When they conquered Mexico and took over half of Mexican territory, they refused to allow Mexicans to be Mexican. In adversely taking over Texas, they refused to allow its residents to be Tejanas and Tejanos. When Anglos conquered Hawaii, they refused to allow Hawaiians to be Hawaiian. When they took over Alaska, they refused to allow Alaskan Eskimos to be Eskimo. The list goes on and on.
Far from exaggeration, Anglo ill treatment of non-white people buoyed by its Manifest Destiny approach is shocking and their conquest follows a grim pattern of abuse. Their track record is consistently well recorded and speaks for itself.
Friendly Betrayal Essay 8
(Bilingualism and biculturalism in the making of Texas)
Try as they may, biased mainstream U.S. history writers have been unable to quite reach their ultimate goal – erasing all Spanish Mexican traces in the Southwest. How can this be, since Spanish Mexican roots in the Southwest run deep? Their signs are everywhere -- in the names of entire states, old towns, rivers, roads, deserts, and geographical regions?
Like traces of DNA, they dot U.S. maps thoroughly like faded patched-over patterns on an old quilt, ensuring that the memory of our ancestors endures. Similar to the proverbial skeleton in the closet, these phantom images haunt the Anglo Saxon telling of the U.S. Southwest history. Since mainstream historians have been unable to treat this part of history in a fair, cogent manner, they gloss over it as if it is immaterial and irrelevant in the recording of history.
No one topic provides a better example than the ranching and/or cowboy phenomena. To perpetuate the myth that they are Anglo Saxon creations, ethnocentric paperback novel writers, TV programming, and Hollywood movie producers have spent generations trying to lay claim to having invented them. However, no matter what they do, the echoes of their true origins come out loud and clear through the Anglos’ continued use of Spanish and Anglicized Spanish terms.
The truth is that as a result of massive propaganda efforts, most Anglos are unable to accept the origins of Spanish-named places and the Spanish Mexican people that put them there. When forced to do so, they merely mention Spanish names of places, but that is all. Although ancient Spanish Mexican footprints are everywhere, non-Hispanic white writers try to pretend that the Mexican culture presence is the result of recent immigration from Mexico. In fact, mainstream Anglo writers are quite effective in writing history only from the point of Anglo Saxon arrivals after 1836.
That brings up a curious fact: Many people in the U.S. have a strange fascination with outlaws. Why is that? The obvious reason is that it’s all the Anglo Saxons in the Southwest can call their own. When Anglos headed west, the region west of the Mississippi had already been “discovered” by the Spanish. Towns, regions, and rivers had been named; Spanish Mexican books and maps were available showing the Anglos from New England where to travel, etc.
Additionally, especially after the civil war, many of these European newcomers from New England were indeed bandits and ne’er do wells who had been driven west by the law. For that reason, the theme of how the west was won is one with an overabundance of outlaws, murderers, land grabbers, etc.
The successful narrow-minded attitude telling of U.S. history is one main reason that the Hispanic community in the Southwest has been kept out of mainstream society. Deliberately placed in a virtual caste system, they ended at the very bottom of all socio-political indicators. The school social studies curriculum, full of embellished Anglo Saxon myths, fails to include but the slightest mention that Spanish Mexicans ever existed in the Southwest.
Since 1836 Spanish-surnamed Texas school children have been deprived from learning of their rich history in the classroom, making them feel as strangers in their own land. As a result, some find it hard to believe the oral history of their elders, simply because as they see it, there is no evidence to confirm their stories in the books that they read about the Southwest or in the many movies that have been filmed depicting a very different version.
There is hope. In 2010, the state board of education has approved the inclusion of a few Spanish Mexican people and events in Texas history books beginning in school year 2011. This is the right thing to do for the right reasons. Hopefully, it will finally end the 175-year old Anglo grudge against Roman Catholic Spanish-surnamed Texans that began with the heavy mythical events at the 1836 Battle of the Alamo.
