I am sitting in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid, looking through 400 year old reports on civil unrest in the Americas. Between the years of 1640 and 1650 the Inquisition in Mexico took on the role of Homeland Security. There were many political factors but the main result was that by 1649 the Jewish population in New Spain was decimated. There was a time in the first half of the 1600s that Jewish people could actually practice their faith openly in Mexico. Scholar Seymour Liebman wrote in his book on Jews in Mexico that before 1640 there were at least 10 synagogues in Mexico City.
The whole "cleansing movement" was directly related to Portugal separating from Spain in 1640. Every Portuguese person was seen as a suspicious character (sound familiar) and assumed to be Jewish. Even if you were a practicing Christian, if your grandmother had been Jewish you would be under scrutiny. There were certain religious orders that had laws again conversos (people who converted from Judaism or their descendants). If you recall from World History class, the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492 just after Columbus said he found America (interesting timing - just as the world was going global).
Anyway, my project has a lot to do with that time period and the history that has been produced from those stories. Someone told me that the Inquisition had nothing to do with the current nativism movement in the U.S. Well, they weren't exactly the same, but there were interesting similarities:
1. People were constantly "telling on each other." Remember the policeman who was a DREAMER - got into the police force with his cousin's I.D. - someone told on him.
2. DREAMERS are children of undocumented immigrants who are also "tainted" according to Lou Dobbs and our Senate.
3. A certain hysteria took over the population.
4. Some people made a lot of money.
5. The people in question were "different."
Well thank goodness no one is getting burned at the stake these days -- but the way we are going... what would it take to be genocide? As it is we are holding people in jail indefinitely without charges; taking nursing babies from their mothers (I understand the baby didn't eat for 3 days), keeping kids out of college (sounds like pre 60s segregation), raiding people's homes without warrants, going into malls (and fast food places) to take people... among other things.
I apologize for being so morose, but looking at these old manuscripts just reminds me that somethings don't change.
image: http://www.hungersbrides.com/images/inq_dunce_cap_left.jpg
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