Was Anyone Surprised at the Right Wing Attacks on Latinos Over H1N1?

The swine-flu outbreak, at least the initial stage of it, appears to be subsiding. If it turns out that H1N1 is not the massive death-wave that right-wing extremists predicted, they will no doubt move on to another "end of America" crisis.

But I have to give credit to conservative commentators. They didn't immediately turn the swine-flu epidemic into a xenophobic witch hunt against Hispanics.

They waited a few days.

Perhaps that was to gather their thoughts. Although if that is the case, I'm not sure why they bothered, because the empty, tired rants aimed at Latinos were shocking not for their offensiveness, but for their predictability.

A virus originates in Mexico, for reasons that scientists still cannot explain, but anonymous commentators have the answer: Because Latinos are dirty and "Mexicans are pigs!" (an actual posting to a conservative website).

Illegal immigrants are to blame, according to other wise sages, and will soon infect us all. Meanwhile, still other rational minds postulate that the outbreak is actually a terrorist attack, instigated by germ-warfare experts who are counting on Mexicans to infiltrate the country.

Actually, that last one gets bonus points for combining three right-wing obsessions (immigration, terrorist evil-doers, and conspiratorial plots) into a parfait of pure insanity.

This kind of hate mongering goes back to the Middle Ages, when Jews became a convenient scapegoat for the Black Death. Since then, the Irish, Italians, Spaniards, gays, and many others have been blamed for nature's occasional hissy fits with us.

As MSNBC pointed out, "It's 'the other,' the group not seen as part of the nation, the one who threatens it in some way that gets blamed for the disease."

So Mexicans, already accused of bringing down America's economy and values, were set to destroy our health as well.

"Oh wait," the right winger says. "Maybe the outbreak isn't so catastrophic after all. Forget what I said."

Well, it's too late now. It's clear what we have to do: Let's focus all our fear and rage on Edgar Hernandez, the five-year-old Mexican boy who was identified as Patient Zero in the outbreak. Just look at him. Who knows what vile plot he'll unleash on us next...

Comments

[Pseudonerd5569]

Unsurprising, but still makes me feel outraged. Why won't Republicans and right-wing extremists like the Minutemen, KKK, and neo-Nazis forget their unhealthy obsession w/ Latinos and immigrants in general? The fools can't even tell the difference between Latinos and people of Italian, Greek, and Eastern European descent in this country! So here's some advice to those groups: Shut up, put down your guns and liquor, get off your porch, and get a REAL job!

[Aranxa]

Mexico should get credit for Montazuma's Revenge, but that's about it.

[OpalSky42]

Sadened, horrified, outraged, yes - surprised, no. Not at all, unfortunately. They all seem to be uniformly bigoted and hate-filled.

[gfulmore]

It seems like we could learn as a nation from all this that 1) we are joined at the hip with Canada to the north and Mexico to the south and 2) that there are American companies in Mexico who without the knowledge of many Americans do what they do to Mexicans without much of any regard to safety or consequences. The story here is what is Smithfield Farms doing in the state of Vera Cruz? And what did it have to do with the flu outbreak? "Poor Mexico, so far from God, and so close to the United States (and all of hypocrites and xenophobic cable anchors).

[Hammerlock]

I'm convinced that every night, Lou Dobbs goes home, crawls into his closet, and starts screaming racial epithets nonstop for an hour.

Its the only way I can figure how he can avoid doing so on-air.

[Glenn1441]

How the hell the GOP had the Latino vote all of these years is a mystery to me.

[LaughingMan]

..........by playing the "Values" and "Religion" or religious conservatism cards. Minorities tend to be more religious and generally culturally conservative than the larger population. It's also how they could have had the Black vote were it not for the putrid stench of their often blatant racism. Witness how they played the Prop 8 vote in California.

Unfortunately for them, their bigotry and general prejudice against darker colored people won out in recent years,a nd they've now managed to drive away a once reliable voting bloc for them.

[K.J. Dwyer - Huffpost Blogger]

What I find extraordinary is that no one confronted Jeb Bush on all of this. On his recent "listening tour" he made a huge point about how important the hispanic vote is for the GOP. Practically the same day, conservative luminary and radio talk show host Jay Severin on his WTKK-FM show in Boston went on a tirade calling Mexican immigrants "leeches", "primitive" and that their greatest contribution to the U.S. was "venereal disease."

Never mind that Jeb Bush's wife is Mexican or that his children are half Mexican (or that grandpa George refers to them as "the little brown ones"), shouldn't Jeb have come out in the strongest language possible to disassociate himself from this element of his party? Especially when he's made such a point of courting the hispanic vote?

All this does is expose the Republican Party for what it is; a disparate band of fools, one dumber and more racist than the next, with no coherent message, no concrete plans to address the collective mess we're in and whose "big tent" has collapsed into a heap of cheap canvas.