The Zapatistas Break Their Silence: When will the Media Break Theirs?
Τετάρτη, Οκτωβρίου 11, 2006
Ένα άρθρο του διαδικτυακού "The Nation" (28/01/2003) από τον Tom Hayden
The Zapatista rebels in Chiapas defiantly broke nearly two years of self-imposed silence by taking over the streets of San Cristóbal de las Casas as the New Year began. More than 20,000 of Mexico's indigenous people, some traveling on foot for fifteen hours, poured into the plaza of the ancient colonial city. It was the equivalent of 100,000 of New York City's poorest people marching to Gracie Mansion from the farthest boroughs. The town's comfortable classes shuddered behind their shutters while thousands of machetes rang "like bells" and torches and bonfires lit the New Year's sky. Comandantes with colorful names ranging from "Esther" and "Mister" to "Bruce Lee" declared their determination to "globalize rebelliousness and dignity" against those who "are globalizing death."
This historic march went virtually unremarked in the US media. Apparently, many reporters and critics assumed that the Zapatista's prolonged media silence meant that the movement was finished. Mexican President Vicente Fox exploited the silence on several occasions to assure global investors that order was restored in Chiapas.
The San Cristóbal march reflected a considerable organizational achievement. Mayan communities have been destabilized by economic crisis, repression and violence over the past decade. Shantytown refugees have swollen the population of San Cristóbal to some 150,000, an increase of 500 percent since the 1970s. "In some Chiapas villages, the only residents are women, children and old men" because hundreds of coffee farmers are forced to migrate monthly, according to the chronicler John Ross. For the first time, gangs and graffiti are beginning to appear. Tens of thousands of Mexican troops continue to occupy the highlands and displace villages. Yet the Zapatista march showed the insurgents to be well organized and intact.
What explains the Zapatistas' prolonged silence? It seems to be an Indian custom the Zapatistas have incorporated. "In silence, the word is sown. So that it may flower shouting, it goes quiet," proclaimed a 1996 Zapatista declaration. The silence followed a peak of struggle in early 2001, when hundreds of thousands caravaned to Mexico City in hopes of influencing the government to guarantee Indian rights of self-determination. During the subsequent silence, the Zapatistas returned to local organizing in the nearly forty "autonomous municipalities" they represent in Chiapas. They also undertook a painstaking assessment of the Mexican situation, concluding that the whole economy was becoming one big maquiladora since NAFTA, with government plans for a free-trade zone, called the Plan Panama de Puebla, running through the very heartland of Zapatista resistance. On January 1, NAFTA was expanded further, with more tariffs lifted on North American imports of wheat, rice, pork and poultry.
The lifting of those tariffs expanded the growing resistance to NAFTA, which has been an economic disaster for Mexicans. While never mentioning or crediting the Zapatistas' warnings, New York Times headlines last year told the story: "In Corn's Cradle, US Imports Bury Family Farms" (February 26), "Free Market Upheaval Grinds Mexico's Middle Class" (September 4), "NAFTA to Open Floodgates, Engulfing Rural Mexico" (December 19). In the year 2000, half the Mexican population existed on $4 per day. The maquila industry, once marketed as the cure for joblessness, suffered a 21 percent decline in 2002, with 287,000 jobs disappearing.
The situation will become increasingly unmanageable as long as Washington insists on worshiping the gods of the free market with the same fervor that Hernan Cortés once brandished the Holy Cross. The accompanying silence of the North American media indirectly assists la guerra de baja intensidad (low-intensity warfare), which is the preferred strategy of the Mexican Army and its Pentagon suppliers. Also unreported was the Mexican government's seizure in December of ten tons of medical supplies and computers destined for Chiapas from religious groups in the United States and Canada.
The only news of the Zapatistas apparently fit to print in the New York Times was a January 1 report of rumors that never materialized. The Times's Tim Weiner wrote that Western embassy officials were urging tourists to flee an American-owned retreat ranch near Ocosingo that is listed as one of the top ten destinations in Mexico, according to the Lonely Planet tourist guide. The Zapatistas were allegedly planning to seize the charming resort. It could have been quite an international drama, but it turned out that the Zapatistas were only opposed to expanding the resort. Weiner also reported an "unconfirmed" rumor that the Zapatistas would seize a bridge over the Usumacinta River where a planned hydroelectric dam will flood indigenous communities and Mayan sites. But Weiner chose not to report the only event that actually happened: the march on San Cristóbal.
