Mexico’s Emo Witchhunt Sparks Violence, Protests
Published on March 27, 2008 by Daniel Taylor · 15 Comments
Mexican emo kids apparently have something to cry about, as they have been victimized by a bizarre wave of emo-bashings, inspired in part by a popular TV personality’s on-air anti-emo tirade. From LA Weekly blogger Daniel Hernandez:
In Mexico, emo culture is a butt of many jokes. It is either despised intensely or generally ignored. But it’s only the despising sentiment that lately has been getting wide airply. In the above clip, a Televisa on-air personality named Kristoff expresses a serious dose of anti-emo rhetoric and switches to English to say, on network television, “Fucking bullshit” to the emo movement. Some emos I’ve interviewed point to the Kristoff clip as a defining provocation of the current wave of anti-emo violence.
The aggressors responsible for emo attacks in Mexico City, Queretaro and elsewhere come from different subcultures, with differing reasons for their shared hate:
Anger against the emos has come from many quarters: punks and goths who think emos are ripping off their culture, homophobes who don’t find emos masculine enough, and those who simply seem threatened by a group that is so different than the mainstream.
But Mexican emos aren’t taking this shit lying down. They’ve organized marches and protests to bring attention to their plight:
Emos have begun to fight back, organizing marches in Guadalajara and Mexico City. And voices have begun appearing warning of a creeping intolerance in Mexican society. Gilberto Rincan Gallardo, a columnist for the El Porvenir newspaper, argued this week that tolerance is the foundation of any healthy democracy. “If a group of young people like (emos) decides to get together and live life in a certain manner, and doesn’t hurt others, it’s the obligation of the Democratic state to protect them…It’s easy for an eccentric and easily identified minority group to be stigmatized and discriminated against…It’s the responsibility of the authorities to make sure the threats aren’t carried out and the aggressions are punished.â€
All I have to say is:
Dear Mexico,
If you don’t want your emos, please send them here. Especially the girls.
Thanks,
America
Mexico's Emo Witchhunt Sparks Violence, Protests,Tags: anti-emo, emo, emo-bashings, kids, Kristoff, mexico, Mexico City, Queretaro, violence
Readers Comments (15)
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YEEEEEEEEEEEEAHHHH Emos roockk and haters know it….
noooooooooooo sen da emo to england were being over run by chaves
what’s so wronge with expressing your emotions that you beat the crap out of the [truthful] people?
im an emo nd i love it…leave the emo kids alone…mexico shuldnt have a big prob wit it…they r just bein fuckups….i live in a place wer there arent many emos nd we always get dirty comments nd beatings nd its a load of bullshit…just leave us be
cheer up emo kids
emo is soo cool i love it !!! ;(
YAY! Thats what I talking about, bash those motherfucking emos brains in!!!!
wtf iz your problem, we didnt do SHIT to you, so why do you have to be so mean to us?
SEND THE EMO BOYZ HERE WE WANT YOU
hahaha omfg thats funny could u send the emo guys to aussie? =P haha i laughed so hard when i saw that haha thats fcukin hilarious lol
Cheers, My photos of my new emo hair
on http://xrl.us/ouog2
Im a mexican emo and i love it its great!
but the harassment and beatings aren’t some thing i like to live with
so what if im emo, im just being me.
Pshawww that little mexican host guy is just jealous cuz he can’t get his mowhawk dyed black and straightened cuz his momma won’t let him
this is a free world and if ur a facken emo or a punk of dark whetever who cares just leave ur facken life how it goes and howyou are fuck the world they don’t know what hurts or bothers you u the only one who knows ur feelings n ur real u (and besides that i like the emo thing)
Leave us alone!!!!!!! God Whats the matter with being different. We are who we are get over it. Everyone should have a right to express themselves independently We may not look like you that doesn’t make us ‘aliens’ to the world.