Cultural Outing Post

On Wednesday, I attended the seminar titled, “Latinos as the Living Dead: The Necropolitics of U.S. Immigration Policy,” led by Doctor John Márquez. He offered some personal information including the fact that his mother spent the first 25 years of her life as an undocumented immigrant, which already made his story relevant to what we’ve been discussing in class. Much of the lecture surrounded race identity and the role of racial violence in immigration policy. His main objective seemed to be revealing the shocking “death toll” aspect of the militarized border, and how the United States has justified these deaths by their residual effect of deterring illegal immigrants from usurping the jobs of American citizens in a struggling economy. Like many of the readings we’ve examined in the class, Dr. Márquez exposed some of the fallacy and hypocrisy in U.S. justification for the border control policy, such as the notion that certain pundits claimed the increase in violence resulted from the attacks of 9/11 despite the fact that the death toll was high before 9/11. He discussed Rahm Emanuel’s “Battle Plan” of pushing immigrants towards desolate terrain where they would be more likely to dies from strategies of head, cold, and hunger, a type of veiled extermination. He mentioned that the agenda of U.S. officials was to perpetuate of decrease in number of immigrants by essentially warning Mexican immigrants that crossing the border could lead to their death. He pointed out the irony of the border patrol protecting rattlesnakes and skunks from the “immigrant footprint” while allowing immigrants themselves to die in large numbers. His points surrounding U.S. xenophobia and the growing death toll would not have left as lasting an impression had he not highlighted a few specific individuals and their stories. By mentioning the story of Ezekial Hernandez, a Mexican-American youth, born and raised in the U.S., who was mistakenly identified and as a drug muggier and gunned down and killed by a Marine sniper, Dr. Márquez was able to personalize and bring a face to a topic that a lecture that could have seemed dry and redundant. The fact that the Marine who murdered Ezekial Hernanadez was defended at the Pentagon for protecting his nation only increased the validity of Dr. Márquez’ lecture.