Chiapas Support Committee
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New EZLN Communiqué: THEM and US
December 21, 2012 March in San Crtistóbal
THEM AND US
I. – The (lack of) reasons from above.
January 2013
Those from above say:
“We’re the ones who make the rules. We’re more powerful, although there are fewer of us. We don’t care what you say-hear-think-do, as long as you are mute, deaf, immobile.
“We can impose halfway intelligent people in the government (although they’re already getting to be difficult to find within the political class), but we chose one who can’t even pretend to know what he’s talking about. [1]
“Why? Because we can.
“We could use the police and military apparatus to persecute and jail real criminals, but those criminals are a vital part of us. Instead, we choose to persecute you, beat you, detain you, torture you, jail you, kill you.
“Why? Because we can.
“Guilty or innocent? Who cares if you are one or the other? Justice is just another whore in our little black book, and believe us, it’s not the most expensive one.
“And even if you follow the rules that we impose to the letter, even if you don’t do anything, even though you might be innocent, we will squash you.
“And if you insist on asking why we do it, we’ll respond: because we can.
“That is having Power. A lot is said about money, riches, and those things. But believe us when we say that what excites us is that feeling of being able to make decisions about anyone’s life, liberty, and assets. No, power is not money; it’s what you can have with it. Power is not just exercising it with impunity; it is also and above all, to do it irrationally. Because having Power is to do and undo without having any other reason than the possession of Power.
“And it doesn’t matter who stands out in front, hiding us. Right and left are only references so that the chauffeur can park the car. The machinery runs itself. We don’t even have to order them to punish the insolence of defying us. Large, medium, and small governments all over the political spectrum, as well as intellectuals, artists, journalists, politicians, and religious leaders fight over the privilege to please us.
“So fuck you, screw you, rot in hell, die, get discouraged and give up.
“To the rest of the world you don’t exist, you are no one.
“Yes, we’ve sowed hate, cynicism, rancor, desperation, theoretical and practical don’t-give-a-fuck, conformity with the ‘lesser evil,’ fear turned into resignation.
“And, nonetheless, we fear that which has transformed itself into organized rebellious rage, without a price tag.
“Because we control, manage, ration, and feed the chaos that we impose. Our ‘law enforcement’ forces impose our chaos.
“But the kaos [2] that comes from below…
“Ah, that… we don’t even understand what they say, who they are, how much they cost.
“And they’re so rude that they don’t beg, await, request, plead–instead, they exercise their freedom. Have you ever seen such obscenity!
“That is the real danger. People who look on the other side, who leave the mold, or break it, or ignore it.
“You know what’s really worked for us? That myth about unity at all cost. To only understand oneself with a boss, leader, ruler, or whatever they call themselves. Controlling, managing, containing, buying one is much easier than many. Yes, and cheaper. That and individual rebelliousness. It’s so wonderfully useless.
“Rather, what’s really dangerous in a true chaos is when every one becomes a collective, group, crew, raza, organization, and they learn to say ‘no’ and ‘yes,’ and they reach agreements amongst themselves. Because the ‘no’ is directed towards those of us who give the orders. And the ‘yes,’… geez… that really is a disaster. Imagine if everyone built their own destinies, and they decided who to be and what to do. It would be like pointing out that we’re expendable, excessive, that we get in the way, that we’re not necessary, that we should be in jail and that we should disappear.
| Art: Bansky |
“Yes, a nightmare. Yes, of course, for us. Can you imagine how bad that world would be? Full of Indians, blacks, browns, yellows, reds, dreadlocks, tattoos, piercings, studs, punks, goths, cholos, skaters, that ‘A’ flag without a nation to buy it, youth, women, whores, children, the elderly, zoot suiters, drivers, peasants, workers, tacky people, proles, poor people, anonymous people… others. Without a privileged space for us, the ‘beautiful people’ [3]… or, so you understand us, the ‘good people’… because we can tell by the way you talk that you didn’t study at Harvard.
“Yes, that day would be night for us… Yes, everything would be ruined. What would we do?
“Hmm… we hadn’t thought about that. We think, we plan, and we execute what to do so that it doesn’t happen, but… no, that hadn’t occurred to us
“Well, in any case, well….hmm… I don’t know… perhaps we would look for who to blame, and then, well, we’d look for, I don’t know, a Plan B. Of course by then it would be useless. I think that then we would remember what that damn red Jew said…no, not Marx… Einstein, Albert Einstein. I think it was him who said: ‘Theory is when you know everything and nothing works. Practice is when everything works and no one knows why. In this case we have combined theory and practice: nothing works… and no one knows why.’
“No, you’re right, we wouldn’t even be able to smile. A sense of humor has always been a patrimony that cannot be expropriated. Isn’t that a shame?
“Yes, without a doubt, these are times of crisis.
“Hey, aren’t you going to take pictures? I mean, so we can fix our hair and put on something a little more presentable. Nah, we already tried that in ‘Hola’ [4]… oh, but what are we saying, it’s obvious that you haven’t gotten past [the comic book] ‘El Libro Vaquero.’
“Oh, we can’t wait to tell our friends that someone so… so… so… other came to interview us. They’re going to love it. And, well, it’s going to make us seem so cosmopolitan…
“No, of course we’re not afraid of you. Regarding that prophecy… bah, it’s superstition… so… so… native… yes, so Region 4 [5]… hahahaha…what a good joke, let’s write that down for when we see the kids…
“What?… It isn’t a prophecy?…
“Oh, it’s a promise…”
(…) (the tee-tu-ta-ta-tatatata sound, from the smartphone)
“Hello, police? Yes, I’d like to report that someone came to see us. Yes, we think he was a journalist or something. He looked so… so… so other, yes. No, no, he didn’t do anything to us. No, he didn’t take anything. It’s just that, as we were leaving to go to the club to see our friends, and we see that someone has painted something on the entrance to the garden. No, the guards didn’t see who it was. Of course not! Ghosts don’t exist. Well, it’s painted with a lot of colors… No, we didn’t see any paintcans nearby… Well, as we were saying, it is painted with a lot of colors, so colorful, very tacky, very other, not anything like the galleries where… what? No, we don’t want you to send a squad car. Yes, we know. But we’re calling to see if you can investigate what the painting means. We don’t know if it’s a code, or one of those strange tongues that the proles speak. Yes, it’s just one word, but we don’t know why it makes us shudder. It says:
“MARICHIWEU!'”[6]
(to be continued…)
From any corner of any world,
SupMarcos, Planet Earth, January 2013
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Listen to and watch the videos that accompany this text:
a.- Pachuco
“Pachuco,” by La Maldita Vecindad y los Hijos del 5to Patio. Video is from the perspective of “from below,” that is, in the middle of the mosh pit. The moral of the story: don’t record while you’re on the trampoline. And what the heck, Maldita? Don’t be so idem and get it together. Or what, you’re just going to leave la raza to the mercy of the Justin Beibers of the world? Fine, greetings from Solin, because you guys really did understand that the communities are pure Kalimán. [7]
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b. -“More for your money.”
“More for your money.” Written and directed by Yordi Capó. Guadalajara, Mexico, August 2003.
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c. – “Of rats and cats.”
Cartoons based on the words of Thomas C. Douglas (1904-1986).
Translator’s notes:
1. Referring to President Enrique Peña Nieto, who is turning out to be at least as inarticulate and factually challenged as George W. Bush.
2. Marcos wrote “chaos” with the letter “k” in Spanish: “kaos.” Like Anglophone anarcho-punks and other rebellious youth, Mexico’s young rebels often replace the “c”s in certain works with “k”s in the written language.
3. “The beautiful people” is written in English in the original. Bourgeois Mexicans like to sprinkle English words and phrases into their vocabulary.
4. Hola! is a Mexican magazine for women. It featured exclusive photos and interviews regarding current president Enrique Peña Nieto’s fairytale wedding to soap opera star Angelica Rivera.
