Properly Subversive/Sherman R. Frederick
Liberal Los Angeles City Councimembers caught using racist language to describe colleagues are under fire from no less than the president of the United States. City Council President Nury Martinez, Councilman Kevin de Leon and Councilman Gil Cedillo, were urged to resign by Joe Biden.
Biden’s spokesperson said last week: “The language that was used and tolerated during that conversation was unacceptable, and it was appalling. They should all step down.” Only one did so far: Nury Martinez.
A recording of the conversation between the three Latinos, Martinez said white Councilmember Mike Bonin handled his adopted Black son as if he were an “accessory” and said of his son “Parece changuito,” or “he’s like a monkey.” She also referred to Bonin, who is gay, as a “little bitch.”
And the ugliness didn’t stop there. At another point in the hour-long recording, Martinez called indigenous immigrants from the Mexican state of Oaxaca “tan feos,” or “so ugly.”
So what’s the take-away?
Well, L.A. Times columnist Jean Guerro writes this episode proves that L.A. needs a new generation of Latinos at its helm — one that can rewrite the zero-sum rules imposed on us by white supremacy.
I’m not sure what that means. The Devil made them do it?
How about we just come to grips with the fact that in all of human existence racism is where you find it. And when you find it, you don’t make excuses for it, you root it out.
Just a theory.
(“Properly Subversive” is commentary written by Sherman R. Frederick for Marinscope Community Newspapers, the “mother ship” of the Novato Advance, San Rafael News-Pointer, Mill Valley Herald, Ross Valley Reporter, Twin City Times and the Sausalito Marin Scope. Mr. Frederick is an award-winning journalist and co-founder of Battle Born Media, a news organization dedicated to the preservation of community newspapers. You can reach him by email at shermfrederick@gmail.com.)
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