Friendly Betrayal Essay 9
(Spanish Mexican-descent Texans share equally in Texas history ownership)
The propaganda against Spanish Mexicans’ right to exist as a group in the U.S. continues. At one end, there are those who for reasons of survival have learned to suppress their “Mexican” heritage and claim very little of it. Usually well educated, they blend in mainstream society. As a defensive mechanism, they do not openly take pride the rich history of their ancestors. Embarrassed to the point that they don’t want to be targeted by racist taunting, they are unlikely to even discuss it. At the other end, there are those who are extremely proud of their past and wish to rediscover the rich history of their ancestors.
Therefore, there is a correlation between pride in one’s heritage and level of education. That is, the more that South Texas children learn about Spanish Mexican heroes in Texas history they didn’t know existed, the more their self-esteem will increase.
With this new sense of dignity, they will hopefully stay in school, graduate, and go on to be productive members of society. By the same token, the more that others know about early Texas history, the more they will learn about long-forgotten details of the true roots of this great place we call Texas. My book will hopefully help in that regard.
Friendly Betrayal Essay 10
(We didn’t cross the U.S. Mexico border; the border crossed us!)
The complex immigration issue continues to confuse many U.S. citizens. Because they are abysmally ignorant of Hispanic origins in the Southwest (New Spain), the distinctive Mexican-flavor community is now the target of daily attacks from far-right conservatives. The assaults are not recent developments. Vicious attacks have occurred many times in the past. They lay dormant for a while only to re-awaken at the beckon call of bigots. During times of economic turmoil, minority groups are blamed for causing the country’s troubles. Once again, the attacks against our Hispanic culture in New Spain continue unabated.
Totally unaware of Southwest history, the more vocal anti-Hispanic “conservative values” critics use the vibrant Mexican culture in the U.S. as the reason why immigration from Mexico must stop. Alarmed by the rapid growth of brown-skinned Texans, the leaders of the Texas Republican Party are now attempting their own version of putting their finger in the crack of their crumbling dike. Acting like arrogant school yard bullies, they push for laws whose only purpose is to intimidate both legal and undocumented Spanish Mexican people.
No other group has been more loyal to the U.S. than its citizens with Spanish Mexican (Mestizo) roots. Their work ethic is second to none and their patriotism is legendary as attested to by the large numbers of Mexican Americans being cited for their valor in battle. Honors include an incredibly high number of Medals of Honor. By the same token, no other group in the U.S. is more under suspicion by the same Anglo population in the U.S. than the Spanish-surnamed descendants of the first citizens of Texas and the rest of the Southwest. However, their loyalty is not mutually rewarded.
Specific behaviors that are known to turn many Anglos into frenzy is hearing Hispanics (l) speak Spanish, (2) celebrate Mexican holidays such as September 16th, and (3) referring to themselves as “Mexican” in any way, shape, or form. Accusations of “unpatriotic” and “Go back to Mexico” are often screamed by those who are ignorant of the long Spanish Mexican history in the settlement of the Southwest.
Unfortunately, many Anglos do not understand that Spanish-surnamed citizens value their U.S. citizenship dearly and have proven that they are willing to die for it. However, they are equally proud of th
eir “Mexican” culture. Therein lays the problem – many Anglos are unable to distinguish the word’s cultural and political use and meaning. That our long and rich history of faith, survival, and determination has been deliberately dismissed by U.S. historians with an Anglo Saxon slant for over 150 years has not helped.
In my view, there is a correlation between Spanish-surnamed U.S. citizens’ low self-esteem in the Southwest and the lack of Spanish Mexican contributions in U.S. history.
There is no doubt that the Spanish were the first Europeans to settle the Southwest. Nor is there doubt that after a tumultuous courtship, the newcomer Spanish and Native American residents of America were able to co-exist and then to strongly inter-marry.