5. Region 4 is the DVD region code for Mexico, Central America, South America, the Caribbean, New Zealand, Australia, Papua New Guinea, and much of Oceania. Mexico also uses Region 1, the region code for the US and Canada.
6. A Mapuche phrase that means “we will win one hundred times over.”
- “Pachuco” means “zoot suiter” in Mexico. Marcos uses a lot of Mexico City slang here and is making reference to another Maldita Vecindad song called “Solín,” which is about a poor man who reads about Mexican comic book hero Kalimán and decides to change his name and make a living as a carnival psychic. Maldita Vecindad is a classic Mexican ska/punk band that has supported many Left causes since the band’s inception in the 1980s. The band is still popular and active, but they haven’t put out an album in years–much to Marcos’ chagrin, apparently.
Translation from the original Spanish: Kristin Bricker
Marcos: Post-Scripts to the Cartoon
PUTTING OUT THE FIRE WITH GASOLINE
(Post-script to the cartoon)
January 11, 2013
P.S. For you most enlightened ones—So you don’t know to whom I was referring [in the cartoon] because you don’t watch television? All right, you are all so very erudite, and you will have nothing to do with lowly popular culture, although… you don’t know who Umberto Eco is either?
P.S. ON GENERAL SPORTS CULTURE IN GENERAL—Lionel Messi, Argentinean; plays soccer for the Spanish team Barcelona. When he’s not making commercials for name brand bread, he’s suspected of having, just like the much-missed Memín Pingüín, gum on his shoe, because the ball sticks to his foot and only comes off when either they take him down (Messi that is) or when the ball is deep in the net.” Cristiano Ronaldo, Portuguese, plays soccer for the Spanish team Real Madrid; also known as CR7; when he’s not making commercials for deodorant, he makes good goals. For more information about soccer as a business and as pleasure (for example: Pelé versus Garrincha), see Eduardo Galeano… hmm… you do know who Eduardo Galeano is, right? And for me, neither Barcelona nor Real Madrid, I’m for the Jaguars of Chiapas, [i] in Mexico, and for the Internazionale of Milán in Italy (I just read that they’ve been routed, it has to be because of the visitors’ jersey they’ve been wearing). But the Zapatistas remain firm, we’re like the real fans of the Pumas [ii] (greetings to the Rebel), who are with their team win or lose, even though among the ownership of that team are people like Joaquín López Dóriga and Carlos Slim; or like the fans of América [iii] (greetings to La Polvorilla) that, when they are told that they are hated they reply, “hate me more”; or like the fans of la maquina azul,[iv] who put bags on their heads when they are ashamed but who never stop supporting their team; or like those who support Atlas[v] (greetings Jis and Trino) and are still behind their team, though it doesn’t even need to be said; etc., etc. Yes, I already know you’re going to say that soccer is the opiate of the masses and why am I promoting such alienation, such lack of culture, blah, blah, blah.
P.S. THAT GIVES GEOGRAPHY LESSONS—Mexico City, Federal District, Mexico. Places where you can find, at a very reasonable price, any television series (including episodes that haven’t come out yet), or movie (in some places you can get Oscar-nominated ones, before the committee of the Academy of Cinematic Arts and Sciences of Hollywood has even met), without having to betray your principles of not watching television: Eje Central “Lázaro Cárdenas” (formerly known as “San Juan de Letrán”); Pericoapa; Tepito, Calzada de Tlalpan; any entrance or exit to the metro; the hallways of any department at the UNAM; any corner of any neighborhood; if you want the originals, then you can go to the Ghandi (greetings to the family of Don Mauricio), El Sótano, or El Parnaso bookstores… El Parnaso closed? (An embrace to Tony), that’s a shame. Ok, ok, ok, I know, but the world has more corners than your favorite Mixup. [vi] Note: don’t be surprised if when you go to get these DVDs you see police extorting the vendors or trying to evict them “because they make the city ugly.” Or if you see a confrontation, don’t be alarmed, the wretched tend to resist.
P.S. THAT GIVES ADVICE TO THOSE GOING TO THE IFE [FEDERAL ELECTORAL INSTITUTE] TO REGISTER[vii]—Maybe it would go better for you in the elections if instead of judging los muertos de hambre[viii] (the most tender term they used during the case of the prepaid cards) that didn’t vote for you, you tried to understand them. But in any case, the millions of Mexicans who did vote for you can tell you who each of the above mentioned characters and television series are.
P.S. THAT EXAMINES THE SUSPICIOUS AFFIRMATIONS REGARDING THE EZLN—A good part of the arguments that they use to criticize us are the same arguments that were used by the big television conglomerates, commercial radio, and the poorly named “bought-off press” from 1994-95 to date.
P.S. THAT SUGGESTS, INSINUATES, OR, AS SOME SAY, PROPOSES A SUPOSITORIO [ix]—Possible route that the “caricatured debate” would have followed (of course, minus the young female assistant that so impressed Mr. Quadri):[x] those alluded to respond with a cartoon where the Sup is taking it easy, scratching those things that have gotten so expensive,[xi] belly out and stuffing himself with junk food, watching television (probably not with the logo Televisa logo, because they’re very careful not to insult TV Azteca—ah, and you didn’t see us accusing them of being paid by Salinas Pliego or Carlos Slim,[xii] or saying that their campaign against the workers at Soriana was paid for by Wal-Mart), with the dialogue bubble saying something like “I’m preparing my next communiqué.” The Sup then counter-attacks with another cartoon titled, “The Recent Past” where he is in a wheelchair and the indigenous person in front of him says, “The compas say they are ready, that it’s up to you now and you know what to do.” And the Sup responds, “Okay, I need to talk to Elías Contreras to have him get me some DVDs.” The press and their friends wouldn’t print the cartoon, but rather would start with reflections like “Is the Sup handicapped and that’s why he doesn’t appear publicly?” followed by some “very serious” investigations on the possible illnesses that might lead to being in a wheelchair.
P.S. THAT GIVES LESSONS ON RACISM IN COMMUNICATION—I read in various places “EZLN yes, Marcos, no” and that they want to hear the indigenous Zapatistas, not the egomaniacal Sup. Okay, here goes: The last time the Sup put out a communiqué in the name of the EZLN: May 2011, on the occasion of the march in support of the just and dignified movement headed by Javier Sicilia. The communiqué from the CCRI-CG of the EZLN sent greetings to the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity and its struggle for the victims of the Felipe Calderón Hinojosa’s absurd war. Between May 7, 2011 and December 21, 2012, the Juntas de Buen Gobierno [JBG, the Good Government Councils], that is, the indigenous Zapatistas WITHOUT INTERMEDIARIES that are mestizo, white, or bearded (or other common things critics like to add), put out 27 denunciations, all tweeted and facebooked (or however you say that) on the “Enlace Zapatista” webpage. On average, the 27 denunciations were visited/read 1500 times each, and all of them were on the main page of the EZLN website for various days.
For example, the August 15, 2012 denunciation of the Junta de Buen Gobierno of La Realidad was the principal article on the Zapatista web page for 24 straight days and got 1080 visitors/readers. Number of tweets (or however you say that) that it provoked: zero. Number of journalists that “wrote up” the denunciation: one. Number of comments about it in writings by intellectuals, zero. Number of re-tweets (or however you say that): zero. Number of comments accusing the EZLN of being a creation of Salinas de Gortari: zero. Number of reflections about why the EZLN only appears in electoral seasons: zero. Number of newspapers that published in their print version the denunciation: zero. Of course, the text of the JBG denounced the alliance between state and municipal governments and the PVEM and the PRD to attack Zapatista communities.
Number of visits to the Sup’s cartoon that so offended the enlightened ones: more than five thousand visits in less than 48 hours (in addition to the tweets—or however you say that—the pingbacks—or however you say that—the cut and pastes, etc.).
