Culture Warriors category archive

There is much gnashing of teeth and flowering of fulminations over the desire of migrants from Central America to migrate northward, ultimately to the United States. Those who bemoan immigration, particularly immigration of persons with (ahem) darker skin and foreign accents, want them stopped, ofttimes forgetting that, a generation or two or three ago, persons who were already here wanted to forbid their own ancestors from arriving on these shores.

Aviva Chomsky reminds us that the United States is neither an innocent bystander nor a blameless victim in this current northward migration.

For the past century and a half, Central America has been subject to the whims of U.S. corporations backed by the U.S. government. In the 19th century, U.S. adventurers and filibusters invaded Central America, settled there and advertised the region as an easy route to the California Gold Rush. Starting at the end of the century, the United Fruit Company developed massive banana plantations along the Caribbean coast and established regular shipping routes in the region, taking advantage of cheap land and labor and creating a market for bananas in the United States.

(snip)

In Nicaragua, the Sandinista revolution succeeded in overthrowing the U.S.-supported Somoza dictatorship in 1979. Somoza’s corruption and violence had alienated even Nicaragua’s business classes, and a broad popular front implemented a mixed economy promoting popular organization, land reform and the socialization of basic services. But the Reagan administration saw this and similar revolutionary projects in El Salvador and Guatemala as stalking horses for communism. It helped Central American elites and militaries to overthrow governments and crush popular movements.

Aside:

Last night, at our DL gathering, we were discussing how persons once derided as “not white,” such as Irish and Italians, have been assimilated into whiteness. We wondered what group will be next.

In the December issue of Psychology Today, Jennifer Latson explores why smart people can believe dumb things, such as the notion that

• 5G cell towers cause COVID-19;
• the January 6 invaders of the Capitol were “Antifa crisis actors” pretending to be Trump supporters; and
• honesty about this nation’s racist history causes more racism.

A snippet; follow the link for the rest.

. . . studies show that some people are especially prone to these beliefs, even without the motivating uncertainty of a global health crisis. Researchers have found that this “conspiracy mentality” correlates with particular personality traits, including low levels of trust and an increased need for closure, along with feelings of powerlessness, low self-esteem, paranoid thinking, and a need to feel unique.

Follow the link for the rest.

At NJ.com, a woman describes witnessing first-hand an outburst of hatred against an aged man of Asian descent. It is quite appalling. But, in her article, I think she may have gotten to a nugget of truth:

People who target Asians or the Black or gay communities are weak, senseless sheep. They have no strong sense of their own culture, so they are building a new one founded on hatred toward others.

Follow the link and read the rest.