Javier Sicilia, Mexican Poet, On Peace Caravan To Stop Mexican Drug Violence

When Javier Sicilia's son Juan was brutally murdered on March 28, 2011, after a fight in a nightclub, the famed Mexican poet abandoned writing. Before doing so, he decided to write one last verse, The Guardian reports:

The world is not worthy of words / they have been suffocated from the inside / just as they suffocated you

Since his son's murder, Sicilia has put down the pen and taken up the fight against drug violence in Mexico and for anti-crime reform through the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity, his push to bring awareness to the conflict tearing the country apart, according to Time.

"Drugs are not a national security issue. They're a national health issue," Sicilia told Democracy Now!. "Turning a public health issue into a security issue has created an absurd war that has killed 60,000, and we don't even know how many disappeared. Two-hundred-fifty-thousand displaced people, 8,000 orphans and a diveded and obliterated country."

Sicilia explained to The Guardian:

The violence is now so widespread that an everyday event, like a row in a nightclub, can escalate within minutes into mass murder. It's a country out of control – people are dying everywhere, the whole time … and many are young, like Juan, on the threshold of their lives.

Promoting drug trade legalization puts Sicilia at odds with the efforts of Mexican President Felipe Calderón, according to Democracy Now!, though President Calderón has sat down for talks with Sicilia and other families of those killed in the drug war.

Sicilia also says the problem isn't limited to just Mexico, but rather is as big of a problem in the United States; Sicilia says guns are getting to Mexico from the U.S. to illegally arm Mexican drug gangs.

According to the Peace Caravan's statement, Sicilia wants to "Bring to the American people's conscience their shared responsibility for the thousands of dead, missing and displaced in the drug war."

Watch Sicilia's interview on Democracy Now! in the video above.

Comments

[acorus]

01:41 AM on 06/04/2012

to illustrate the abject absurdity of federal drug comprehension: cannabis currently is a schedule l along w/ heroin, it makes a farce out of the entire drug scale, esp since cocaine is schedule ll, and esp since both heroin and cocaine are highly addictive, along with alcohol.....at the very least, cannabis should be re-scheduled from l to lll, like alcohol, even though it's safer than beer. that is not an exaggeration. beer can turn very ugly, whereas cannabis is never violent, never creates speed lust whilst behind the wheel, instead drivers slow way down, like whoa baby, 25mph seems like 65mph

[angelavictoria5]

03:44 PM on 05/21/2012

If you taught the people of Mexico the french language, they could travel to so many parts of the world and relocate if necessary. Teach your children francais.

[angelavictoria5]

02:58 PM on 05/21/2012

Las Vegas Nevada was built in the middle of nowhere in the big desert. Anything is possible with God.

[angelavictoria5]

02:55 PM on 05/21/2012

Could the Mexican government with infrastructure plans in place, choose to make one city a safe haven then expand in ever widening circles from there? We have moveable cement walls in the US. We put them up along highway construction. The goal is to secure one big place then expand with security forces.

[JohnThomas]

05:48 PM on 05/12/2012

Marijuana consumers are no more to blame for the gang violence than alcohol consumers were to blame for the gang violence during ITS prohibition. Only prohibitionists engage in this kind of dishonest blame shifting. It is only the fraudulent, counter-productive prohibition that creates the black market that requires violence to settle disputes, since they cannot take them to court.

We've been through this all before with alcohol prohibition. There is simply NO excuse to maintain the fraudulent marijuana prohibition. In all its seven miserable decades, it is has NEVER accomplished even one positive thing. It has only caused vast amounts of crime, violence, corruption, death, and the severe diminshment of EVERYONE'S freedom.

[JohnThomas]

04:16 PM on 05/12/2012

Marijuana is CLEARLY not addictive. Despite the mountains of propaganda and junk science dumped on the media by the Drug Czar, NIDA and other organizations designed to protect marijuana prohibition, the truth is clear.