Now, take a look at the period from August of 2003, the year in which the Juntas de Buen Gobierno were formed and when they become the direct spokespersons of the Zapatista communities, and see how many times they speak, in their own words and without intermediaries. Do the math of how many times you all realized that this word even existed. Okay, now, yes, write about the “suspicious” silence of the Zapatistas and ask yourselves why the Zapatistas and Marcos only “appear” when the PRI, which never left, comes back.
P.S. THAT TWEETS (or however you say that) ABOUT THE EZLN:
Tweet 1: “The Zapatistas are those who, in bullfights, root for the bull.
Reply 1: “Well they’re naïve, in the end, the bull always gets killed.”
Tweet 2: “Not always.”
Reply 2: “The flowers are always for the bullfighter, not for the bull, the Zapatistas are confused.”
Tweet 3: (annulled for exceeding 140 characters): The political parties fight over who will be the bullfighter: some say it is better that the picadors wait longer to come out and thus facilitate the work of the bullfighter; others say that one must be merciful and offer spiritual comfort to the bull before it is sacrificed; others say that what you have to do is lower costs so that the bull-fighting administration isn’t so burdensome; others say “by how much?”
Reply 3: (There isn’t one because tweet 3 didn’t go through).
Tweet 4: “Bull fights are going to disappear. In the meantime, the Zapatistas applaud the bull even more when, despite its wounds, it manages to take down the bullfighter.”
Response 4: (There isn’t one, they all went to bed).
The P.S. continues tweeting (or however you say that). After awhile, someone realizes that they’re still there and replies, “How come you only appear in suspicious situations?”
The end?
P.S. THAT NOW DOES NOT EXCEED 140 CHARACTERS (I think): “Durito: the Zapatistas are like Doctor House: they are almost always correct in their diagnosis and treatment, but the majority don’t like their methods. And we won’t even mention the patient.
P.S. THAT CLARIFIES: We have read you closely. We see how, when one of you dissents from another, you accuse each other of “pejezombie” or of “televiso” or derivatives of the same.[xiii] We don’t think that differences necessarily have political affiliation. For example, when someone says “the EZLN is an invention of Salinas de Gortari,” we don’t think that person is necessarily a “troll,” a pejezombie, a televiso, or a tvazteco (or whatever names they throw at each other). It could be, we think, that this is just a case of someone with a low IQ, too lazy to read more than 140 characters, or who might be trying to hook up with someone who has already said the same thing.
P.S. THAT CHALLENGES GEOMETRY: The world is round, it turns, and it changes. But the world imposed by those above, no matter how many times it turns, always leaves us on the bottom. The world that we want is also round, it also turns, and it also changes, but nobody is above at the cost of those below.
P.S. THAT CALLS UP A BIT OF MEMORY: While a part of the enlightened left was still doing juggling acts to try to give theoretical foundation to the unfortunate occurrence of the “loving republic”[xiv] and was living a torrid honeymoon with the mass media (dedicating huge quantities of money to electronic and print media publicity), the students that would become known as “#yosoy132” had already denounced the role of the mass media in Mexican “democracy.” Later what happened happened, and that same enlightened left decided it wanted to become the mentors of these young rebels (or “trouble-makers” as they now call them). But since the young rebels are no longer in style, the enlightened left has forgotten about them, claiming that these young rebels have “missed their chance” or that they “made a lot of noise but didn’t achieve anything,” or that they’re just “Starbucks revolutionaries” (or however you say that), or “that you can’t change the world with a smartphone” (or however you say that). The calendar continues bleeding itself out and suddenly, they [the young people] will come back, stronger, more numerous. And those that now forget about them or criticize them will say, “of course, I knew they hadn’t disappeared,” or, “now I’m going to tell them what they should do.” Although there are others who will say “it’s very suspicious that you all appear when something is happening.”
P.S. THAT SHOWS ITSELF TO BE COMPREHENSIVE: No problem, we understand. We are “that” which, at home and at school, would provoke the following recommendation of parents, friends, and other sensible and decent people: “you shouldn’t hang out with those people, there’s a lot of talk about them.” And well about the Sup what can I tell you, it would be something like, “it’s not a good idea to associate with that man, we don’t even know who he really is.” Or, “it’s one thing is to help the poor little Indians, it’s something else entirely to associate yourself with that rabble who don’t even have cell phones, much less smartphones, not even a hand-me-down.
P.S. THAT WINKS: “Nerd is hot.”
P.S. ABOUT THE MILLIONS AGAINST THE THOUSANDS, OR HUNDREDS, OR DOZENS, OR FEW: The argument of majorities against minorities tires us, it reminds me of an old graffiti (or however you say that) on an old wall that I saw when I was old. With a symphony of colors, it dictated: “Eat shit. Millions of flies can’t be wrong.”
P.S. THAT COUNSELS PATIENCE: Oh, don’t despair. Just a few more words (or drawings, or audios, or videos) and soon only those who we are really interested in as interlocutors will be able to hear and understand us.
Vale. Cheers and, believe us, we understand: there are many reasons and not-reasons to ground cynicisms, apathies, to hell with it all, or whatever other synonyms that occur to you; there are many, too many, they are all there is. Finding reasons in order to change and improve is a job very few are willing to take on.
The Sup trying to get a “Fatality”[xv] package for the final words of the season.
(you’re kidding… now he’s going to come out with videogames).
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Traducción del Kilombo Intergaláctico
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[i] The Jaguars are a first division Mexican league soccer team, based in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas.
[ii] Another Mexican league team, based at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
[iii] América is a Mexican league soccer team based in Mexico City.
[iv] Maquina azul (literally the blue machine) refers to the Mexican league soccer team Cruz Azul, based in Mexico City.
[v] Atlas is another first division Mexican league soccer team from Guadalajara, Mexico.
[vi] Mixup is a chain record store.
[vii] “Those going to the IFE to register” refers to the newly formed party of MORENA [Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional] that seeks official recognition as a party from the Mexican electoral system.
[viii] “Los muertos de hambre” was a pejorative term used by supporters of the institutional left to refer to those who were suspected of voting for the PRI in exchange for prepaid debit cards to use at popular chain stores.
[ix] “Supositorio” could imply presupposition but also means “suppository.”
[x] During a one of the presidential debates that took place in 2012, candidate Gabriel Quadri was captured on camera ogling a young female presenter.
[xii] Two Mexican businessmen who are on the Forbes list of richest people in the world.
[xiii] “Pejezombie” refers to those who are thought to unconditionally support Andrés Manual Lopez Obrador. “Televiso” is the pejorative reference to those who support Enrique Peña Nieto, a creation of the Telvisa media machine.
[xiv] This refers to the “la república amorosa” (Beloved Republic) slogan used by Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador during the presidential campaigns.
[xv] “Fatality” refers to the third installment of the “Mortal Combat” video game.
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Above is the English translation (with minor edits by the Chiapas Support Committee) on the Enlace Zapatista website. The title can also be translated as “Adding Fuel to the Fire” or “Throwing Fuel on the Fire,” a common expression in English.
Marcos Responds to Cartoon Critics
“If the Sup Doesn’t Speak, the EZLN Doesn’t Exist for the Media or the Politicians”
** In a new communiqué Marcos attempts “to throw fuel on the fire” from his graphic letter
** He also criticizes those who accuse the Zapatistas of being an invention of Carlos Salinas de Gortari
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
In a series of 16 “post-scripts to the graphic letter” published Thursday, Subcomandante Marcos now appears “throwing fuel on the fire.” And he proves, with data, in the new communiqué, that if he doesn’t speak, the EZLN and the rebel communities “don’t exist” to the media, the political class and public opinion (come in a tweet or in whatever). He also continue responding to his critics with soccer information, tips for navigating in the seas of piracy in Mexico City, ironies about television, print media, social networks and the partisan left.
