. We throw numbers around with millions still up in the air. Very hard to quantify the impact of illegal immigration when you (a) don’t know how many are here (b) how many are working and for what wage (c) how many actually use the various services that they are being accused of (d) how many have kids in the education system or (e) how many pay into the system illegally or at all.
All of this is conjecture when some studies show 11 million in country…and some as high as 18 million.
I just don’t think they even know. And who ever is behind all of the protest organizing and walk-out concepts is surely no more in the know than anyone else.
Which is I feel one of the real motivators in this walking out…to show finally the impact. They are betting it will be high. I am betting it won’t even be a blip on the radar…cause the real motivations will show through. Sure…some will follow through…but I am betting that the majority of the 11-18 million will get up and go to work…so that they can send the money home.
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I’ve talked to folks who run businesses that employ a lot of Hispanics. They say a great majority are planning on participating and they’ll have to basically shut down operations for the day.
But, low skill workers are easily replaced. The pool is deep. The skills easy to come by. That’s why all these jobs were done in the past and will be done in the future by Americans. That’s why folks that barely speak English can do them.
This walk out will be disruptive, but only because a mass walk-out by any group of workers is disruptive. If they all were deported tomorrow (somehow), we’d recover, and we’d do so more quickly than one might think. The widespread distribution of low skill Hispanics in the work false only creates an illusion of necessity; in their absence, slightly less work, at slighlty more renumerative wages, would get done by other people, marginal entrants to these fields who are ohterwise employed or who prefer leisure to working at third world wages. Americans are adaptable and resourceful and there is no job they won’t do. After all, aren’t the libertarian advocates of free markets believers in the responsiveness of elastic labor markets. It might take a few weeks or months of adjustment, but we can find Americans to mow our lawns, put fries in the deep fryer, mop a floor, etc. Americans used to do these things for ourselves.
But there is no way hese low skill immigrants could conduct a bypass operation, police a city, run a hedge fund, design a car, cure a disease, create a play or book or something else of value, teach algebra, or otherwise add much to our culture. Judging by the quality of life in Juarez and San Salvador, I should think not, or at least not very well.
It would be a modern day *Atlas Shrugged* if middle class Americans would do something equivalent. What we’re seeing now is just a revolt of the masses, a temporary work slow down by people who do low skilled, though necessary work, but are by no means the only people that can do it.
So basically you are trying to avoid a similar situation that happened long time ago and now we have a bunch of uneducated rednecks living of the system while the few “educated” immigrants can’t get those doggone uneducated rednecks to do our work for us at what it is worth.
its not ture because in my college there is a lot of Mexicans like me who want to get an education. People judge as not being smart enough but we are actually smarter because we are bilingual.
Most Mexicans in America cannot speak English or choose not too. They are having translators in school to help Mexicans understand what is being said. Learn English or go home. Speak English when around Americans. That is so irritating going to a store and hearing them talk in their language. Many Americans want to work but cannot find jobs because all of these Mexicans are taking the American jobs. All Mexicans are doing is hurting our country. Crime rate has went up since they starting coming here. In my town we never had any killings and now it is nothing to hear that someone was stabbed or shot by a Mexican. All of them have the same name and ssn. That is ridiculous. Go home where you belong!!!!!!
The real issue the walkouts are rasing is the about the quality of education. Obviously they are not staying in schools because they are not expected to succeed. Therefore,
the schools they attend don’t push academics, forcing them to remain part of the cheap labor force. I am a first generation decendent of Mexico. I am obtaining my Bachelor of Arts in History. You article is generalizing and reenforces negative stereotypes.
I agree with the preceding post about the reinforcement of negative stereotypes. I teach AP U.S. History at a very diverse school and my Mexican and Hispanic students are among my hardest working and successful. The real wake-up call for Americans will be when the opportunities begin to spring up around the globe and Americans start to compete for them outside of American borders. Many Americans who go live and work in other countries do not assimilate to any great degree. The core of the complaint about Spanish-speaking immigrants is not about protecting our country. Anyone who paid any attention in history class knows that Polk took what Americans wanted after Mexico was unwilling to make a deal. The core is the same sense of superiority and pride that made Americans believe that taking it from Mexico was okay. There is a widely held belief in this country that we have nothing to learn or gain from anyone and that everyone wants to steal what we have. There is an absurd perception that the problems that we have couldn’t possibly be institutional flaws. They must be problems caused by an inferior people polluting this great country. Patriotism has its place, but wake up Americans…patriotism based on hating Mexicans or any other immigrant group is the last refuge of scoundrels. That is so easy, even President Bush gets that.