The gold standard of marijuana research is found in the several major government commissions on marijuana, including the last U.S. one - President Nixon's Shafer Commission of 1972. All these major commissions conclude marijuana is not addictive, FAR less harmful than alcohol, and should be regulated as is alcohol. The reports of all these commissions can be read here:

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/Library/studies/studies.htm

The science is further confirmed by the more than 100 million Americans (from SAMHSA statistics) that have consumed marijuana. Marijuana's non-addictive, near harmless nature is why it is so popular. The vast majority of marijuana consumers partake infrequently, on the weekends, or less.

[JohnThomas]

10:26 PM on 05/12/2012

See post at 5:48pm - May 12.

[MexicanDude]

01:10 PM on 05/12/2012

To keep it simple, let's just consider the bilateral problem, excluding other countries, which make these numbers worse, not better.

If a $10 bag of illegal stuff is purchased 24 times per year by all 19m addicts in the US it's $4.7b. If the same is done by the 6m addicts in Mexico it's 1.4b. Together they are 6.215b, not counting outflows. The *entire* budget of the Mexican military, all in, is 6.299b. Third largest in LatAm. The Mexican police budget is only 228m.

So the US is providing 77% of the illegal cartels' budget, Mexico is providing 13%. Once other countries are counted, the gangs actually have more cash than the military. USA provides only 500m drug aid annually.

The *only* way to make them irrelevant is for our populations to reduce their numbers of users - a health issue. So as long as you are purchasing this stuff illegally, you're directly contributing to this. No matter what else you think about it. We can disagree with lots of laws, but we still must follow them.

You may say "they'll just move to other crimes", but all others are more expensive to prepare and riskier so they bring the killers out in the open more often, making them an easier catch. So it's not futile to stop.

Forget your politics a minute. Just choke the source. Stop doing drugs now if you have the willpower. And if not, get help. You'll be glad you did anyway.

[Jose3]

10:05 PM on 05/11/2012

Anyone who thinks the cartels want peace or legalized marijuana is probably smoking the synthetic stuff.

I would rather see them turn back than have their severed heads end up in a paper bag.

[JohnThomas]

04:55 PM on 05/11/2012

To solve this monstrously destructive problem, we must shine the light on those creating it. As long as we allow them to operate in the shadows, we will never get at the root of this nightmare.

Everyone who has been paying attention knows marijuana is less "addictive" than coffee and FAR less harmful than alcohol. Indeed, polls show public support for ending the marijuana prohibition has now passed 50 percent - nationwide. So why do we still have this barbaric persecution?

Because police, prosecutors and politicians build their careers and empires on it. Because industries like alcohol and pharmaceuticals don't want the competition. Because other interests like the drug treatment/testing industry and the prison industries depend on it for their life's blood. Because many shaky corporations couldn't exist without the laundered money. And because government uses marijuana prohibition as a means of controlling minorities and the poor.

Of course, the TRILLIONS of dollars made by the drug gangs have not been buried in the ground. They have been invested in legitimate business, causing another huge support of this persecution of millions of innocent people.

For a good view underneath the iceburg, see Catherine Austin Fitts' excellent article: "Narco Dollars For Beginners." - keeping in mind that while Fitts employs cocaine because it best suits her metaphor, FBI statistics show marijuana sales comprise 80 percent of all "illegal" drug transactions.


http://www.ratical.org/co-globalize/narcoDollars.html

It's time to dismantle the marijuana-prohibition-industrial-complex!

[chevyliddle]

06:50 PM on 05/11/2012

"Everyone who has been paying attention knows marijuana is less "addictive" than coffee"

Not entirely true. Coffee is associated with a physical addiction that isn't present with marijuana but marijuana can have a severe mental addicition with anyone. I agree that it is no worse than alcohol but legalizing it will only increase the manufacturing and distribution of other drugs like cocaine and heroin.
http://www.livestrong.com/article/149665-addictive-properties-of-marijuana/

[JohnThomas]

07:15 PM on 05/11/2012

No. A "mental addiction" or "psychological addiction" are just terms made up by treatment quacks and prohibitionists to try and rope the millions of marijuana consumers into their clutches. These terms actually refer to the repetition of ANY enjoyable experience - like playing golf, watching TV, or eating ice cream.

