Peer responce

one page peer responce

Zimmerman 1

David Zimmerman
Instructor Cullom
Ethnography Final, Draft
WR 121, Fri 10:00 – 12:50
December 2nd, 2013

Passion and Murder: A Tale of two Méxicos.

We have heard the phrase time and time again. “How well do you know your neighbor?” I set out to put this phrase to the test by exploring Mexico through multiple lenses. I wanted to learn about this country through the eyes of another individual, published academic research and relate it to what my assumptions were of the reality of the smallest country in North America.

When I started off on this academic journey I found it hard to look past the media’s portrayal of Mexico as a kind of Wild West, a regime of lawlessness and a country controlled and in fear of the drug cartels that seemingly run the country with this highest rate of immigrants to the United States. I selected an informant, Daniella, who had grown up in Mexico but has been in the United States for the past few decades. I expected her to paint a very different picture of Mexico than she did.

I had believed that the tough times I pictured in Mexico would lead to tough individuals who protected themselves emotionally from the atrocities that they had seen in their country. Yet I came to find out that she was one of the sweetest passionate women I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. When I had asked her if she was willing to do an interview about her home country of Mexico a week earlier, she lit up with excitement. “Ooohh, you will get to hear all about my Mexico,” she said with tears forming in her eyes. I knew from that moment that I had chosen the right person. Not only was I able to use her as research for my paper, but I was able to give her the opportunity to tell her story, one that no one had ever asked her to tell.

We nestled in a corner as the familiar, bold smell of espresso wafts through the air. The whirr of beans grinding and milk being steamed is accompanied by the hum of laptops to form a cacophony of sounds all too familiar. I get up to grab my latte, a large, as I knew I would be sitting there a while, and we began. Sitting across from me is Daniella. A warm smile crosses her face and her soft hazel eyes gaze in my direction. Her curly dark brown hair glinted, even sparkled, in the soft light of the shop. This was not the picture I had painted of the haggard Mexican women who had been through the oppression of her countries practices. No she looked proud of her Mexican heritage. She had been born in Mexico city in 1959 well before the widespread cartel takeover of Mexico and was about to turn sixty years old when I interviewed her. She, unlike many American women was so pleased at this. She was happy to be alive and living. Daniella reflected the goodness in humanity and the kindness that can appear in anyone.

I assumed that Mexican history as a people began with an originally indigenous population influenced by the invasion of Spain in previous centuries. The obvious result of this has been the establishment of Spanish as the dominant language in the country. It would also seem that this Spanish influence also established Catholicism as the main religion in Mexico. Unless I am mistaken, the Spanish empire at the time of the invasion was still very close to the Vatican and catholic dogma. When I asked Daniella about her religious background she smiled and agreed that there are many Roman Catholics in Mexico. “However I am Jewish and my grandfather is from Turkey. There is actually a very large constituent of people of the Jewish faith in Mexico. Not many people realize this.” The kicker of all of this is that her family originally tried to immigrate to the United States but with Ellis Island full of immigrants they were sent down in Mexico instead.

Due to the nature in which our culture portrays Latino communities having a stronger emphasis on family than mainstream American culture does, I inferred that this would be the case. I assumed that Mexicans live with their extended families and put a strong emphasis on respecting and caring for their elders even at the expense of their own well-being. With family seemingly very important to Mexican families, I imagined that weddings are a huge deal. I had assumed that the small get together on the beach, a seemly growing trend in the United States, is probably not an idea very popular in their culture. I asked Daniella about this idea. She placed a hand wrinkled from hard work on my arm and said:

“Yes, David, yes, it is very different.” It was as if she was consoling me for not experiencing how it was down there. “In Mexico, you don’t or didn’t used to…You lived at home until you got married whether you were a girl or a boy. There was no shame in that, and yes the extended family was always there, playing a big role in our upbringing.”

I could tell how blessed she felt to be raised in Mexico until her late twenties with so many loving family members intricately part of her life. Since the death of her mother and moving to the United States, she has not lived in the same city as her siblings for over 30 years. It was clear to me from her big eyes staring past me and the sigh that washed over her whole body how important this part of Mexican culture is to her.