One of these PS “gives advice to those who go to the IFE to ask for registry:” “Perhaps it would go better for you in the elections if instead of judging ‘the deaths from hunger’ (it is more tender than what you told them in the case of the pre-paid gift cards) that didn’t vote for you, you try to understand them. But okay, millions of Mexicans who did vote for you, can explain who are each one of the mentioned characters or series” (in the cartoon published by La Jornada, 01/10/13).
Further on, the Subcomandante “does a little bit from memory:” “When a part of the learned left still juggled to try to give a theoretical foundation to the unfortunate occurrence of the ‘beloved republic,’ and a torrid honeymoon was lived with the big communications media (and large quantities of money were dedicated to publicity in electronic and print media), the students of what later would be known as #YoSoy132 were already denouncing the role of the big communications media in Mexican ‘democracy.’ After what happened and that same learned left wanted to establish itself as the tutor of the young rebels (or ‘rioters’, as they say now). As they are no longer in fashion, they forgot about them and tell them ‘you lost your opportunity,’ ‘much noise and you didn’t get anything,’ ‘Starbucks revolutionaries (or however you say it),’ ‘you can’t change the world with a Smartphone (or however you say it).’ The calendar will continue losing blood and, suddenly, they will re-emerge, better, stronger. And those that now forget about them or criticize them will say ‘sure, I knew that they had not disappeared’ or ‘now I am going to say tell them what it is that they must do,’ but others will say ‘there is a lot of suspicion in that you appear every time that something happens.’”
Lesson in racism
In one more PS in his communiqué, the Zapatista spokesperson “gives lessons about racism with the following commentaries: “I read in various directions that ‘EZLN yes, Marcos no’ and that they want to hear the indigenous Zapatistas, not the egomaniacal Sup. Ok, go: The last time that el Sup wrote a communiqué in the name of the EZLN: May 2011, on the occasion of the march in support of the just and dignified movement headed by Javier Sicilia. In the communiqué of the CCRI-CG of the EZLN it greeted the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity and its struggle for the victims of the absurd war of Felipe Calderón.”
And he adds: “Between May 7, 2011 and December 21, 2012 there are 27 denunciations from the Good Government Juntas, in other words, from indigenous Zapatistas WITHOUT INTERMEDIARIES mestizos, white and bearded (and the common places that they like to gather), all tweeted and facebooked (or however you say it) by the enlace Zapatista web page. On an average, the 27 denunciations were visited-read 1500 times each and all of them were several days on the principal heading of that web page.”
Marcos gives an “example,” the denunciation of the La Realidad Junta, August 15, 2012: “For 24 days it was posted as the principal note on the Zapatista web page and it received 1,080 visits-readers. The number of tweets (or however you say it) that it provoked: zero. The number of journalists that ‘made note of’ the denunciation: one. The number of comments from intellectuals in their writings: zero. The number of re-tweets (or however you say it): zero. The number of comments accusing the EZLN of being an invention of Salinas de Gortari: zero. The number of unfounded imaginations about why the EZLN only appears in electoral times: zero. The number of newspapers that published the denunciation in their print edition: zero. For sure, the text of the Junta denounced the alliance between the state and municipal government with the PVEM and the PRD to attack Zapatista communities.”
And next he points out: “The number of visits to the Sup’s cartoon that so offended the cultured people: more than 5 thousand in less than 48 hours (mostly twitters –or however you say it–, more the pingbacks –or however you say it–, the cut and pastes, etcetera). Now, review the period that goes from August 2003, the year in which the Juntas were formed and in which they became the direct spokespersons of the Zapatista peoples, and you will see how many time they made official statements, in their own words and without intermediaries. Count how many times you even knew that that word existed. Ok, now yes, they will write about the ‘suspicious’ silence of the Zapatistas and will question why the Zapatistas and Marcos ‘appear’ only when the PRI, that never went away, returns.”
Upon reviewing “the ‘suspicious’ affirmations about the EZLN,” Marcos indicates: “A good part of the arguments that they use when they criticize us are the same ones that the big television networks, commercial radio and the misnamed ‘sellout press’ used, from 1994-95 to this date.” And next “it suggests, insinuates, proposes” a “suppository:”
“A possible route that the ‘caricaturized debate’ (for sure, without the young female aide that so impressed Señor Quadri) could have followed: those alluded to answer with a caricature wherein the Sup is sprawled out, scratching what are very dear, bulging out and choking on junk food, watching television (probably with the Televisa logo, because best that they are careful not to glue themselves to Tv Azteca –ah, and we don’t accuse them of being paid for by Salinas Pliego or Carlos Slim, or that their campaign against the Soriana workers was paid for by Walmart–), the title or a dialogue globe with something just like ‘I am preparing my next communiqué.’
“El Sup counterattacks with another caricature, titled ‘The Recent Past,’ where he is in his wheelchair and an Indigenous in front says to him: ‘The compas say that they are ready, that it falls to you and that you already know what to do.’ The Sup responds: ‘Ok, I need to speak with Elías Contreras to order some DVDs from him.’ The media and friends that accompany them no longer would reproduce the caricature, but rather would start with unfounded kind of imaginations ‘Is the Sup an invalid and therefore does not appear publically?’ followed by ‘very serious’ investigations about the possible diseases that they could have as a consequence of being in a wheelchair.”
Low intellectual coefficient
Trying to submit oneself to the limits of Twitter, in a sudden appearance Durito suggests: “The Zapatistas are like Doctor House: the diagnosis and treatment almost always hit the mark, but the mode of the majority disgusts him. Of the patient, not speaking.”
Always in reference to reactions and responses that have stirred up his recent communications, the Zapatista military commander “clarifies:” “We have read them attentively. We see how, when one dissents from another, they are accused as a Pejezombie [1] or as a Televisa fan and their derivatives. We don’t thin that disparities necessarily have a political affiliation. For example, when someone says ‘the EZLN is an invention of Salinas de Gortari’ we don’t think that he is necessarily a troll, a Pejezombie, a Televisa fan or a Tv Azteca fan (or however they mutually say it). It can be, we think, that we’re just dealing with someone with a low intellectual coefficient, too lazy to read more than 140 characters, or that he is trying to link up with someone that already said that.”
Challenging geometry, he writes: “The world is round, it turns, it changes. But in the world imposed by those above it doesn’t matter how many turns it takes, we are always below. The world that we want is also round, also turns, also changes, but no one is above at the expense of those below.”
Finally, the Zapatista commander gives his opinion “about the millions against the thousands, the hundreds, the dozens or the few,” a theme also present in the latest reactions of his critics: “The argument of the majority against the minority makes us lazy and makes me remember an old graffiti (or how do you say it) on an old wall that I saw when it was old. With a fiesta of colors, it sentenced: Eat shit. Millions of flies cannot be wrong.”
[1] Pejezombie – Peje is the nickname for Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), twice the presidential candidate of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) in Mexico, who has since left the PRD to start a new party whose acronym is Morena. Saying Pejezombie is like saying AMLO zombie.