Weiner did report a war of words that broke out over the plight of Basques in Spain, between Subcomandante Marcos and a Spanish judge, Baltasar Garzón. Marcos alienated much of his intended audience by calling Garzón "a grotesque clown" for his harsh crackdown on Basque separatists. The judge, well-known for his legal pursuit of the former dictator Augusto Pinochet, challenged Marcos to a debate without his mask. Mexican intellectuals including Carlos Fuentes and Carlos Monsiváis condemned Marcos for being soft on Basque terrorism. The duel escalated as Marcos proposed the Canary Islands as a site and called on the Basque separatists to adopt a unilateral truce. Then the Basques criticized Marcos for not informing them of his initiative. Perhaps it was an unintended squabble, although Marcos views the Basques as the equivalent in Spain of the Indians in Mexico, and has written fables in which a beetle named Durito plans to invade Spain in a sardine can to reverse the Conquest. By January the war of words had faded. But the invisible conflict was escalating.
Posted by...Erwtas Stomaxhs at 12:56 π.μ.
Καλά, από σήμερα θα αρχίσω να ψάχνω στο δίκτυο για να βρω έστω μια φωτο αυτού του Κομαντάντε Μπρους Λη -δεν μπορώ να σκεφτώ τίποτα καλύτερο από επαναστατημένους με χιούμορ. Και ο Ντουρίτο, λέει, σχεδιάζει απόβαση στην Ισπανία με σαρδελοκούτι για να απαντήσει στους Κατακτητές; Άψογο!
Πάντως, η εμπλοκή του Μάρκος στο θέμα των Βάσκων αυτονομιστών δείχνει και τις ευρωπαϊκές αγκυλώσεις που καταδικάζουν κάθε προσπάθεια σε αποτυχία -σε αντίθεση με τη Λατινοαμερικάνικη απλότητα-αποτελεσματικότητα.
Στο δικό μου το μυαλό πάντως δεν έχει καμία σχέση ο αγώνας του Μάρκος με αυτόν των σημερινών (τονίζω των σημερινών, γιατί η οργάνωση έγινε επί Φράνκο για να χτυπήσει τη δικτατορία, αλλά στην πορεία άλλαξε σκοπούς) Βάσκων τρομοκρατών της ΕΤΑ. Που σκοτώνουν αθώο κόσμο αδιάκριτα, στα πλαίσια επίτευξης του στόχου της αυτονομίας ή όποιου άλλου...
Και μιας και το άρθρο μιλά για το San Cristóbal de las Casas, ακολουθεί ένα μικρό απόσπασμα από email που μου είχε στείλει πριν 6 χρόνια φίλη Μεξικάνα, όταν επισκέφθηκε αυτά τα μέρη.
"We are ok, a little tired after the driving it was 11 hours to get
from Puerto Angel to San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas...
We had some problems with the car and that make the trip much longer but it's didn't matter after the experience of been in El Cañón del Sumidero, this is an unbelievably beautiful place in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas.
It's a canyon and the Grijalva river runs in there. You take a
little boat that goes up the river to a big Dam, you can enjoy the
feeling of been so small because the mountains are so big... really
incredible! We visited a Zoo big as hell but plenty of exotic animals from the jungle!
Then we went up the mountains to San Cristobal de las Casas, it´s a
terrific town with cool weather and good restaurants and very
tranquil night life with pubs and music from the Marimba (tipical
instrument from Chiapas and Oaxaca).
Next day we went to your favorite, San Juan de Chamula, a small poor town as you know plenty of magic and wierd guys nativos, in a Catolic church drinking cokes and having a men's meeting inside the church talking to different Saints.
They have this belief, if they burp the sins goes out your body and soul, thats why they drink cokes... it´s amazing the way the beliefs and customs of the indigenos and the spaniards are mixed today!
They are indians (Chamulas) and so poor so they try to sell lot's of
crafts as soon you get off your car, they ask for your name and call you all the time 'till you buy something from them, kind of funny but mainly sad for the situation and the life standards of people in my country. I lie about my name i told them my name was Cuca but it was worse 'cause it sounds similar to pig in their language as I found out later! So you can imagine what happened...
One remarkable thing is in spite they have this army against the
goverment the place is peaceful and you can walk and enjoy Chiapas
freely and talk to the people and learn about their life, hopes, dreams, about their struggle to survive. We in the cities have really no idea."
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@Mboy lol
@juanita euxaristoume pou moirazesai mazi mas to mail ths filhs sou
Αυτή η ιστορία με το "θάψιμο" των Ζαπ. είναι για μένα κριτήριο για το πόσο "ανεξάρτητα" είναι τα λεγόμενα "εναλλακτικά" δίκτυα πληροφόρησης του Ίντερνετ. Και σ' αυτά, ακολουθείται η ίδια λογική παρουσίασης και επιλογής των ειδήσεων - μόνο που ο αυτοπροσδιορισμός τους ως "εναλλακτικών" τα καθιστά περισσότερο επικίνδυνα: τουτέστιν, όταν δεν δεις μιαν είδηση στην Washington Post, λ.χ., ξέρεις γιατί δεν την βλέπεις, αλλά όταν δεν την δεις στα "προοδευτικά" εναλλακτικά δίκτυα υποθέτεις ότι δεν υπάρχει...
