Imagine a supremacist group calling for a Civil War to carve out a ‘racially pure’ land. A movement that revels in vicious bigotry and racial pejoratives. A group that brazenly affirms the need for ethnic cleansing to throw off the shackles of foreign oppression.
An organization that considers “The Race” to be of the utmost importance, that defines itself by skin color, that wallows in xenophobia.
What could this dastardly, dangerous cohort of bigots be? The Ku Klux Klan, perhaps? Aryan Nations, maybe? The American Neo-Nazi Party, even?
Nope. All wrong.
It’s the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan. And, believe it or not, you may soon be funding it.
Some have presented MEChA as a harmless cultural-advocacy group whose funding would represent another step in our march toward better diversity.
To the contrary, it would represent a giant leap forward in our march toward self-destruction. Here are a few quotations that might help lift any misconceptions about exactly what this group stands for.
* From MEChA’s “El Plan Espiritual de Aztlan”: “In the spirit of a new people that is conscious not only of its proud historical heritage but also of the brutal gringo invasion of our territories, we, the Chicano inhabitants and civilizers of the northern land of Aztlan from whence came our forefathers, reclaiming the land of their birth and consecrating the determination of our people of the sun, declare that the call of our blood is our power, our responsibility, and our inevitable destiny”.
* El Plan Espiritual de Aztlan: “Aztlan belongs to those who plant the seeds, water the fields and gather the crops and not to the foreign Europeans. We do not recognize capricious frontiers on the bronze continent.”
* The organization’s official mantra, boldly emblazoned on its constitution: “Por La Raza, todo. Fuera de La Raza, nada (For The Race, everything. Outside of The Race, nothing).”
What to expect from MEChA’s governance of this “physically liberated,” independent land? According to Miguel Perez, then-leader of the Cal State Northridge chapter of MEChA: “Non-Chicanos would have to be expelled … opposition groups would be quashed because you have to keep the power”.
The Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan espouses the “physical” liberation of the American West and Southwest, “northern Aztlan.” For it, blood and The Race override everything. Por La Raza, todo. Fuera de La Raza, nada. “Brutal gringos” must be driven out to secure “The Bronze Continent”.
To those who would actually consider funding such an organization: wake up.
This isn’t a racial-justice or cultural-advocacy group. This is a supremacist group. Diversity is good, but not when the diversity is between those who think all people are equal and those who believe that those not of “The Race” must be ethnically cleansed. This isn’t ambiguous, or a matter for personal interpretation; this is as black-and-white, as good-and-evil, as us-and-them as it gets.
The Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan believes that all people are not equal, to put it mildly. Does the University of Wisconsin-Madison agree or disagree with that?
Christopoher Oster ([email protected]) is a freshman, major undecided.