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Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, January 13, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/01/13/politica/005n1pol
Resumen de Noticias sobre Los Zapatistas – Diciembre de 2012
DICIEMBRE DE 2012 RESUMEN DE NOTICIAS SOBRE LOS ZAPATISTAS
En Chiapas
1. Mas de 40,000 zapatistas marchan en Chiapas – El 21 de diciembre, al final de la cuenta larga del calendario maya (13 Baktun) y del inicio de un nuevo calendario, más de 40,000 bases de apoyo Zapatista marcharon en silencio en cinco ciudades chiapanecas (Ocosingo, Palenque, San Cristóbal, Las Margaritas y Altamirano). Construyeron plataformas en las plazas principales de cada ciudad y cada uno subió a la plataforma con los puños en alto, luego bajaron y en silencio regresaron a los Caracoles de donde vinieron. Los comandantes zapatistas (el CCRI-CG) publicaron un comunicado firmado por el Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos dirigido a los medios de comunicación. Decía en parte: “ESCUCHARON? Es el sonido de su mundo derrumbándose. Es el del nuestro resurgiendo…” Era un mensaje breve pero directo al nuevo gobierno: Todavía estamos aquí. Hemos resistido la contrainsurgencia y estamos más fuertes por haber aprendido cómo resistir y construir nuestra autonomía. Nuestro mundo está resurgiendo. Esta muestra de fuerza sacudió a los de arriba y provocó olas de esperanza en l@s de abajo. Vea el video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K_z_ceSlwE&feature=youtu.be
2. El EZLN emite 3 comunicados – El 30 de diciembre, el EZLN emitió un nuevo comunicado y dos cartas. El comunicado habla de los próximos pasos del EZLN. Una de las cartas va dirigida a miembros del nuevo gobierno (“los de arriba”) y la otra carta a Luis H. Alvarez, el ex-Comisionado para Pueblos Indígenas que anduvo por Chiapas dando dinero a no-zapatistas y anti-zapatistas para comprar sus conciencias. Pronto publicaremos mas información sobre estos comunicados.
3. Las Abejas conmemoran el 15 aniversario de la Masacre de Acteal – Del 20 al 22 de diciembre, Las Abejas realizaron ceremonias para conmemorar el 15 aniversario de la Masacre de Acteal. Entre los discursos que se dieron, las Abejas criticaron al nuevo gobierno por la violenta represión en la Ciudad de México el 1ro. de diciembre y por incluir en su gabinete a Emilio Chuayffet como Secretario de Educación. Él ocupaba el cargo de Secretario de Gobernación cuando ocurrió la masacre, y Las Abejas lo consideran como uno de los autores intelectuales de la misma que aun no ha sido llevado a la justicia. Las Abejas también señalaron que ahora son más fuertes en su lucha y resistencia. La Comisión Indígena del Movimiento por la Paz con Justicia y Dignidad asistió a las ceremonias en Acteal y, mientras estaban en Chiapas, visitaron a los presos zapatistas y de la Otra Campaña en el penal de San Cristóbal.
4. Nuevo gobernador toma posesión en Chiapas – El día 8 de diciembre de 2012, Manuel Velasco Coello empezó su cargo como nuevo gobernador de Chiapas. Es integrante del Partido Verde Ecologista de México (PVEM). Al inicio de su administración, Velasco Coello saludó al EZLN y a las Juntas de Buen Gobierno, indicando que reconocía sus aportaciones y que él quería tener buenas relaciones con ellos. También enfatizó que quería reducir las tensiones. ¡Ya veremos! El nuevo gobernador puso en libertad a los dos hermanos López Monzon, bases de apoyo zapatistas, y sus dos hermanos no-zapatistas quienes estaban presos en la cárcel de Motozintla, además de retirar las órdenes de aprehensión en contra de Alfonso Cruz Espinoza, un base de apoyo zapatista propietario del terreno pegado al sitio arqueológico de Toniná. Después de que un colectivo del caracol zapatista de Morelia construyera un kiosko zapatista de artesanía, el gobierno anterior libró órdenes de aprehensión en contra de Cruz Espinosa. Al parecer, el gobierno saliente de Sabines esperaba mucho turismo alrededor de la fecha del inicio del Baktún (a fines de diciembre 2012), y quería ocultar la presencia zapatista para l@s extranjer@s.
Por otras partes de México
1. Heridos y detenciones en las protestas del 1 de diciembre – Como reportamos el mes pasado, Enrique Peña Nieto pronunció su juramento como presidente de México el 1 diciembre, en medio de protestas que se se volvieron violentas y en las cuáles hubo muchos heridos, aparentemente por balas de goma disparadas por la policía o por gas lacrimógeno. Varias personas sufrieron heridas graves. Un joven miembro de #YoSoy132 perdió un ojo. Otro hombre, adherente de La Otra campaña del EZLN, sufrió heridas severas en el cerebro y permanece en estado de coma inducido. Algunos de los manifestantes fueron arbitrariamente detenidos, muchos de ellos jóvenes y del movimiento #YoSoy132. La policía puso en prisión a 70. La mayor parte de ellos fueron liberados poco después. Sin embargo, 14 permanecieron encarcelados enfrentando cargos y sin derecho a la libertad bajo fianza. Existen vídeos que prueban la arbitrariedad policiaca en varias de las detenciones y que demuestran la falsedad de las acusaciones. Hubo también varias manifestaciones exigiendo la libertad de los 14. Las últimas noticias sobre este tema fueron que la Asamblea Legislativa de la Ciudad de México aprobó modificaciones a la ley, que disminuyen la severidad del castigo en el delito de “ataques a la paz pública” para que los 14 pudieran alcanzar la libertad bajo fianza. Y, el 27 de diciembre, inmediatamente después de que fue oficialmente publicada la nueva legislación, todos los 14 fueron puestos en libertad. Todavía tendrán que continuar con los procesos judiciales en las cortes, pero continúan también los actos de protesta exigiendo que todos los cargos les sean disueltos. A pesar de la legislación de la Ciudad de México, la represión violenta y las detenciones han solidificado la oposición al nuevo gobierno PRIista de Enrique Peña Nieto.
2. Cifra de muertos debido a la guerra contra las drogas alcanza 116,100! -Una organización civil Italiana, Libera, informó que calcula en aproximadamente 136,000 las muertes malintencionadas entre 2006 y Diciembre de 2012. De estas, 116,000 son atribuibles a la “guerra contra las drogas”. Libera es una agrupación de más de mil organizaciones de derechos humanos y activistas de Europa y América. Sus cifras fueron recopiladas del Inegi (Agencia de estadísticas del Gobierno de México) y de defensores de derechos humanos. Antes de este informe, el Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas había confirmado un número similar con algunos fuentes en Chiapas.
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Compilación mensual hecha por el Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas.
Nuestras principales fuentes de información son: La Jornada, Enlace Zapatista y el Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de las Casas (Frayba).
_________________________________
Chiapas Support Committee/Comité de Apoyo a Chiapas
P.O. Box 3421, Oakland, CA 94609
Tel: (510) 654-9587
Email: cezmat@igc.org
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chiapas-Support-Committee-Oakland/86234490686
https://compamanuel.wordpress.com
Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity Responds to the EZLN
México D.F. on January 3, 2013.
Our struggle is for life, and the evil government offers death as the future.
Our struggle is for justice, and the evil government is filled with criminals and assassins.
Our struggle is for peace, and the evil government announces war and destruction.
CCRI-CG of the EZLN
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
Brothers and sisters
First, we send you a fraternal embrace for your 29 years as EZLN and for the 19 years since you appeared publically. We congratulate you because we, in our short existence as a movement, know full well how difficult it is to build and sustain an organization. And above all, for your steadfastness, for showing us that morals, ethics and truth are the most powerful tools to build a world with peace, justice, dignity and democracy.
We also use this letter to thank you for the many lessons you have given to Mexican society and the solidarity you gave to the victims of May 7, 2011, when, making our cry yours, We’ve Had It Up to Here! [¡Estamos hasta la madre!], you came out to march in silence to demand an end to the war and justice for the victims. We will never forget that great mobilization and message as well as the fraternal reception that the Good Government of Oventic gave to the Caravan to the South.
Since then, the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity diagnosed the national emergency that you had already foreseen. With our walk in sorrow, we confirmed that this world is indeed crumbling and, facing this, we recuperated the fundamental elements of our humanness and life to begin building another world.
Just like you, we have taken on the struggle in the terrain of the symbolic to show the breadth of the transcendence of our causes. That’s why we have put the testimony of the victims before the discourse of politics. However, the deafening system – in which the political class and organized crime have satiated their ambition for power and wealth, imposing a criminal economy where life and death are interchangeable products – has blocked all understanding of the gravity of the situation in which we are submerged: 80,000 dead, 20,000 disappeared, hundreds of thousands displaced and families and bodies destroyed. This new face of war is nothing more than the extension of the long night of the 500 years, which the dictatorship of the State party has taken charge of redressing in paramilitarism and repression against the people and social movements.