As her cultural pride permeated throughout her whole aura I had decided to dig deeper and lighten the mood at the same time. She beamed at me as she reminisced about something as simple as a Mexican birthday party. Hands waive around as she describes the all-day affairs. “There are not set times…” she says giggling, “these are all day affairs; we are having a party on Friday for Bradley, see you there, there is no four to six or anything like that, they would start at noon and go late into the evening”. She was trying to reflect the closeness and community she feels even with Mexicans that are not her kin. They did have maids, as they made enough money, but even they were treated as part of the family, more as colleagues than employees. They were meant to help out, not be subservient. Even the waiters and other service positions there have pride. These are not occupations to look down upon like they tend to be in the United States. It is clearly a culture that is quite progressive and tolerant. This surprised me somewhat as I had assumed that Mexico was a somewhat of a developing country except for the resort communities. To this day she had told me that she can meet another woman of Mexican descent and can feel like she has known that person for years.

What I knew of this country is that, Mexico shares a border with the United States, one that is constantly patrolled for drug smuggling, illegal immigrants, and firearms. Chiefly it had come to my attention, the vast amounts of illegal drugs that were being fed into the United States. According to U.S. National Drug Intelligence Center numbers, organized crime groups that perpetuate drug trafficking earned an estimated $17 billion to $38 billion a year just from wholesaling drugs to the black markets of the United States (Kellner and Pipitone 30). Mexico is a democratic country; however I have heard that the politics in the past have been deeply corrupt to the point where elections have allegedly been fixed for a particular candidate. When I asked Danielle how the widespread corruption affected her life in Mexico, if at all. She smiled: “It was great, at least for me, because everything could be acquired under the table for a price. You need a driver’s license? Do you want to take the test or just slide something under the table? Do you think there is no corruption here David? I prefer my corruption, Mexican style.” This was something that, besides being incredibly humerous, shocked me and indicated to me that the corruption is so widespread and ingrained into the culture that people have grown accustomed to it. I went on to compare it to how used to going to foreign wars we are here in American culture.

I wanted to know about the fear of these organizations and their relationship to Daniella. In her first interview she had told me, “indeed the drug cartels, they do horrible things. People go on with their day to day lives and the cartels leave them alone for the most part. We do not live in fear.” While I had believed her I had to ask her some follow up questions as she was there before things really had gotten bad.

The initial cartels that arose through Mexico’s new strategic position in the drug trade were different than those we are somewhat familiar with today. They played by what Kazi describes as “gentlemen’s rules.” They were not using such widespread violence and brutality to get their way. The initial method for success was to establish “networks of businessmen, politicians and journalists. Utilizing his position they built a network that didn’t need to use violence” (Kellner and Pipitone 30). One such cartel was named the Guadalajara Cartel. Cartels like this early player rose to power and flourished during the 1980s and the 1990s, during the time of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). “NAFTA made it easier to ship goods of all kinds across the border, Mexicans become the go-to distributors for Afghans, South Asians, Middle Easterner and anyone else looking to sell illegal substances to Americans” (Lawson).

In our second brief interview she agreed that she had not seen the worst of it when she was living in the middle class suburban area of Mexico City. She said, “my response was simply to serve as a model for the resilience of my people, the information you have presented me is truly shocking and I am blessed that it did not happen in my time growing up there.” She told me more recent stories of these atrocities perpetuated by the cartels happening in areas where friends and family lived. They had reflected an over-arching theme that I had discovered in my thorough research of the cartel phenomenon in the past three decades. . On paper, it appears that the initial pushes came from United States drug policy to begin with. In the year 1914, the U.S. Harrison Narcotics Tax Act succeeded in outlawing opium based products such as heroin and raw opium. This initially created a huge incentive for smugglers to take up the business (Zaitz). After the ban of heroin imports in 1922 by the U.S., smugglers set their sights on poppy-growing areas of Mexico. (Zaitz). Reflecting the market for drugs in the United States and with demand on the rise, traffickers of narcotics become more organized in the 1960s and 1970s in order to funnel Colombian drugs to U.S. consumers. (Zaitz). What finally solidified Mexico’s dominance over the smuggling routes to the United States was the move by the U.S. in the 1980’s that cut off Caribbean cocaine routes and eradicated the power of Colombian cartels (Zaitz). With the attention of the U.S. focused on Colombia, the Mexican drug rings began to gain significant power.

There are many factions that vie for control of a piece of Mexico’s drug trafficking business. Many smaller organizations are out there under the umbrellas of larger cartels. The cartels operate much like parent companies do in the business world with the smaller organizations acting as subsidiaries. The largest and most influential drug cartels or umbrella organizations in Mexico are as follows: The Sinaloa Federation, Los Zetas, La Familia Michoachana, and The Juarez Cartel. The two most powerful of these two are the Sinaloa and Los Zetas.

