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 Editorials | Issues | November 2006 
Fox Comment Underscores Views of Many
 Dane Schiller - Express-News
| | "We are already a step ahead, having been born in Mexico. Imagine being born in the United States oof!" Fox said with a chuckle, according to the Associated Press. |
When President Vicente Fox said Mexicans should be glad they weren't born in the United States, it was a reminder of an ugly little truth.
Aside from the U.S. economy, many Mexican citizens especially those still living in Mexico don't care much for the United States.
"We are already a step ahead, having been born in Mexico. Imagine being born in the United States oof!" Fox said with a chuckle, according to the Associated Press, after a remark that Mexicans should be thankful for their heritage.
The comment, made at a public event while Fox visited the central state of San Luis Potosν, raised some eyebrows in the United States but went all but unnoticed in Mexico.
That is because although millions of Mexicans risk their lives to sneak into the United States as undocumented immigrants each year, many see U.S. society and politics as troubled.
Mexicans often see America full of broken families, rampant drug use and unchecked materialism, run by a government that doesn't hesitate to go to war or meddle in the affairs of others a standing underscored by current events in Iraq.
"It is an incredible schizophrenia we live with we don't have a good perception of the United States, but we do cross the border," said Edna Jaime, a Mexico political analyst.
The U.S. Embassy in Mexico declined to comment.
Mexicans still point with anger to the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, under which Mexico signed away about half its territory, giving the United States most of what would become the American Southwest.
They also wonder why the United States would now want to build a wall along the border to keep out undocumented immigrants, yet the U.S economy is so reliant on their labor.
When it comes to illegal drugs, Mexicans see the United States as very willing to point the finger at Mexican drug cartels but unwilling to do more to reduce drug consumption among the American people.
"It doesn't surprise me Fox would say that at all," said Henry Dietz, a Latin American expert at the University of Texas at Austin.
"Part of it is envy, part disdain, part a need to separate themselves and maintain an identity that is not overwhelmed by the United States," Dietz said.
Among the most popular sayings regarding Mexico's perception of the United States is one credited to Mexican dictator Porfirio Diaz, removed from power by the 1910 Mexican Revolution: "Poor Mexico, so far from God and so close to the United States."
Despite the negative reputation of the United States, many Mexicans still see it as better than what they have at home.
"If Mexicans were so content here, why would millions of us try and go to the United States?" said Lino Chαvez, a Mexico City artist. "If you ask me, what Fox said is stupid. How could he say something like that?"
dschiller@express-news.net |
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