Saw this interesting cultural critique of Mexico.....
"It's not America's job to make things better in Mexico, that's Mexico's job, and if it can't, then the folks there need to have a revolution, either bloodless, hopefully, or not.
The Mexican people have the government they deserve.
They've had years now of narco-killings, with over 100,000 dead, plus billions plundered from their treasury due to corruption, and life just goes on, with a demonstration here and there, and then everyone's ok with everything again, with dirty drinking water, with streets full of potholes, with shuttered businesses, with judges being murdered in broad daylight in affluent neighborhoods.
Many Mexicans' definition of success is to someday be in a position where they can screw over every other Mexican and take what they haven't legally earned.
There's a saying in Mexico, "Si no tranzas, no avanzas." Translation, "If you don't cheat to get ahead, you won't get ahead." That is the dominant mentality for a large portion of the Mexican populace.
There's lots of positive things I can say about Mexicans and Mexican culture, but the fact is there's a dominant culture of compadrismo in Mexico. There are undercurrents of professionalism within Mexico, but they are not the dominant faction. This compadrismo results in an entire nation run by a few competent people and many, many, many incompetent people, usually the relatives or friends of the competent people.
In the U.S., sure, there's favoritism, but to a much larger degree, folks hire the person most competent for the job.
In Mexico, families are much closer than in the U.S., and that's fantastic in many respects, but it has at least one huge negative effect when it comes to hiring.
When one Mexican "makes it" into a good job, be it in the gov't or in the private sector, the first thing he does is recruit his family and friends, all of them, be they competent or not, to work under him.
If you replicate this scenario 1000 times, you get a nation that's barely holding together, kept afloat only thanks to the excess resources created by the dynamic system of the neighbor to the north.
These resources include intellectual capital, hard currency, and jobs, both in the U.S. and in Mexico itself.
In addition to that, Mexico is lucky enough to count on the natural resources of the land, be it ancient Maya ruins and beaches that attract tourists from all over the world or oil in the ground below.
If Mexico didn't have all these resources to continually subsidize its ineptitude, it would be in even worse shape than it is today.
Illegal immigration from Mexico to the U.S. has long been a pressure release valve for Mexico's corrupt ruling class because the very people most likely to protest, to overturn the existing order, the young, the able-bodied, those that want to work for a fair wage instead of a slave wage, those people move to America in search of a better life.
The other option for most of them is to scream at a deaf system.
If that wall is built, illegal immigrants are deported, and legal immigration is tightened, Mexico may experience a revolution which it badly needs. Whether something better replaces it is up for conjecture, but the current Mexican gov't is not meeting the needs of its people.
In the short term, a revolution could cause a refugee crisis, depending on whether it's bloodless or not, but in the long term, once things stabilize and Mexico cleans house, it would be a great thing for both countries, but especially for Mexico.
Sometimes a country needs a good bitch slap to get its act together.
Donald J. Trump is that bitch slap."
"It's not America's job to make things better in Mexico, that's Mexico's job, and if it can't, then the folks there need to have a revolution, either bloodless, hopefully, or not.
The Mexican people have the government they deserve.
They've had years now of narco-killings, with over 100,000 dead, plus billions plundered from their treasury due to corruption, and life just goes on, with a demonstration here and there, and then everyone's ok with everything again, with dirty drinking water, with streets full of potholes, with shuttered businesses, with judges being murdered in broad daylight in affluent neighborhoods.
Many Mexicans' definition of success is to someday be in a position where they can screw over every other Mexican and take what they haven't legally earned.
There's a saying in Mexico, "Si no tranzas, no avanzas." Translation, "If you don't cheat to get ahead, you won't get ahead." That is the dominant mentality for a large portion of the Mexican populace.
There's lots of positive things I can say about Mexicans and Mexican culture, but the fact is there's a dominant culture of compadrismo in Mexico. There are undercurrents of professionalism within Mexico, but they are not the dominant faction. This compadrismo results in an entire nation run by a few competent people and many, many, many incompetent people, usually the relatives or friends of the competent people.
In the U.S., sure, there's favoritism, but to a much larger degree, folks hire the person most competent for the job.
In Mexico, families are much closer than in the U.S., and that's fantastic in many respects, but it has at least one huge negative effect when it comes to hiring.
When one Mexican "makes it" into a good job, be it in the gov't or in the private sector, the first thing he does is recruit his family and friends, all of them, be they competent or not, to work under him.
If you replicate this scenario 1000 times, you get a nation that's barely holding together, kept afloat only thanks to the excess resources created by the dynamic system of the neighbor to the north.
These resources include intellectual capital, hard currency, and jobs, both in the U.S. and in Mexico itself.
In addition to that, Mexico is lucky enough to count on the natural resources of the land, be it ancient Maya ruins and beaches that attract tourists from all over the world or oil in the ground below.
If Mexico didn't have all these resources to continually subsidize its ineptitude, it would be in even worse shape than it is today.
Illegal immigration from Mexico to the U.S. has long been a pressure release valve for Mexico's corrupt ruling class because the very people most likely to protest, to overturn the existing order, the young, the able-bodied, those that want to work for a fair wage instead of a slave wage, those people move to America in search of a better life.
The other option for most of them is to scream at a deaf system.
If that wall is built, illegal immigrants are deported, and legal immigration is tightened, Mexico may experience a revolution which it badly needs. Whether something better replaces it is up for conjecture, but the current Mexican gov't is not meeting the needs of its people.
In the short term, a revolution could cause a refugee crisis, depending on whether it's bloodless or not, but in the long term, once things stabilize and Mexico cleans house, it would be a great thing for both countries, but especially for Mexico.
Sometimes a country needs a good bitch slap to get its act together.
Donald J. Trump is that bitch slap."
