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Posted on 04/13/2003 6:01:57 PM PDT by Houmatt
It is said, "The truth will set you free."
From my experience, and those of my opinion-sharing Latino colleagues, the truth just gets a lot of people mad at you.
Take, for example, the recent usage of the popular character "Hello Kitty" by political satirist Lalo Alcaraz in his nationally syndicated comic strip La Cucaracha. Aside from drawing Kitty with a decidedly Latino twist, a sombrero planted behind the ever-present bow, it was the text in the cartoon that animated discussion.
As with most of his work, Alcaraz's blunt assessment of life in the United States for Latinos and Latino immigrants doesn't purr so well with some readers. The strip in question depicted the children's character facing readers saying, "Mi nombre es "Hola Kitty"! (My name is Hola Kitty.) But I won't speak Spanish if it offends your ignorant narrow-minded ears!"
Well, it offended one reader enough to presume the cartoon was anti-white, and to send a letter to her local paper demanding the cartoon be removed for being offensive. To further underscore her contempt with the comic strip, she states, "I read the paper for information and entertainment, not to be offended."
Sometimes the truth is offensive. In fact, the truth of the matter is that offensive situations occur every day until someone says something about them. Then people either realize the injustices of the situations and try to rectify them, ignore them or, worse, believe they are nothing more than exaggeration. Alcaraz's "Hola Kitty" reminded me that it's no exaggeration that the Spanish language is threatening to some people.
About seven years ago, while helping to set up for my church's annual spring carnival, I ran into Richard. Richard was an elderly maintenance man who worked at the church. He also was Latino. Whenever I saw Richard, though he spoke English well, he would always greet me in Spanish, and we'd carry on a conversation in a language I knew he loved to share. On this particular morning, we were alone in the hall setting up tables and chairs and speaking in Spanish about everything planned for the day. All of a sudden, from the far corner of the room, a nasally voice shrilled, "Speak English."
I didn't see anyone nor could I believe that I heard right. So, Richard and I continued our conversation. A few minutes later the voice interrupted us again, and this time, I saw her. She was a fellow parishioner whose children were in my children's classes at school. I had always been conscientious of not speaking Spanish in front of those who could not understand. It's just bad manners. But the way this woman rudely yelled orders at us, from a distance, and assigned herself to be the language police angered me, and intimidated Richard. I reassured Richard everything would be fine and in a louder voice continued the conversation. She got the hint.
Whenever I draw attention to these injustices in my columns, I am labeled by some readers as a "whiner." I don't whine. I quit whining when as a teenager I saw my mother afraid to enter a private eatery because the sign above the door said, "No Jews, No Blacks and No Mexicans."
I quit whining when while working at a day care a man approached me offering to donate cribs. He said he and his wife were getting out of the day-care business because they didn't want to take care of Mexican infants. "You just don know where they've been," he reasoned.
I quit whining when I saw a young Mexican family, replete with a crying infant and toddler, leaving church and getting into their car only to have an Immigration and Naturalization Service agent hustle them into a van. He ignored the mother's pleading that the baby was on special medicine that was at home in the refrigerator.
I don't whine. I tell the truth. Imagine if I could draw, too.
Treviño, of Rowlett, Texas, is a contributing columnist with Hispanic Link News Service. She may be contacted by e-mail at mtrevino@airmail.net.
I don't think so.
I saw that the Chronicle was kind enough to mention Trevio's e-mail.
Are you thinking what I am thinking?
I don't buy the paper but do see a copy of it now and then.
This wouldn't be the first time that the creator of the strip has gotten flack for making racially insulting comments. I saw one strip that portrayed someone writting a letter trying to get them to drop the strip. The character's name was something like Johnny Whitecracker.
Boondocks recently had a strip that wasn't even a comic strip, just a protest statement against Bush (text printed over an approximation of a comic strip).
If Boondocks was the strip where you saw that "Johnny Whitecracker" business, then it shows you MacGruder's attitude towards those who write and voice their disgust at his bile.
And even if it was not, he is still an afthole who has gotten his fair share of well-deserved hate mail for the crap he pulls in that birdcage fodder he calls a comic strip.
So what did you think of Ms. Trevino's op-ed piece, anyway?
All of these strips are political and politically correct. There are only a handful of strips (5 or 6) that I read out of the Houston Chronicle's licensed strips. Ocassionally I do look at the others on the page (if I'm in a waiting room, etc.)
The author of this editorial appears to be all over the place and basically saying, "I'm above criticism".
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