The proof, of course, is the beautiful blending of Old World and New World bloodlines. Such a union created the modern-day Mexican people that populated the bottom third of North America and included what is now known as the U.S. Southwest.
Today, we call ourselves Californios, Nuevo Mexicanos, Tejanos, Mexicanos, Mexican Americans, and the like. We may have Spanish and other European surnames, but for many of us our indigenous roots make our skin brown. Created in the furnace of adversity, the brown skin that covers our bodies is also our American birth certificate.
Reflecting the strength of our indigenous ancestors, it is what ties us unmistakably to America, regardless of political boundaries. As such, most of us look like both our European and Native American ancestors. In contrast, most non-Hispanic whites in the U.S. look only like their English and Northern-European ancestors.
Generations before the arrival of Anglo Saxons, a system of Spanish Mexican settlements existed from the Gulf of Mexico, North to Colorado and west to the California Coast. They were all connected by the various segments of El Camino Real. In truth, it was these old Spanish-built roads that Anglos used in their way to win the west.
Yet, ever since the 1830s Anglo invasion of New Spain most all that is written about the Southwest is through the eyes of Anglo Saxon historians who instinctively perpetuate their Manifest Destiny take-over of America. In doing so, they inject a unique biased rendering of history from only their own ethnic Northern European perspective.
The Anglo perspective tramples on the truth as historians try to paint a make-believe mainstream version of history. The approach has been extremely successful in perpetuating a fantasy world, proving that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword. This narrow-minded attitude has found a way to white-wash the contributions of the original settlers; the Spanish and Mexican (Mestizo) people. Inspired by their Hollywood script frame of mind, they rationalize the complete takeover of America without reservation.
As a modern-day example of how history is skewed favoring the Anglo-Saxon conquest of America, we offer El Camino Real de los Tejas itself. Never one to miss a photo-op, a modern-day senator from Texas was instrumental in naming El Camino as a part of the national park system. In announcing the news, she pretended as if the trail begins at the Rio Grande, the modern-day political boundary of Texas and Mexico. As a matter of fact, the Texas portion of the Camino actually has its roots in Monclova, Mexico. The Camino trail actually begins in Central Mexico (Mexico City) and extends well North to Santa Fe and east to Louisiana.
As a matter of note, the first contact between Spanish Europeans and Texas tribes was in New Mexico. The Rio Grande, today accepted by some as if it has always been a set barrier, was actually one of many rivers that our Native American ancestors navigated in their vast terrain. Conversely, the Rio Grande is a river that our Spanish Mexican ancestors settled on both sides at least 100 years before Stephen F. Austin’s arrival.
The natural purpose and intent of the trail is completely lost on the politician. The national park designation reluctantly pays tribute to the “heritage” of the Tejas indigenous people, then abruptly jumps to declare that the honor was given because waves of Anglo arrivals “used” the Camino to begin their conquest of Texas in the mid-1830s. The act refers only to the physical location of the Camino in Texas and abruptly stops the trail at the Rio Grande, ignoring the fact that the Camino was a road system built by the Spanish. It began in Mexico City and meandered throughout the northern territory of New Spain including Texas.
In another heavy-handed attempt to mislead, Anglophiles attempt to make everyone believe that European-style civilization began with the Anglos’ arrival in Texas. In making the official announcement on the Camino’s new designation, the senator continued the long-standing ethnocentric telling of history and purposely omitted any mention of the builders themselves – the intrepid Spanish Mexican pioneers. Nothing is farther from the truth than that assertion. However, this particular politician is only mouthing the Anglophilia and Hispanophobia contained in mainstream Texas history books. That is the attitude that some of us are trying to change.