In spite of the foregoing, we walked to raise up the voice and testimony of the victims throughout the width and breadth of the country, as well as across the United States of North America, publically calling for accountability from those above, all political parties and all the powers that be, exposing the ethical and moral degradation of the political class, the criminals and the institutions. In our walk we have also seen dignified peoples and persons who are confronting this reality, breaking with the dynamics of the system and putting down the bases for the construction of other worlds, almost always with youth, victims and indigenous peoples as the main social subjects. We also identify as the indigenous peoples those who can be found heading up the construction of alternatives: Cherán, Santa María Ostula and Tiripetío in Michoacán; the peoples of the mountain and coast of Guerrero who bringing to life the Community Police; the defense of the sacred lands of the Wirrárikas and hundreds of communities that resist the megaprojects, the extraction economy and the accumulation of wealth by plunder.
Since May 8, 2011, before thousands of people in main plaza of Mexico City, we proposed the necessity of setting the minimum bases needed to begin the reconstruction of the country. In that sense, we believe that one of the first necessary minimum measures is the signing and fulfillment of the San Andrés Larráinzar Accords, a project that would be the first step, not only to begin to pay off the historic debt that the Mexican nation has with her first peoples but so that the State keeps its word and, above all, to begin the construction of a model of democracy and justice through which true peace with dignity can be consolidated. That’s why, and responding to your most recent communiqués, we want to let you know that we are ready to begin walking at your side and at the side of all Mexicans who are committed to this demand. That we believe that a Mexico with Peace, Justice and Dignity is only possible with Democracy and Liberty. That Mexico cannot be a complete nation with her peoples.
Dear Zapatista sisters and brothers,
We say from our hearts, which have been hurt by war and that struggle so that other families don’t have to live the sorrow of losing or having a family member disappeared: we embrace your struggle the way you have embraced ours. We will struggle for a Mexico for all, a country that truly includes and recognizes her indigenous peoples, for a country where there are no dead or disappeared due to the ambition and opulence of a few and one in which, as your communities have already begun doing so, life that has been violently taken away can begin to flower again.
In the construction of a Mexico with Peace, Justice, Democracy and Dignity. All together!
Yours,
Movimiento por la Paz con Justicia y Dignidad
(Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity)
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http://movimientoporlapaz.mx/es/2013/01/03/carta-al-ejercito-zapatista-de-liberacion-nacional/
Subcomandate Marcos, EZLN: We Don’t Know You?
WE DON’T KNOW YOU? ***
Zapatista National Liberation Army
MEXICO
December 29, 2012.
To Whom It May Concern Up There Above:
They think that they are in the winning party… so that, besides being traitors, they are idiots. Tyrion Lannister in A Song of Ice and Fire. Volume II: “Clash of Kings.” George R.R. Martin.
” —A reader lives a thousand lives before dying —John said—; one who never reads lives only one,” Jojen Reed in A Song of Ice and Fire. Volume V: “Dance of Dragons.” George R.R. Martin. (Jojen Reed will appear in the third season of the HBO series “Game of Thrones.” Thomas Brodie-Sangster will interpret the character. Note contributed by Marquitos Spoil).
—If anyone draws a bull’s eye on their chest —Tyrion said after sitting down and drinking a sip of wine— he has to be conscious of the fact that sooner or later they are going to launch arrows at him.
—We all need to make fun of ourselves from time to time, Lord Mormont —Tyrion replied shrugging his shoulders—. Otherwise, we start to take ourselves too seriously. Tyrion Lannister with the commanders of the Night’s Watch. In “A Song of Ice and Fire,” Volume I: “Game of Thrones.”
“An end to the handsome men / it’s better being ugly but tasty / than being handsome and driveling” Botellita de Jerez.
Ladies and Gentlemen?
When we saw the note we thought that it was a December 28 joke, but we saw that it is dated the 24th of the same month.
So, we don’t know you? Hmm… hmm… let’s see:
Enrique Peña Nieto. Wasn’t he born in Atlacomulco, State of Mexico? Is he not related to Alfredo Del Mazo and Arturo “long hands” Montiel?
Is he not the one who decided, colluded with the PRD municipal government of Texcoco, the dislodging of the flower vendors and the apprehension of the leader of the Peoples Front in Defense of Land, Ignacio del Valle, in May 2006?
Is he not the one who launched his bulldog and criminal, Wilfrido Robledo Madrid, to attack the town of San Salvador Atenco and ordered his police to sexually assault women? Is he not the intellectual murderer of Javier Cortés and Alexis Benhumea? Was it not the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation that determined that the 3 levels of government (note: federal government: PAN; state government: PRI; municipal government: PRD) did indeed incur grave violations of the population’s individual rights?
Is he not the one who tragically ridiculed the case of the little girl Paulette, better known as “the case of the mattress murderer?”
Is he not the one who bragged about the police violence in San Salvador Atenco with an arrogant attitude, forgetting that he was in front of critical youth and not a television set, from his command post located in the Ibero’s bathroom, ordered slandering dissenters and thus detonated the student/youth movement later known as #yosoy132?
Is he not the one who, as his first act of government, now collusion with the PRD government of Mexico City (DF), ordered the repression against the December 1, 2012 demonstrations, which resulted in the arrest, torture and incarceration of innocent people?
Is he not the one who does not read well, even with the teleprompter that still accompanies him, even with the July 1, 2012 media coup?
Is he not the one that now wants to hide behind the skirts of alleged kin of the repeatedly deceased, as if from he’s dealing with crummy telenovela (soap opera)?
Hey, and now that we’re talking about the telenovelas, what will the fashion be for the next six years? I mean, with Echeverría it was the guayabera; with López Portillo, aguas frescas; with De la Madrid, the grey rat; with Salinas de Gortari, Prozac; with Zedillo, the bad jokes; with Fox, the wisecracks; with Calderón, the blood… and with Peña Nieto? ”True love?” Wooo… for sure!
Okay, sorry, we continue with our ignorance:
Emilio Chuayffet Chemor. Was he not Enrique Peña Nieto’s boss and “teacher?” Was he not Secretary of the Interior (Gobernación) with Ernesto Zedillo? Is he not the drunkard that, in 1996, told the Cocopa that the federal government accepted its legal initiative and later withdrew it while hung over? Was he not one of those intellectual authors responsible for the Acteal Massacre in December 1997? Was he not the one that wanted to impose the “flirty pompadours” fashion among PRI members and the only one that seconded him was his then pupil Enrique Peña Nieto?
Pedro Joaquin Coldwell. Was he not the government’s peace commissioner in Chiapas when the Acteal Massacre occurred who remained silent and continued to get paid by doing nothing?
Rosario Robles Berlanga. Was she not the head of the Mexico City government for the PRD? Did she not boast about the repression that her police undertook several times against young students during the UNAM strike in 1999-2000? Is she not the one, while presiding over the PRD, who sold out her party in every way? Is she not the one now in charge of the fight against the corporatism of the Bejaranos in Mexico City and throughout the republic?
Alfonso Navarrete Prida – Was he not the first who covered up the organized crime score-settling that resulted in the murder of Enrique Salinas de Gortari (psss, you guys don’t really get along, do you?) and then exonerated Arturo “long hands” Montiel?
Miguel Angel Osorio Chong. Was he not accused of diverting government funds to the PRI? Didn’t the PGR [Attorney General’s Office] open the criminal investigation PGR/SIEDO/UEIDORPIFAM/185/2010 to investigate his ties to the “Los Zetas” criminal organization? (Ah, a change of strategy in the fight against drug trafficking?)
