Wait for it… wait for it… if you listen carefully you can hear the gnashing of teeth from the meritocracy believing, pull your self up by your bootstraps advocating, “color blind” segment of society. Countdown to slowhike’s predictable response begins… now. Don’t disappoint me bro. I know you are not really a passive racist compadre; you just play one with alarming consistency and predictability in the comments section the Daily Lobo.

Multicultrualism is a myth, and if it’s not a myth then it’s an incomplete concept that stops short of any solution or resolution. It’s one thing to honor a specific culture, it’s quite another to ask a country’s citizenship to help support a “Little Mexico” within the country’s borders. That’s where the initial beneficial aspects of multiculturalism stop and the damaging and detrimental aspects begin.

The predominant reason New Mexico is one of the poorest states and one of the poorest academically performing states in the USA is the infatuation with the concept that somehow we must emphasize the Hispanic culture. What’s needed and deserved is to aculturate any external culture into the core culture, regardless of which country we could discuss. That my friend is how we integrate and assimilate and support one another.

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Interesting political argument slowhike. Your only flaw is in construing your culture as the core culture. No worries mate, egocentric thought is simply underdeveloped cognitive capacity. With time and effort your myopic mind can develop into a complex reasoning system that can fully understand the concept of multiculturalism. Dialectical reasoning capacity can be developed here at UNM if you study hard and allow yourself to be transformed. In the mean time check your history book to see what indeed is the core culture of this region. Long before the mayflower graced us with its docking on the eastern shores of this land, there was a culture here that existed. Save your hasty generalizations for commentary on fox news. To conclude that New Mexico’s poverty and academic challenges in its youth is caused by an infatuation with emphasizing Hispanic culture is about ignorant as saying that you have foreign policy experience because you can see Russia from your back porch. Oh and by the way, Hispanic culture and Mexican culture are not synonymous. I know they must seem the same to you because compared to your core construals of reality, we are just brown faces that talk Spanish and complicate things because we are different from your so-called brotherhood. One last thing my brother, multiculturalism precedes integration, and yes, equality is achieved through integration. However, have no doubts, integration is bidirectional and reciprocal, acculturation is not. Read the article again, this is what this initiative is all about. Peace and enjoy the chile, red or green your choice.

Yes, thankfully there are no poor white people in this state. We’re all incredibly rich with the best opportunities given to us from birth. NOT.

The fact is this state already spends 40% of its budget on education. Yet families continue having kids that they can’t afford to feed, never mind educate.

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Well put David. I couldn’t agree more. I am so sick of the entitlement mentality that people like Patricia Caballero promote. Her last paragraph says it all, how this absolutely horrible mean country has oppressed her somehow, and so now we all owe her for it.

The only way to close the education gap is to get off of your ass and start studying. If New Mexico as a state would promote this attitude things would be different. Hard work is required, there is no free lunch in this world, or this universe for that matter. Sad but true.

As I’ve noted previously, parental involvement or responsible adult involvement are critical elements to educational achievement. This type of involvement goes beyond watching your kid participate in a sports event.Parents and/or responsible adults should be there when kids need homework help, help in preparing for an exam, help when class projects are due and letting teachers see the faces of the parents and/or responsible adults. Even if the parents can’t fathom Algebra or participles, just knowing you are there, is often just what a student needs to give him/her the impetus to succeed.

This is, I believe, where government assistance may not help.

Hey hispanics, how about buckling down and studying instead of whinning for a change? yeah, try that and get the hell out of my pocket.

The first 3 commenter’s are dismissed. If an argument cannot be made without the degradation of another, your argument no longer holds water.
The situation in New Mexico is not that different than that of Mississippi a few years ago. It is a cultural bias that sets in place the phenomenon of the welfare state. I work my butt off for minimum wage when my neighbor does not work at all but has more of a disposable income then I do, I think I would be tempted to take the government cheese. Handouts do not help anyone. Remember the adage; give a man a fish he eats for a day, teach a man to fish, he eats forever. It’s easier for politicians to dump money into an inept system then it is to stand up to the teachers unions and require teachers to teach. Pay teacher on THEIR performance, not the performance of the child. It’s far too easy to lower the bar so a child can be shown to have succeeded.