In writing this novel, I hope to record as much of oral history that mesmerized me as a young child. That God-sent awe of our inspired heritage is the motivation that propels me to put on paper the many stories I head as a child.
oOo
Appendix 1
“Tejas in the Beginning”
oOo
It is generally accepted that the first humans in Texas were the descendants of small groups of people who walked into the continent of America from Asia. Based on archeological evidence the first Americans originated about 60,000 years ago in Russia’s Lake Baikal area in the Siberian tundra. At 25 million years old, Lake Baikal is the oldest fresh water lake in the world. It is believed that about 20,000 to 40,000 years ago, the first Americans walked across Beringia, a frozen packed ice bridge covering the Bering Strait. However, no one seems to know exactly when.
Albeit based on DNA evidence, humans from these same groups were already living in the southernmost extremities of South America about nine thousand years ago. If that is true, then the question is how long did it take them to get there from the Bering Sea? Again, it is a “guesstimate” at best with most experts believing it took at least one thousand years to walk the entire length of the continent. Others estimate that it took somewhat longer.
Still, there are other diverse theories. One possibility is that the first humans came straight through from Asia by island-hopping through the Pacific Ocean. According to this premise, they landed on the American continental coastline anywhere from Northern California through South America. Supposedly, they then populated the land from there.
Another school of thought proposes a different island-hopping hypothesis. Small clans sailed their skin-covered boats in a clock-wise fashion sailing the coastline islands from China and the Japan Sea area through the Aleutians and dispersed into the huge Continent of America from there.
Not to be outdone, some Euro-centric historians claim that Europeans first settled America. While adding to the fascinating discussion, most of the proof points to the ancient Siberian people trekking through Beringia. All other theories have been proven to be unrealistic alternatives.
So, let’s go back to our basic two questions. How and when did the first humans get here? How long have people lived in this hemisphere? As to the first question, the land bridge theory is still the best answer. Some experts postulate that it may have been up to 40 thousand years ago. Again, no one is quite certain. It is an on-going debate and the jury is still out. Maybe one day we may have a better idea regarding the timeline details of this vital, first migration of humanity into the Continent of America.
One thing is clear. By being “first”, our ancestors who crossed the Bering Strait did not displace any other human group when they got here. They should be simply known as Americans, just as the people in the Continent of Europe are known as Europeans. The Siberians’ arrival in the pristine landscape may have been as close that a mass migration of human beings has come to finding an Eden-like location to call home.
Theirs was not an incursion of an aggressive army looking for plunder and ne
w territory to conquer. Nor was it a movement of great hordes. Rather, their arrival was in small groups of related and extended family clans.
Once entering the continent, it seems that the first Americans undertook a three-pronged approach. Closest in distance were the farther extremities of northern Canada. From there they proceeded toward the middle part of North America. They settled the west, east, and south segments. Eventually, they travelled all the way to the tip of Tierra del Fuego in South America. Those that stayed in the wide open spaces of what is now the U.S. organized themselves in a multitude of complex, separate tribes, each with their own language, culture, and territory. Further discussion on the uniqueness of some of these indigenous people follows later.
Based on commonly accepted research, the first humans approached foreboding Beringia in a continuous flow. At one time, it may have been the outer boundary in their several-day chases of migrating herds. Finally, small hunting parties journeyed into the terrain. Quickly learning that this land had more distinct seasons must have been a bonus. One can only imagine how our first American ancestors felt when they found out that they didn’t need the extra layers of animal skins to cover their bodies during hunting expeditions.
Likewise, they quickly found out that it didn’t snow all the time. They weren’t always walking on frozen ice, but on land. Their new home wasn’t as cold as the place they had left. They must have marveled at the vast exposed areas of earth and greenery. The different dimensions of beauty in the attractive flora and fauna were a welcome new experience. The splendor of the magnificent panoramic views surrounding them in present-day Canada must have put them in a state of awe. So special was this place compared to their old environment that their amazement must have certainly transformed into instant worship. That is, they most likely invented natural deities, such as Mother Earth, Father Sun, and so on. Mountain peaks certainly earned special treatment. Surely, in thanksgiving for their good fortune, they must have developed a number of subordinate deities.
Friendly Betrayal Page 19