The Sionaloa is often considered the largest and most powerful in Mexico. It is “an alliance of several powerful drug lords that operates in dozens of countries. The cartel’s head, Joaquin “El Chapo (Shorty)” Guzman Loera, is one of the most-wanted drug barons in the world” (Kazi). It operates on a large scale using vast quantities of production and shipment to ensure profits for its business. An example of this is the 2011 discovery of a marijuana plantation covering the equivilant of 200 football fields. In addition it is known to be the main producer of methamphetamine in Mexico (Kazi). This cartel is known for buying off government and military officials rather than relying on pure brutality in order to protect its profit. This primary focus on bribery and corruption instead of violence sets this cartel apart from others (Kazi).

While the Sionaloa cartels primarily rely on bribes to get their way, Los Zetas use much more violent tactics. Los Zetas arose from the former Gulf Cartel, where they were its armed wing. They are “considered the most violent and ruthless criminal organization in Mexico” (Kazi). Most of the Zetas’ members were previously Mexican special forces troops who defected, are well trained, and highly organized (Kazi). They are responsible for a large number of brutal and grotesque killings (Kazi). This sets them apart from the Sinaloa who prefers to use bribes to get their way.

The level of violence and corruption that has brought about and been caused by the cartels is staggering. The result of which has been widespread and differing affects to the lives of Mexican citizens. The amount of murders surely has created fear in the average citizen. “During January and Febuary 2010, there were more than 1,500 executions according to Reforma. At this pace, Mexico may end this year with 9,000 drug related murders” (Kellner and Pipitone 33). Even smaller mountain towns are not safe from the sweeping power of the drug cartels that according to Lawson are, “essentially holding an entire nation at gunpoint.” A mountain town by the name of Auguascalientes was overtaken in 2007. Until that point it was a safe heaven and place of prosperity. Six months following an event signifying the start of the presence of the drug cartels, “11 Aguascalientes police officers had been murdered” (Kellner and Pipitone 33). North of Auguascalientes, a group of cartel members used automatic weapons and grenades to assault a police station in San Francisco de los Romo with the major inside (Kellner and Pipitone 34). This level of brazen violence has created a atmosphere in Mexico where no one feels sale. With groups like Los Zetas and other cartels having such influences they are even able to brazenly complete prison breaks and attacks on police stations (Kazi).

The Mexican drug cartels have risen from the black market created by the United States’ drug policy. They have become increasingly more sophisticated by organizing themselves to mirror huge multinational corporations. With their geographical position and competitors edged out, the cartels have created a monopoly on drug trafficking to the United States as well as the rest of the world. These monopolies play off the corruption of officials in Mexico and utilize extreme violence to intimidate, control and dominate their trade. The result is a nation that is under control by criminal organizations that have become more powerful than its government.

This record of cartel violence paints a truly ominous picture. It goes against the great passion that Daniella portrayed of her wonderful Mexican heritage. However it stands to reason that she grew up in a much different financial position than many other do in Mexico. As she had told me, “the majority of the jobs are agricultural and there are many poor farmers that live there.” It is no surprise that the cartels prey and recruit individuals who are not financially sound. People who need to take care of their families in ways that are more dangerous, illegal but very lucrative. However there is more to Mexico than the drug cartels and big beautiful family gatherings. As in most cases, everything is not black and white.

When I set out on the mission to educate myself about Mexico, I wanted to learn not only about the country and its history, but I wanted to learn about its people and its culture. At the end of the day what I found was two Mexico’s co-existing side by side. On one hand was the beautiful culturally rich Mexico full of great people, passion, and love. The other side belonged to the dark and secret Mexico that was corrupt and full of violent drug trafficking. From a functionalist perspective I would say that everything serves its purpose and comes together to make it a great and livable country. I am glad I know more about our neighbor to our south and hope to go on having a great relationship with Daniella my link to their culture.

Stastna, Kazi.“The Cartels behind Mexico’s Drug War.” CBC News,N.p. 28 August 2011. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.

Zaitz, Les. “Drug Cartels in Oregon: History of Mexican Cartels.” Oregon Live. Oregon Live LLC, 21 June 2013. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.

Flintoff, Corey. “A Look At Mexico’s Drug Cartels.” NPR. NPR, 16 April 2009. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.

Thomas, Kellner, and Francesco Pipitone. “Inside Mexico’s Drug War.” World Policy Journal Vol.27 Issue1: 29-37. Academic Search Premier. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.

Lawson, Guy. “How the Cartels Work.” Rolling Stone Issue 1087. 50-53. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.