(Oops, I see now that one of the brothers of the undersecretary of Migration, Population, and Religious Affairs in the Interior Ministry, which Mr. Osorio Chong heads, has not one but several criminal investigations (pending). Several of them have the stamp “closed due to death of the accused,” then another stamp “was never dead,” and then another “well it turns out he is really dead” and so … um … 18 times. The last stamp “there goes the condemned” is dated on December 21, 2012, and a handwritten note says: “pending activation, await instructions from CSG.” … hmm … what would those initials stand for? Did they change the abbreviation for the Attorney General’s Office from PGR? Anyway, let the guy from Tampico know, ok?).
Ok sure, you all will tell me that these people are not in charge, but in reality it is Carlos Salinas de Gortari who dictates what Enrique Peña Nieto does (ah, what would become of this country if the teleprompter were not invented?).
Ok, ok, ok. Carlos Salinas de Gortari. Is he not the one who plundered like no other the national wealth during his administration? (Yes, I know they are all thieves, but let’s say there are amateurs and professionals). Is he not the one who devastated the Mexican countryside with the reforms to the Constitution’s Article 27? Is he not the one whose New Years toast we ruined in the dawn of 1994? Is he not the one who saw his dictatorial dreams shattered by wooden rifles? Is he not the one who ordered the assassination of Luis Donaldo Colosio Murrieta? Is he not the one who looked ridiculous with his hunger strike in 1995? Or the one who, on December 21, frantically asked for the red phone: “What did they say, what did they say?” And who felt a chill in his back when they told him: “nothing, they are in absolute silence?”
Are you all not the ones who have always chosen violence over dialogue?
The ones who always use force when there is no reason?
The ones who pioneered corruption and contempt in all the political parties?
Are you all not those who have refused to comply with the San Andrés Accords that would mean the constitutional recognition of indigenous rights and culture, and an end to evictions disguised as mining, water, dams, resorts, roads, and subdivisions?
Are you not the ones who, along with your friends in the political class, resemble those security advisers in large buildings, trying to convince the tenants of the middle floors, and high penthouse, that there is no danger while you dynamite the lower floors, the ground floor and the basement? By the way, does anyone believe them?
You, who have killed me so many times, declared me dead, extinct, defunct, deceased, disappeared, beaten, defeated, surrendered, bought, annihilated, do you think anyone will believe you when I truly, like in love, am delivered body and soul to death and am just a little bit more earth on this globe?
If you have answered “no” to any of the questions, then you are right: we do not know you.***
From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast,
Subcomandante Marcos.
Mexico, December 2012.
P.S. To reiterate – I know you already know, but it’s convenient that you remember: we’re not afraid. Oh, and we’re not the only ones.
P.S. WHO GENEROUSLY OFFERS THE BAD GOVERNMENTS A 10 STEP MANUAL (note: easy read, do not be frightened), ON HOW TO IDENTIFY A ZAPATISTA AND TO KNOW IF THEY CAN SAY OR NOT THAT “THEY HAVE CONTACTS WITH THE EZLN:”
1. – If he asks for money or projects from any of the 3 levels of government, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
2. – If he establishes a direct line of communication without announcing it publicly beforehand, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
3. – If he asks to speak or speak directly with any of the three levels of government without announcing it publicly beforehand, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
4. – If he wants an elevated position, appointment, honors, awards, etc., HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
5. – If he is afraid, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
6. – If he sells out, surrenders or gives up, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
7. – If he takes himself very seriously, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
8. – If he does not cause chills when being seen, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA
9. – If he does not give the impression that he says more with silence then HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
10. – If he is a ghost of those that vanish, HE IS NOT ZAPATISTA.
P.S. APOLOGIES. – Oh, I know you expected something more serious and formal. But isn’t the style and tone of this “proof of life” letter better than a photo or video? And it’s even signed.
P.P.S. I LEAVE YOU WITH A HAIKU WRITTEN BY MARIO BENEDETTI TO SUPMARCOS: “I do not want to see you / for the rest of the year / or till Tuesday.”
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Originally Published in Spanish by Enlace Zapatista
English Translation: Chiapas Support Committee
December 29, 2012
En español: http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/2012/12/30/no-los-conocemos/
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*** Translator’s Note: The title of this letter is a response to the federal government’s statement: “You don’t know us yet; don’t anticipate.” That statement was made by Interior Minister Osorio Chong in response to the December 21, 2012 communiqué directed at the new (PRI) federal government.
Letter to Luis Hector Alvarez Alvarez from S.I. Marcos
A Letter to Luis Hector Alvarez Alvarez*
ZAPATISTA NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY
MEXICO
November – December 2012
“Almost all men prefer to deny the truth before confronting it,” Tyrion Lannister to Jon Snow.
“If he has nothing to fear, a coward doesn’t distinguish himself in anything brave. And we all fulfill our duty when it costs us nothing. At those moments, following the path of honor seems very simple to us. But in the life of all man, sooner or later, a day arrives in which it’s not so simple, on which one must choose,” Maestre Aemon Targaryen to Jon Snow.
For: Luis Hector Alvarez Alvarez, someplace in Mexico (I hope).
From: Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos. Chiapas, México.
Señor Álvarez…
Errr… Permit me a moment, Señor Alvarez, this part is to explain a little about where the epigraphs come from: The quotes are from the book: A Song of Ice and Fire. Volume I: Game of Thrones. 1996. George R.R. Martin. The television series Games of Thrones, which takes its name from the first volume of the saga, no está nada mal (Peter Hayden Dinklage, who gives image and voice to Tyrion Lannister, stands out, paradoxically, above the other actors and actresses; Jon Snow is interpreted by Kit Harington, and Maestre Aemon Targaryen by Peter Vaughan) and the first 2 seasons can be had a moderate price with your favorite film seller (say yes to piracy).
The DVD that I saw was an involuntary gift of the informal commerce on Eje Central, México D.F., (in other words, someone bought it there and sent it to me)… oops, the DF’s government of the “left” is going to apply Article 362 to me, because, accepting it, it applies to everything (they would be the envy of Gustavo Díaz Ordaz… oh, oh, that Article was proposed in 2002 by the then head of the DF’s government, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and approved by the ALDF with a PRD majority… hmm… don’t put in this part… they are not going to say that I am at the service of the right… they already see that it has always worried me in the extreme what is said about me.)
The image has a lot of pixels, but you can see and hear it well. A good price, they tell me; anyhow, cheaper than paying for HBO, and without the anxiety of having to wait for the following week to know what happened with little Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright), or with the dazzling Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke).
Nevertheless, I would also recommend reading the books -yes, I already know that the six-year fashion is not to read books and that hair gel is cheaper-, but an advantage is that one can take a course in practical philosophy (ah, las paradoxes) with the dialogues of Tyrion Lannister (according to what they tell me, is a literary projection of Mr. George R. R. Martin). Another advantage is that you can “spoilear” [1] (or how do you say it) without risk on his favorite blogs. Although the enmity of many will be earned, your points (although negative) for postear [2] will go up appreciably. That so, do not abuse, because if it occurs to them to say that in “Dance of Dragons”… ok… ok…ok… l shut up… say no to spoil.
You’re welcome.
Sincerely: Marquitos Spoil.
Now then:
Señor Alvarez Alvarez:
This is not only to reaffirm what the multitudinous silence of December 21 ought to have made clear to you, to the political class and to the National Action government, in general, and to Felipe Calderón Hinojosa in particular: You failed.
Oh, there is no drama. Other governments had already attempted it before… and they will continue attempting it.
But, Señor Alvarez, you should not look for your failure in us, not even in the little professionalism of your not intelligent intelligence service (although now you know that they were and are shameless). To whom does it occur that a Zapatista, any of us, would go to a government of criminals to ask for help if he were sick? Who can rationally think that the Zapatistas rose up for money?
Only the mentality of a passé conquistador (whose best example is Diego Fernández de Cevallos) that you implant in your political party, National Action, could have permitted swallowing that mill wheel with enthusiasm.
