There is no point to a May “skip” day for Latino students

Give me another shot of tequila. It seems that the same kinds of “geniuses” who came up with the concept of a Tequila Party to encourage Latino political involvement concocted another nonsensical idea that would go a long way toward achieving the exact opposite of its alleged intentions.

It seems that activists in the Phoenix area, sick and tired of young Latinos having their interests ignored in school, want to make a symbolic gesture to show how important the young ones are to the educational system.

HENCE, THEY ARE considering a measure by which all Latino students on May 2 of next year would stay home from school that day. They seem to think everyone will be shocked and appalled at the lack of brown faces and Spanish-tinged names in the classrooms – and will suddenly realize the significance of the Latino to the student body.

Excuse me for snickering. Because a part of me wonders if this particular  bit of “protest” is legitimate, or some sort of sick joke concocted by some sort of Klan sympathizer.

Who else would think that having Latinos stay at home for an extra day (it’s a Monday, so we’d be talking a three-day weekend) is somehow a plus? It strikes me as being similar to those people who took the promotional items from the film “A Day With Out A Mexican” and turned them into racist diatribes about how our society would be better off with that very predicament – even though the film portrayed a world where no work got done because there were no “Mexicans” to do it.

In fact, just about all the Internet “commentary” I have read in response to this idea for a protest praises it because it reinforces their segregationist fantasies.

IF ANYTHING, A more serious idea that would “offend” the sensibilities of those in our society who are our opposition would be if every single Latino showed up in school on that date and took a serious interest in their personal self-betterment through education.

Then again, that would take some serious work to coordinate. I suppose telling people to slack off for a day is so much easier.

As I understand it, the group behind this effort is one called Chicanos Unidos Arizona, which has tried several stunts to draw attention to the hostile activity that has emanated from that state’s Legislature – and which will be battled out in the federal court system for the next few years all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States.

This group has urged people to boycott Madonna because the aging singer is including Phoenix on her upcoming concert tour. They even wrote out a $350 check to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., even though none of them as Arizona residents could vote for him.

IN SHORT, THIS group seems  to be about public stunts and theater; creating a bit of drama to draw attention to their cause – which is a noble one on account that it is improving the lot in life of the growing Latino population.

So if we think of these activists as actors trying to create a show, then perhaps their acts such as filing a court brief in support of the federal government’s position challenging the Arizona state law requiring local police to take a greater role in federal immigration law enforcement is the equivalent of the group putting on an Oscar-worthy production.

But just as every star actor has a few clunkers, this latest proposed stunt is one of them. Perhaps we should think of it as the activist equivalent of the film, “Howard the Duck.”

Just as that film is best ignored every time it comes on an obscure cable television channel, the idea of skipping school on May 2 is equally abominable – right alongside the idea of creating a separate Latino political party named for tequila.

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