Thread: Mexican flag kindles passions pro and con

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Mexican flag kindles passions pro and con

By Hiram Soto
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
April 8, 2006

Red, white and . . . green?

The sight of marchers in recent protests carrying Mexican flags inflamed passions on all sides of the immigration debate

The controversy will likely fly again tomorrow, as community, religious and union groups plan to rally thousands of marchers in downtown San Diego to support legalization of undocumented immigrants.
Latino leaders are aware that such displays not only offend some people, but can be counterproductive in efforts to influence legislation and improve the image of immigrants.

Some of them, in fact, have requested that people planning to participate in tomorrow's march leave their Mexican flags home.

Other organizers, however, say that the Mexican flag is too meaningful a symbol to be set aside, particularly by recent immigrants. They say the marchers should bring whatever flag they want to honor.

Although protesters in recent immigration marches have carried flags from several countries, including the United States, the Mexican flag was ubiquitous during recent student demonstrations in San Diego County.

And people took notice.

“It's good to see that everybody is very passionate about this issue,” said Tim Graney, a Los Angeles attorney who was visiting San Diego when students marched through downtown San Diego on March 31.

“But as compared to (the March 25 march in) Los Angeles, I think you saw many more American flags there, and I think that shows unity with the people of this country.”

For protesters, particularly students, the flag is a symbol of their heritage at a time when they feel their life in the United States is under attack.

But the sight of protesters marching with Mexican flags has angered many people who see it as an affront to the United States, the very country the protesters are asking to be accepted by.

“We have our flag, we fall by it, and then someone else's flag shows up in our country and it is used as a symbol for a movement?” asked George Taddei, a former Navy officer and a World War II veteran.

“No sir, we can't have that,” he said. “It is disrespectful and distasteful.”

Students say they mean no disrespect.

The years of anti-immigrant rhetoric here and across the nation have deeply hurt them, they say. And the flag is the most accessible symbol they have to show pride in their family's roots, not to assert Mexican nationalism.

“I'm waving a Mexican flag because they want to criminalize Mexicans, they want to criminalize my parents,” said Laura Elena Gutierrez, a 17-year-old Madison High School student who marched March 31 from Barrio Logan to downtown San Diego.

The flags that have made their way onto the streets in recent protests more typically come out when Mexican immigrants display them for celebrations of their homeland's holidays or to cheer on their national soccer team.

As students made their way through Barrio Logan, neighborhood residents added to the sea of red, white and green by handing out their own Mexican flags.

One such person was Timoteo Lopez, a downtown resident who said he gave away his Mexican flag because he supports legislation that would eventually allow some undocumented immigrants to gain legal status.

“What's the difference which flag they wave?” he asked. “I would have given them an American flag, too, if I had one.”

Concerned that the Mexican flags waved during student marches in Oceanside were causing bad feelings and racial tension, the Oceanside Unified School District banned students from bringing flags of any kind on campus this week. The school superintendent has lifted the ban as of Monday, when the school district begins its spring break.

The school district also closed its middle and high schools March 30 and 31, alarmed by the rise of racial epithets among ethnic groups.

The use of a foreign flag in political rallies is not new.

Historians point to their use during the mid-19th century as immigrant groups fought for acceptance and better living conditions.

John Laslett, a history professor at UCLA, said immigrants marched with Irish flags in Boston before the Civil War, and Germans who had settled in Missouri paraded with theirs.

“They were aware, as the debate today, of whether or not it's appropriate for another country's flag to be used in demonstrations,” he said of the Irish immigrants, who were then the target of racism and discrimination and restricted to menial jobs. “They were also aware that it might offend those who think that they were advocating some form of Irish nationalism.”

The use of the Mexican flag during the protests was a hot topic for talk radio.

“If you are here and this is the country you pledge your faith and love to, it is the American flag you should be using,” said Jimmy Valentine, radio producer of the conservative “Roger Hedgecock Show,” which received many calls blasting the display of Mexico's flag.

“If it's a Mexican flag you want to honor, then there's a country which honors that flag and perhaps that's where it ought to be waved.”

Some of the organizers of tomorrow's march have invited participants to march with the U.S. flag. They have requested that 10,000 flags be donated for the event.

Javier Rodriguez, one of the coordinators of the massive march in Los Angeles, sees that idea as a hard sell, particularly among young people.

“Students have been victims of discrimination . . . have been stigmatized. Now they want to deport their parents, and they want them to carry the American flag?” he asked. “That's arrogant.”


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Hiram Soto: (619) 293-2027; hiram.soto@uniontrib.com

Javier Rodriguez, one of the coordinators of the massive march in Los Angeles, sees that idea as a hard sell, particularly among young people.

“Students have been victims of discrimination . . . have been stigmatized. Now they want to deport their parents, and they want them to carry the American flag?” he asked. “That's arrogant.”

Who's asking them to carry an American flag? We're asking that ICE round them up and throw them all out! We're asking our government why mobs of illegals are carrying a foreign flag through our streets. Carrying an American flag isn't going to do them ANY good at all. NO PHOTO OPS WITH AMERICAN FLAGS THAT GET THROWN IN THE TRASH CAN AFTERWARDS, PLEASE! don't let the poor little illegal victims of "discrimination" vent their pique on OUR OLD GLORY.