And intelligence was not needed, but just minimally reading the newspapers or listening to the news: the rascals that introduced themselves to you as “close friends of Sup Marcos,” are the same ones that simulated a surrender and “delivery of weapons” to the ominous Croquetas Albores in 1998, simulating being Zapatistas, and that some are known swindlers that no longer deceive anyone… well, you yes. How much did they get? The difference is that Croquetas knew that it was a pantomime and paid for it (and so that the media would present the Jataté bathing spa, on the outskirts of the municipal seat of Ocosingo, as if it were “in the Lacandón Jungle”), and they not only deceived you, but you even put it in your book.
And not content with that, you invite Felipe Calderón Hinojosa to the presentation of that book, drunk with blood and alcohol, who not only babbled incoherencies, he also distributed the stenographic version to the media. For sure the media charged double: not for publishing it, but for not publishing it, since the state of inebriation of the one who proffered those words was made patent. I believe that it’s clear now that Felipe Calderón Hinojosa lied up to the last minute and that it was a brazen invention that he points to in his last government report. The only approach that his government had with “representatives and commanders of the EZLN” was that of his armies, police, judges and paramilitaries.
But, good, now you know, Señor Alvarez, what it is to be scorned for what the implacable calendar wears.
As indigenous, the elderly are scorned. And as a symbol of that scorn, goes the money for alms, or, in their case, the offense of deceit, the insult of being ignored and the behind-the-back jokes.
But there is a difference, a small difference, but one of those that make the wheel of history go round: while you paid (with money that wasn’t yours, by the way) for being ridiculed (and even made a book); we, indigenous and Zapatista, we punish their scorn with our silence and prolonged moving.
Because we know very well that they also sold you on the idea that you will be remembered for your struggle for democracy (in reality, your struggle for power, but there above they are accustomed to inverting both terms), but no. Although small, you could also be remembered for having been an accomplice (or an official, it’s the same) of the most criminal government that, since Porfirio Díaz, this country has suffered.
And around here, in indigenous Zapatista lands, you could be remembered as part of a government that mostly tried to make us give up (or buying us off, it’s the same) and, as has been evident by the thunderous silence of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Altamirano, Las Margaritas, Palenque and Ocosingo, you failed once more.
Because the political class and those who live from its stupidity, will have died off without anyone taking them into account (if perhaps, just to give thanks that they no longer obstruct), and there will be nothing, but one more number on the long list of those duped by the dream of being “historic.”
And you see that we do not question your morality. It is known that all criminal gangs, like the one that you served all these years, look for one who would present a good and kindly face, so that, with that face as an alibi, they hide their predatory identity.
I believe that you already knew that Señor Alvarez. In the above of every political spectrum, all are equal. Although some ingenious ones will even come to discover that they suffer injustice in their own flesh, while they ignore it when that injustice was being distributed daily in other geographies near or far.
Your compañeros in the party, who profited from the blood of innocents, and now lament that for the market there was one who paid-cost more, all of them, are nothing but a row of criminals that made and make grotesque contortions to the foolish rhythm that the media frame for them.
Are you filled with pride at having been part of a team with a thug like Javier Lozano Alarcón, who had to be hidden in the Senate so as not to be called into account by justice? Do you feel good for having been the compañero of Juan Francisco Molinar Horcasitas, a criminal with his hands spotted with the blood of infants?
And, although at times the paradoxes are comical, others are tragic.
Your political party, National Action, was one of those who headed, since the dawn of 1994, the hysterical cries against our asking that we not be annihilated because we were threatening to plunge the country into a bloodbath. And it turned out that the acts of your government were those that extended the terror, the anguish, the destruction and death to all the corners of our already battered country.
And what do you say about when the members of your party’s bench (together with the PRI and PRD benches), voted against the San Andrés Accords for which you worked, warning that those accords meant the fragmentation of the country. And it has been your party, Señor Alvarez, who delivers a nation broken to bits.
But console yourself, Señor Alvarez, your zeal for passing into history will be compensated. You will have a place in line, yes, among those swindled by the jokers.
But also in the pages of the history and geography books, in the Zapatista schools, one paragraph will read:
“The bad government of Felipe Calderón Hinojosa is known as the one that brought absurd death to all the corners of Mexico, offered injustice to victims and victimizers, and left, as a bloody self-homage to the crime made co-government, his monument. If Porfirio Díaz left the Angel of Independence, Felipe Calderón left the Trail of Light (Estela de Luz). Without wanting it, both thus announced the end of a world, although they delayed and they will delay in understanding it.”
I suggest that you add an epilogue to your book. Something like: “I ought to recognize that one can be an extremely bad student of the indigenous Zapatista communities. Nevertheless I say, after listening to their thunderous silence, that I learned the principle: that it’s not important that we use bombs, bullets, clubs, coups, lies, projects, money, that we buy media so that they shout falsehoods and quiet the truth, the result is always the same: the Zapatistas don’t give up, don’t sell out, don’t surrender and… surprise! They don’t disappear.”
Because history, Señor Alvarez, will continue repeating itself once in a while: rebels will reappear in every corner and, perhaps, with them, their Marios Benedetti, their Marios Payeras, their Omars Cabezas and their Carlos Montemayor will appear. And perhaps the Eduardos Galeano of those rains will manage their accounts or not.
And there will also be windows, with or without frames.
And you, Señor Alvarez, will continue looking out, looking at us without seeing us, and hardly realizing that, in that looking out at the world to come, they are irremediably out.
I believe that you did not put it in your book, but you remember that once I told you the Zapatistas are worth a lot, but we don’t have a price. And “one must not confuse value and price” (no, that’s not what Karl Marx said, but rather Juan Manuel Serrat).
Nevertheless, Señor Alvarez, in memory of the moments of firm dignity that you had, and of which I was a witness when you worked on the Commission of Agreement and Pacification, you can still change that:
Leave your party and what it represents, abandon that political class that has done nothing but become an insatiable parasite. You are from Chihuahua. Go to the Sierra Tarahumara and ask that they give you entry to one of the Rarámuri communities. Perhaps they won’t let you stay. The very affectionate Ronco is no longer there to ask. But perhaps they let you be there a few days. There, with them, you will learn the fundamentals of the indigenous heart, about the struggle and hope of the original pueblos of Mexico. After all, isn’t that what your book is called?
Go, Señor Alvarez Alvarez, to that or any indigenous town that will accept you after renouncing what you are now. You will be respected there (not badly tolerated) for your age, and, above all, you will learn that, for the Indian peoples of Mexico, “dignity” is a verb that is conjugated in the present since more than 500 years ago… and what they lack.
Go, perhaps this is the day in which one must choose. And in your case it is not easy, because it’s about choosing between one world and another. May age or bad advice not stop you! Look at us, we are more than 500 years old and we are still learning.
If you don’t do it, at least you will have known for yourself the truth that is enclosed in the 17 syllables of that Haiku of Mario Benedetti:
“Who would say it, the truly weak never surrender”
Vale. Health and did you hear it? “There are few things / as deafening / as silence” (yes, also Haiku and also from Mario Benedetti).
From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast,
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.
Mexico, December 2012.
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* Luis Hector Alvarez Alvarez (aka Luis H. Alvarez) is a Mexican politician belonging to the PAN political party. He was the federal government’s “Peace Commissioner” to Chiapas during the Vicente Fox presidency. During that time he distributed assistance funds to non-Zapatista and anti-Zapatista communities to either entice people away from the Zapatista organization or keep them from joining it. He published a book critical of the Zapatistas in 2012.
1. “Spoilear” is Spanglish for the verb to spoil.
2. “Postear” is Spanglish for the verb to post.
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Originally Published in Spanish by Enlace Zapatista
English Translation: Chiapas Support Committee
En español: http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/2012/12/30/carta-a-luis-hector-alvarez-alvarez/
Chiapas Support Committee 