Websters defines addiction as the: "compulsive need for and use of a habit-forming substance (as heroin, nicotine, or alcohol) characterized by tolerance and by well-defined physiological symptoms upon withdrawal."

"Well-defined" is a nice way of saying intolerable. Addicts continue to consume an addictive drug to avoid these intolerable withdrawal symptoms. - Marijuana doesn't have them.

Marijuana's non-addictive nature is one of the reasons millions of consumers choose near harmless marijuana over addictive, very harmful alcohol - and of course, the other hard drugs.

[JohnThomas]

07:21 PM on 05/11/2012

Who are you agreeing with when you say, "it is no worse than alcohol" - which is to infer it is about the same.

Not me. - Alcohol consumption directly kills more than 50,000 people each year in the U.S. alone. Add to that the many thousands killed by alcohol-fueled violence and traffic deaths. We are all witness to the massive human toll of drinking alcohol.

In all of recorded history, NO ONE has ever died from consuming marijuana. That makes it safer than aspirin, coffee and peanuts!

[Kirsten Han]

01:59 PM on 05/11/2012

When I was in Mexico I had the privilege to attend a plenary session by Mr Sicilia, and also to be in Cuernavaca to observe the first anniversary of the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity. The strength, compassion and resolve that Mr Sicilia has is shared by so many victims and their families, and it was incredible inspiring to see them translate that into action and do something about the situation.

I wish the very best to the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity!

[ThirdRAILKink]

03:52 AM on 05/11/2012

He's right. I really don't understand the strength of irrationality that keeps us waging a War on Drugs. How can we continue to be so absurd and self-destructive?

[Jeremy Echols]

01:15 AM on 05/11/2012

It's sad to see what our global anti-drug agenda has done to other countries. Sadder still that so few of us even care, looking down on Mexico for not being able to control "their" drug problem.

Mexico needs to stop fighting OUR war. Their country could thrive by supplying cannabis to their prohibitionist neighbors. Get the production out of the cartels and let the government and law-abiding citizens of Mexico reap the benefits of our absurd policies, rather than paying such a hefty toll.

[Fran Jaime]

02:15 AM on 05/11/2012

Thank you for a truly well thought out comment! You are Fanned and Faved!

[MexicanDude]

04:49 PM on 05/11/2012

Frankly I don't care what we do at this point. But doing what we've been doing has taken us to this point.

What I've learned from illegal immigration, the drug war and similar economic problems is you can't prohibit only one side of an economic transaction without creating a huge problem. So if you're deporting illegals, throw their employer in jail, no parole. If you're going to make recreational drugs illegal, also throw users in jail for a long time or force them into rehab-jail, no ifs-ands-or-buts.

But we instead hand-wring regarding the side of the economic transaction that doesn't "hurt us" (though this is really relative) or that would throw people we know in jail yet we demand stricter enforcement on the side where we don't know people. A selfish NIMBY approach that we should both be ashamed of.

But of course if we throw every US drug user in jail (because they *are* committing a crime by purchasing it).. Like the joke in Mexico goes "if we throw all corrupt cops and politicians in jail, then who's going to close the door on the outside?"

Let's realize that the problem is as much demand than it is supply, and either take the opportunity to minimize one side of the economic transaction as the other country is cracking down on the other *together*, or just don't pursue it at all.

Stop doing drugs already, dudes! It ain't cool.

[Jeremy Echols]

05:30 PM on 05/11/2012

When one nation has to suffer because of the U.S.'s insane demand for drugs, that nation shouldn't give a damn what will happen to the U.S. by taking a smarter course of action.