Ha! Is the quality of a man or women measured by their education? In the pursuit of our academic prestige we are forgetting that our grandparents lived and served, with as little as a 6th grade education. I feel we have been fooled to think that an education is the best answer. A productive man is a valuable man, and there are many ways to get there. It takes a lot more than books to teach a man to be productive. Just like it takes more than being able to speak Spanish or ordering red or green to be New Mexican. We are pigeonholing ourselves into believing we are failing, instead of understanding that we are treading our own path. We may not be as educated by the American standard, we might even be a burden, but we are more than a diploma or degree. We are a people who, in five hundred years, have held onto to a unique culture that for the most part respects the land, neighbors, and traditions. “slowhike” We are not “little Mexico” we “little New Mexico”, Phd and BCDC. To all Americanized people, my condolences to our diminishing heritage, and may we find equal belonging in our new traditions. Miss Caballero thank you for advocating and participating in the gift of learning. We are not an arrogant people, but societal influences are definitely teaching us to be. Q-Vo

Dear apolitical vato loco, your name says it all.

I concur with thomas’ comment other than to point out that my post is an invitation not a degrading observation. Come and join us is not degrading in my book. Every culture has a core culture, the USA is no exception. Politicising external cultural issues inside the USA is degrading to the culture of origin.

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When the culture values education the children will value education. I have yet to see land grant families complaining that the educational system ‘fails’ them.

Holie Molie! When will the ever-lovin free stuff ride be over for these Hispanics? Is there nothing you can do by yourselves besides cry and whine about not being treated equal. Get a clue compadres, equals don’t need help because they are equal…. get it?

A poor child of color!!!??? What we know from mounds of data is that it is not race or ethnicity that determines the kind of education or living one achieves. Instead it is predominantly and substantially the economic stability factor that determines this outcome. In other words, if you are African American or Hispanic American and you are wealthy, you will get your kids a good education and in most cases they will fare well. If you are Caucasian and dirt poor you will experience the difficulties of being at a low socio economic level.

Those who attempt to relate this phenomenon to ethnicty are abusing their own race, as well as re-instilling a “less-than” self image in them and their children. You should stop.

Once again the cause is lost in the argument. This issue is not about maintaining a culture, it’s about VOTES. The legislation that seems to be the core of this discussion is not the issue, neither is, “do they deserve it”. The simple fact is a politician can gain popularity by politicizing a controversial issue. One side is for it because it gives them a perceived advantage; the other side is against it and is dubbed racists if they protest. This is the point that an education makes all the difference in the world. Not a book learning education, a life’s lessons education.

Thank you all for commenting on this opinion. Hopefully you can be present during a DREAM ACT forum LULAC will be sponsoring alongside El Centro de La Raza, and MexSa sometime in April. It is actually quite sad that the majority of this state does not have the resources or equal opportunity to consider themselves higher education students as you all do. It is that ignorant selfish attitude that we Hispanics battle every day and will continue to do so until we have achieved equal representation. It is politically correct to say there is power in numbers, something Hispanics in this state are not short of. Slowhike, David Wilson, Casey, Ed and all the other opponents of equality, hear this: We will not stop, we will never surrender the noble fight for our people. Hope to see you at our forum to discuss a path to citizenship for immigrant students. Announcements for the set date of the forum will be in the Daily Lobo sometime next week.

Focusing on the plight of one racial group does not help move us towards “equality”. Yes it is hard for hispanics in this state to get ahead, but by saying that you are also ignoring the plight of many other groups in this state. I am a caucasian female that has come from an almost poverty level family. All my life I have had to work for all good things that have come to me. I will not be receiving as much finacial aid as my hispanic counterparts just because of who my family is. More money being thrown out to these groups will not improve their educational performance, but motivation from within their culture will. I would love for the people supporting this bill to spend a couple of days in an albuquerque high school and explain how the school is failing its hispanic students.

