Tag: mexico

Casa News: Tacos Trucks on Every Corner

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In case you missed it: mapmaking as empire-building, QBs protesting police impunity, and tacos on every corner…

If borders matter, then so do maps. Did you know that Palestine is not labeled on Google Maps? Read more on the importance of mapmaking in territorial and cultural conflicts.

The California legislature voted this week to give California farmworkers overtime pay for any work over 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week. Let’s hope Governor Brown signs the bill into law.

49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick refused to stand for the national anthem before a football game in protest of the oppression of people of color in the U.S. It’s inspiring when athletes actually use their power for good, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s defense of Kaepernick is worth a read. We stand [sit?] by Kaepernick’s decision. More info from SI and Jacobin on Kaepernick’s protest.

Trump met with Enrique Pena Nieto, Mexico’s president, this week. While we already wonder why Pena Nieto would take a risk like that with his already embarrassing approval ratings, more disturbing was Trump’s immigration speech from the same day. This NPR fact check sets Trump straight. Now if only he actually cared about facts.

And finally, this.

In case you were wondering, here’s what might happen if there really were #TacoTrucksOnEveryCorner. (Aside from everyone gaining 15 pounds and being 15% happier.)

Casa News

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A few links that caught my attention this week:

On the appropriation of reggaeton. Reggaeton has a huge place in my heart, and I got my start listening to Daddy Yankee. This piece reflects on the way reggaeton beats are now being used (or appropriated) in mainstream American music.

On the hope and faith of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border. Last summer, I spent four months working with deported and in-transit migrants at Kino Border Initiative soup kitchen in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico. It’s difficult to capture everything that experience taught me, but here, Father Sean Carroll captures some of what most inspired me, the hope and faith that migrants carry with them no matter what they’ve been through. Worth reading.

On Central Americans and asylum. This in-depth piece explains why, even though many Central Americans migrate to America fleeing violence, it’s so hard for them to gain refugee status.

On closing Guantanamo Detention Center. Obama finally releases plans to close Guantanamo Bay Detention Center, to mixed reactions. Yet closing the prison does not resolve the problem of indefinitely holding prisoners who have not even been charged with a crime.

Pope Francis’s tour of Mexico was a couple weeks ago now, but it’s worth remembering. (He called out Donald Trump! Thank you!) Here are 5 key moments from his trip in case you missed it.

 

 

Drugs, Guns, and the Outsourcing of Violence to Latin America

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A Los Angeles Times editorial by Iain Overton, an expert on U.S. gun culture, published this morning (read here) discusses the often overlooked international effects of domestic gun policy. As many Mexicans and Central Americans know, United States domestic policy often has a huge effect on these neighboring countries, perhaps nowhere more clearly than in drug policy and immigration policy. Continue reading →