Brown Against Brown

摘要

Antonio Perez learned a few quick lessons when he arrived in Garden City, Kans., 10 years ago to take a job at a meatpacking plant. First: the most backbreaking and bloody work fell to the brown-skinned. In his case, it was to tear the hides off cattle with an air knife, maybe 700 per shift, while inhaling the stench of freshly slaughtered flesh. Second: not all the brown-skinned were made equal. There was a sea of copper faces in the plant, many Mexican immigrants like him. But alongside them, often wearing yellow supervi- sors' hats, were Chicanos—Mexican-Americans. "Go back to Mexico, wetback," some of them taunted. Chicanos numero uno! they scrawled on the bathroom walls. "They think they're more gringo than Mexican," says Perez, 34. To this day, "I never mix with Chicanos."