Mexican flag inside an American flag

Adaptándose de mal manera a la frontera

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EL PASO — Muchos socialistas frecuentemente se refieren a los países del mundo como “una gran familia”. Visto desde esa perspectiva, podríamos asumir que cada país, como si fuera una persona en la familia, tendría su personalidad propia y en el caso del continente americano, Estados Unidos juega el papel de el “exitoso” hermano mayor. Los hermanos mayores definitivamente son una de las primeras influencias en nuestra vida, para bien o para mal, en especial para los jóvenes sin guía como lo es México que en su adorar ciego del “sueño americano” ha perdido su propio sueño, rechazando su identidad milenaria y prostituyendo sus valores sociales. Irónicamente en la frontera México-E.U. donde altos muros intentan fútilmente separar la identidad de ambos países, se presenta el porcentaje más alto de mexicanos que adoptan una falsa identidad americana, creando así una tercera identidad entre dos países. Casi todos los países tienen fronteras con otro, pero no en todos los casos se presenta este mismo fenómeno.

Ernesto López Portillo. (Jaime Cervantes/Borderzine.com)

Ernesto López Portillo – El problema de seguridad en México radica en la producción de instituciones fallidas

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EL PASO ­– La tesis con la que introdujo López Portillo una conferencia este pasado jueves 7 de noviembre en la Universidad de Texas en El Paso fue simple: “Más seguridad, más derechos humanos.” Pero, pese a la simplicidad de esta propuesta, dijo que llegar a implementarla en un contexto mexicano sería sumamente complejo. El experimentado periodista y analista político López Portillo, junto con su organización Instituto Para la Seguridad y la Democracia (INSYDE) buscan promover una reforma estructural de la policía en México. López Portillo habló, entre otras cosas, de la vieja lucha por “recontextualizar” la agenda de seguridad en México, la cual actualmente es solo “un espacio para la reducción del ejercicio de otros derechos.”

Explicó en tono reflexivo que “México presenta una transición democrática fallida…pensábamos que elecciones libres y competidas nos darían gobiernos de calidad. Pensábamos que la posibilidad que se fragmentara el poder iba a dar competencia de gobierno para generar gobiernos de calidad. Pero hoy, la noticia que tenemos es que nos ha fallado la fórmula.”

Para López Portillo, el problema de la policía y la seguridad en México radica en una profunda crisis en la política mexicana que “está generando y reproduciendo instituciones fallidas.” Esta competencia por el poder sin reglas ha desorganizado al régimen político mexicano generando así vacíos de poder y “no hay vacío de poder que no sea llenado de alguna manera,” comentó.

A newspaper vendor at Hermanos Escobar Ave in Ciudad Juarez. (Jaime Cervantes/Borderzine.com)

Corpses on the front page boost the circulation of Juarez tabloid

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JUAREZ, Mexico – A few days after her 15-year-old son Juan was shot in the head by armed men, Mayra Carrizales remembers driving along a street in Juarez and glancing at a newsstand. She flinched when she saw the mocking front page headline in PM a Juarez tabloid – “Se lo descuentan!” which means “Wasted!” – and then she realized the picture beneath it was of her son’s bloody and battered face. “Every time I remember my boy, that photo pops out in my mind against my will,” said Carrizales, in Spanish during an interview in her home in the Las Torres neighborhood of Juarez. “It’s like somehow my memories of him had been tainted.”

Juan Nuñez was murdered in 2010, presumably by rival gang members who dumped his body in an empty lot near the Juan Gabriel freeway. To date nobody has been arrested.

Border reporters, Angela Kocherga and Hugo Perez, reporting from Boquillas, México. Kocherga was part of a panel of border journalists that shared their experiences covering immigration. (Courtesy of Angela Kocherga)

Experienced border journalists share tips for covering tough immigration stories

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EL PASO – Radio journalist Mónica Ortiz Uribe related how she was deeply moved when she witnessed the detention of a an undocumented woman from Guatemala who had crossed the border into Brooks County in South Texas with her two small children. “I had never seen an apprehension… that really struck me immensely,” said Ortiz Uribe. “She looked at me and I was standing with my microphone and my headphones, and she’s pleading saying ‘please tell them not to send me back’ and all of a sudden all this imagery exploded in my head… what has this women had gone through?”

With a chuckle, she added that she would never make it as a border patrol agent because “I’d probably have said to the woman, ‘No, no, váyase señora, váyase. It’s O.K. I didn’t see you.’”

Ortiz Uribe, who reports for the public radio news outlet Fronteras Desk, was one of four local journalists who cover immigration on an ongoing basis and discussed their experiences during a training workshop Immigration from the Border to the Heartland last week at UTEP for 20 radio, broadcast, online and print journalists. The workshop was sponsored by the McCormick Foundation and hosted by Borderzine.com.

(Javier Cervantes/Borderzine.com)

Occupy El Paso – A wimpy protest against an ambiguous foe

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EL PASO – The cold morning breeze of October blurs the historical Plaza of San Jacinto where a handful of people occupy the plaza in an act of solidarity, adopting a cause originated by one national feeling: inconformity. Occupy Together is undoubtedly the most important movement of the decade, spreading all across the country and some important cities around the world; and although Occupy El Paso is not as massive as in New York, or as aggressive as the Oakland (Cal.) movement, it is still a symbol that conveys the same message. For the past three weeks, San Jacinto plaza has witnessed how both workers and jobless rally against the unfair distribution of wealth in the U.S. From students drowning in a sea of debt to veterans from all the 20th and 21st century wars, the diversity of the crowd is vast. “I’m here because I truly believe that we actually can do something,” said Claudia, an Iraq War veteran who encountered a jobless country after the war. Like Claudia, I had experienced some of the same problems that started this movement; however, sincerely speaking I remain a little bit skeptical about the honesty of our petitions.