It is not just a poverty issue, it is also a cultural issue. The thing is with many white families (esp. foreigners) higher education, well … is part of tradition, it is pushed for, it is not an option but a necessity. Those that can’t achieve it are viewed as well… stupid — shaming their families.

If this view is adapted universally, then there wouldn’t be a problem!

Patricia,

Thanks for your article. This bill is needed!

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Like most bottomfeeders, they get used to eating the feces of others. Unlike our esteemed colleague they do not complain they adapt. I get so frustrated with the ignorance of the self-righteous. Live for a moment in the hogons of the true native sons and daughters of New Mexico then speak of mistreatment. The resistance of those that wish to prevent a people from excelling is stemmed from their own lack of fortitude to seek their own future. They see themselves standing in line with their hand out but not getting as much as some others. Personally, no one deserves a hand out; no one should be entitled to that which has been earned by someone else. ALL people should be afforded the same opportunities and advancement base on merit. Why, if this inequality is purely based on race, do some races still continue to excel (i.e. Asian everywhere, Hispanic’s outside of New Mexico, Black’s away from big urban areas)? As I stated before, it is a culture of rewarding failure and punishing success that is at the root of this issue.

Also, where are the parents of the children who are being failed by the educational system in New Mexico? The legislature can funnel all the money into the schools, but they cannot change the parental support system. In the cultural gap in academic achievement, the blame is always placed on the schools but no one asks what the children’s parents are doing to help the child.

I have to agree with Educator. Economic circumstances always trump racial and ethnic circumstances. I could be a supporter of this type of legislation if it didn’t sound darn exclusive. Also, I am always skepitical of legislative solutions to educational woes. Education and education expectation starts at home not in the classroom or in the State legislature.

The article that Patricia Caballero wrote for our campus community was thoughtful – and needed. It was more needed than I previously understood, or so I realized after reading the long list of hateful and derogatory comments. Are there truly so many in the UNM community who deny the inequalities that persist among us? Will you really denounce so viciously legislature that seeks to correct those inequalities, that strives to promote the equal opportunity that is a foundational tenet of our society and nation?

To those of you who have shared your racist hatred against our fellow Hispanics, or offered your so-called logical arguments against the Hispanic Education Act, allow me the opportunity to share my views as well. While we may all be created equal, our equality often ends at birth – our disadvantages beginning early as we learn painfully about the systemic inequalities that prohibit many amongst us from gaining full-fledged educations. Socioeconomic inequalities are enduring and, outside of this forum, truthfully recognized and acknowledged. I applaud the New Mexico legislature for recognizing the systemic inequalities that prohibit many Hispanic students from reaching their highest educational potential. The legislative interest in Senate Bill 132 shows that many among us understand that while the United States may have a mantra of equal opportunity, such equality is neither universal nor guaranteed.

Slowhike, did you ever think about what the “core cultures” you speak have had in common throughout history? Firepower. They only become “core cultures” after supplanting by force those cultures that stood in their way and then by propping up politcal boundaries.

Also, when you gripe about the particluar language kids learn in school you can’t see the forest for the trees. The point is not Spanish or English or Swahili; the point is literacy.

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No matter how low I set my expectations y’all’s comments never fail to disappoint. The oppressive narratives invoked repeatedly here demonstrate why people fight for acts such as this one.

If you have paid attention to the debate in Santa Fe, the opposition to this bill was not based on wanting Latino students to fail, or on prejudice against 57% of public school students who list themselves as Hispanic. This is from the New Mexican:
“Rep. Jane Powdrell-Culbert, R-Corrales, said the Public Education Department is charged with educating all of New Mexico’s children. She expressed concern that New Mexico would be regressing to the divisions of the 1960s by passing an act relating to a specific ethnic group.

“We’re all Americans first, and I think it’s so important that we stop reinstalling all of these boundaries,” said Powdrell-Culbert, who is black. “What I think we’re doing is developing a whole new generation of racism.”

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