A propos, τι έγινε με τις εκλογές στο Μεξικό; Το Σεπτέμβριο δεν επρόκειτο να ανακοινωθούν τ' αποτελέσματα??
Litsa diabazeis germanika?
an diabazeis ri3e mia matia sta links tou site "Chiapas gia germanoma8eis" 8a breis polles eidhseis kai epikaires!
Polu kalo site!
Βγήκαν οι ίδιοι με νοθεία Λίτσα. Κάπου είχα πετύχει κάποια άρθρα, αλλά δεν πρόλαβα να τα ποστάρω εδώ. Η juanita νομίζω είχε γράψει κάτι σχετικό -που είσαι juanita ακούς; Για βοήθα.
Συμφωνώ με τον Στομάχη (ρε γαμώτο, σταμάτα να μου παίρνεις τα σχόλια -βαλτός είσαι;). Για τους Βάσκους της ΕΤΑ, εγώ τουλάχιστον δεν έχω πλήρη εικόνα. Και όπου υπάρχουν διαμάχες οι οποίες στηρίζονται στον εθνικισμό ή σε θρησκευτικές δοξασίες (βλέπε και Ιρλανδία) είμαι λιγάκι σκεπτικιστής.
Πάντως, κάθε διαμάχη εξαρτάται από τους σκοπούς τους οποίους υπηρετεί, νομίζω. Γιατί, σε επίπεδο πρακτικής -ο πόλεμος είναι πάντα πόλεμος. Τρισάθλιος, φρικιαστικός αλλά πόλεμος.
Υ.Γ.: Λίτσα, με το σχόλιό σου εξηγείς μια χαρά γιατί ήθελα (θέλαμε;) να ασχοληθούμε με τους ζαπατίστας και την Τσιάπας.
Mprabo, etsi etsi!
http://mx.news.yahoo.com/
http://www.terra.com/noticias/americalatina/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/spanish/latin_america/default.stm
http://ipsnoticias.net/latam.asp
http://www.science.oas.org/rlq/noticias_en_AL.html
http://www.efe.com/
http://www.prensa-latina.org/
http://www.notimex.com.mx/w/voto/index.htm
http://iarnoticias.com/directorios/titulares/americalatina.html
http://www.26noticias.com.ar/
http://www.univision.com/content/channel.jhtml?chid=3&schid=181
http://noticias.aol.com/americalatina
Λίτσα, για τις εκλογές στο Μεξικό ρίξε μια ματιά εδώ
http://juanitalaquejica2.blogspot.com/2006/09/blog-post.html
Εντάξει, αυτό δεν είναι μπλογκ -είναι κόμβος πληροφόρησης. Ευχαριστούμε ρε (ελπίζω τα λινκς που έβαλες να μην είναι όλα στα ισπανικά -δυο μαθήματα έχουμε κάνει μόνο).
Στομάχη, όχι δεν διαβάζω γερμανικά (δεν μπορώ να τη μάθω αυτή τη γλώσσα, πάει και τελείωσε).
Mboy - θέλαμε, χρυσό μου, γιατί αναρωτιέσαι;
Juanita - αγαπώ juanita για όλα τα Links - με τα διαβάσματα και τις βλακείες έχασα πολλά επεισόδια.
Και να θέσω ότι ΠΟΛΥ χαίρομαι που αυτό το blog ΕΙΝΑΙ Κόμβος πληροφόρησης!!
Κάποια πρέπει να υπάρχουν και στα αγγλικά. Ομολογώ το έγκλημά μου, τα συγκεκριμένα είναι στα ισπανικά. Σε δυο χρόνια θα τα παίζετε στα δάχτυλα motorcycle boy!
Καλά, περίμενε να αντέξω τόσο πολύ. Από τη στιγμή που θα μπορώ να διαβάσω ένα βιβλίο που θέλω -adios amigos.
Αυτό το ποστ μάζεψε ασυνήθιστα πολλά σχόλια και τα διαβάζω με δόσεις. Αν είναι να πω κι εγώ τι αγαπώ -ε, αυτό είναι να βλέπω τη Λίτσα να κουβεντιάζει με τον Στομάχη. Και μου λείπει πολύ να σας βλέπω και όχι να σας διαβάζω.
Εκεί που είσαι Motorcycle Boy δύσκολα θα πεις adiós. Ένα hasta pronto και πολύ είναι, θυμήσου τα λόγια μου. Πόρωση σου λέω...
Ρε άσταδιάλα. Με συγκίνησες ρε άτιμε...
KTFB!
juanita μακάρι -αλλά είμαι σκράπας γενικώς.
Στομάχη, το Σάββατο ρε.