As LEAP would say, "Drugs are bad. The war on drugs is worse."

Drugs are valuable only because they are illegal. Pot is absurdly cheap to grow and harvest, yet selling a few kilos of it to the U.S. black market is enough money to pay a very good hitman for a month in Mexico. With prices that inflated, countries like Mexico will always bear the bigger burden of our drug war.

That is why I say that Mexico should legalize the biggest cash crop on the planet, cannabis, and let us deal with our side of things in our own way. They have paid the price for our sins too long. Whether you consider "our sins" to be prohibition or drug use, it isn't something that Mexico (or Colombia or any other country) should have to bleed over.

[JohnThomas]

10:34 PM on 05/11/2012

Do you ever have a beer or a glass of wine?

[PlayTOE]

10:18 PM on 05/10/2012

If drugs were legal and controlled, then there would not be a market for illegal drugs. There is no market for illegal beer, because we have access to safe inspected well made legal beer.

[chevyliddle]

09:28 AM on 05/11/2012

Is there such a thing as safe, inspected and well made cocain or heroin? How many addicts can we afford to support in this country if we make it legal, cheap and easy to get?

[MexicanDude]

01:21 PM on 05/11/2012

Let me get this straight - in order for you to save money supporting your addicts, 60 thousand and counting have to die?

Let's set aside the indefensibility of this comment on the human rights department and go straight to the logical fallacy. You're telling me that today there are *no* addicts? Who is buying the drugs then? No, clearly there *are* lots of addicts, you just don't see them. But walk under any highway bridge of any US city and you'll find one in under 10 minutes.

The difference is that you can swipe your problem under the rug of the border (and indeed have been for a generation now). But it's bulging south of it, and when it explodes (which Sicilia's march is an evidence of it already starting to) it will explode in your face.

And tell me, who will be to blame when it finally does?

As Sicilia said, the US is refusing to solve their local public health issues only because they can turn it into a violence issue across the border to make it somebody else's problem, and when we see it blow up the only thing we can think of doing is throwing money at it hoping it will go away.

Because that has worked so well before.

[Kirsten Han]

02:03 PM on 05/11/2012

If drugs were no longer relegated to the underground and peddled by dodgy, shady criminals, it's much more likely that the product would be better. And there could be health and rehab centers set up, because all the resources (like money) that's currently directed towards arresting and prosecuting drug offenders could be spent on research, health and rehabilitative purposes.

It's a policy adopted in Portugal, and they've seen a 50% decrease in drug abuse in 10 years.

[Jerry Bourbon]

07:35 PM on 05/10/2012

Sr. Sicilia, I feel for your loss. As an American, I apologize for being part of the society that finances this chaos through our insane drug prohibitions.

May I ask, sir, why you feel that removing MY constitutional rights to own guns, as you have advocated, will in any way change the violence perpetrated by multi-billion dollar criminal gangs?

(P.S., what do you think of Operation Fast and Furious?)

[MexicanDude]

01:31 PM on 05/11/2012

Can only speak for myself and not Sicilia, but Fast & Furious is a travesty, and Holder et-al should be prosecuted for international arms-smuggling. But before you do your partisan happy-dance, so is conservative drug policy and refusing to provide money for drug health and prevention locally and instead buying violence abroad with that same cash, and liberal collusion by not pushing to also throw users in jail just because they perceive them as their base (if economic activity is going to be illegal it should be illegal on both sides of the transaction, or not at all, don't you think?).

The only thing you've accomplished here is creating the worlds most dangerous and experienced criminals.

I didn't hear him trying to remove your right to own guns, I heard him trying to remove your right (and everyone else's) to sell them across the border to criminals in a country that doesn't allow drugs, a violation of international law. "Control" doesn't necessarily mean you can't own them. Only worrying about our own selves (the "MY" being your only emphasis here is telling) is precisely what is getting us all in this mess.