Angry Borders, Soft Hearts

My heart pounds, heavy and my face brilliant red…blood pulsing throughout my body…this is my reaction to these readings. I am left uncomfortable and reminded of the ignorant words that wounded me over the years. Why have we learned history so skewed? Why have I not crossed paths, until now, with a teacher who exposed their students to more of the truth behind the history of the world we call home? I am angered with the system. I am angry that even those who feel as though they are fighting for change in a historic mistake are still ignorant. People for or against a group that we call Native Americans…but do we even know who truly fits into the “native” group? It seems as though we do not since we refer to Mexicans as immigrants. “Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe, to distinguish us from them” (Anzaldúa 25). I have no words for the way this quote makes me feel…other than broken and ashamed.

What has happened to community? Why are we so set on separation and discrimination? What is the definition of normal and who decides those who fall into this category? It is unsettling to think that these questions may not have answers, even though we live in a society in which people abide by these ideals that have no true explanation. Though the most unsettling factor is that there are so many people that have never and will ever be exposed to the way Gloria Anzaldùa presents.

These readings bring me back to one event in my life that changed me forever. The word border almost acts as a trigger to tis awful memory that changed me school experience forever. I was in the seventh grade and a very mean rumor had ben started about me and my family. All of my peers were talking about ‘my poor family that crossed the border and live in a trailer and go canning for money to stay afloat’. None of this was true, but to my peers they needed no proof…they set up a cruel border that kept me separate from them. “And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging…”(Anzaldúa 25).

It was not long before I felt the need to stand up for myself. I couldn’t take it anymore so I exploded one day. I stood up for myself in the middle of the halls…for all my peers to hear how much they were hurting me. I wanted them to know the real truth, that I was half Cuban, not Mexican…and I was not poor and I didn’t live in a trailer and my family didn’t cross the border…but most important I wanted everyone to know that even if that had been the truth that they had no right to exile and torcher me. “We have some interest in history but no real devotion to it, for the histories we would encounter are deeply problematic” (Casey 190). Here I was deeply rooted in my heritage as well as the culture I have been raised in, surrounded by ignorance and disinterest. Instead of interest in our histories my peers (and most of society) have been ingrained with separation, ideas of proper “norms”, and discrimination. What is wrong with the way we are being raised?

“We crucify and we swindle. We are the kind of people who make others aliens and strangers in their own land when we are the newcomers. We outlaw that language of those who were here before us. We are racists and salve drivers, markers by greed, egotism, and selfishness. We are self-centered opportunists…” (Casey 18). How I wish more than anything I could have announced these words in those hallways. For my peers and teachers to hear. After speaking up for myself that day I was escorted to the principals office and forced to see a councilor twice a week during the school year instead of going to class. They took away from my education because they failed to educate an entire school enough to stay away from such ignorant selfish acts of cruelty.

“To take refuge in exaggerated outrage rather than accept responsibility for the sadows our actions cast on our neighbors: Even as we deny any responsibility for helping extend the human rights adequate shelter, food, healthcare

References

Anzaldúa, G. (2012). Borderlands/La Frontera: The new Mestiza (4th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Aunt Lute Books.

Casey, E. S., & Watkins, M. (2014). Up against the wall: Re-imagining the U.S.-Mexico border. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.