Cinco De My Ass

A sure sign that a large segment of the Hispanic population of the United States, if not the majority of them, are more Pro-Latino Nationalist than they and a good many of their supporters would like you to believe, is their obsession with the relatively recent, to America, phenomenon of the celelbration of the Mexican holiday of Cinco de Mayo. The political impications are obvious to me, given the current national mood and controversial nature of the illegal immigrant issue.

This is more than just a Mexican version of the Irish Saint Patricks Day, which has become as much an all around American tradition, in this country, as it is an Irish one. Cinco de Mayo reeks of Mexican nationalism, in fact that is what it openly celebrates. Ordinarily, I would not begrudge them this, as they certainly have a right to the holiday and the celebration of it, however way you slice it. I just can’t help but feel that an Anglo whose loyalties are unknown would be looked upon with suspicion by the masses of Latino celebrants, should he find himself in the middle of one.

Actually, I wonder just what the hell it is they are celebrating. Are they perhaps actually looking toward the future in a more symbolic way than they would care to admit? I know that question may itself reek of a sense of paranoia, but the situation being what it now is, I can’t help but wonder. Maybe I am reading too much into it. After all, probably most of the Latino population celebrates the holiday in an appropriately festive way, with no underlying feelings of anarchistic or rebellious attitudes. All perfectly innocent. But there is that undercurrent. Okay, call me a worry wart. Maybe it is all perfectly innocent, and maybe I should just lighten up.

On the other hand, what the hell are they celebrating? Unless I am mistaken, Cinco de Mayo is supposed to be a celebration of the Mexican rebellion against and overthrow of the French, who attempted to impose themselves on the people of Mexico, which they desired as a colony. I guess this relates to the capture and execution of Maximillian, a puppet king of Mexico, and descendant, I think, of Napoleon, who was installed by the French-or was it the Austrian Hapsburghs? Or was it both? Does it really matter? The Mexicans won that one, God bless ‘em. While they are celebrating that victory, maybe they might want to look anew at the way things turned out in the aftermath. Not too well, I tend to assume.

In fact, Mexico from that point on didn’t so much begin a long downhill slide, it had already spent a good many years in that precarious predicament. But from this point on, it was a sudden drop straight down to the depths. You are looking here at a nation that has spent almost the entirety of it’s independent history as a feudal fiefdom divided pretty much among a relative handful of wealthy families who pretty much control the nations wealth and infrastructure, and civil services, and agriculture, and what industry there is to speak of, and have continued to do so with the grip of an iron hand. Thank God for tequilla and mezcal, I guess, if you’re going to celebrate, you need something to help you forget you really don’t have a damn thing to party about.

It just don’t make any fucking sense. Not to me, anyway. A generalized celebration of Mexican culture, now that would be something I could certainly understand, no mystery there. But Cinco de Mayo? That makes about as much fucking sense as celebrating the overthrow of the Alamo.