On Monday, December 5, from 6 PM to 9:30 PM, a fundraiser will be held for the Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican American Studies program at the Northridge Hall at the Student Union of California State University Northridge. It is important that we as a community show our support. Our special guest will be Sean Arce, the coordinator of the program, who has borne the brunt of the attacks of right wing zealots and special interests such as the Southern Arizona Leadership Council, the Tea Party and bought politicos such as Tom Horne and John Huppenthal.

   It has been a particularly intense struggle and through the budget the Tucson program has dwindled to a fraction of what it was two years ago. The federal government has allowed the State of Arizona to nullify its laws and single out Mexican Americans and Latinos to discriminate against them.

   Like in every civil rights struggle the state has deep pockets and outspends the plaintiffs a hundred fold. The media is hostile, captives of special interests. In the case of Tucson, it is the white business community led by the SALC that controls local officials and institutions.

   SALC controls the University of Arizona that just signed a football coach to a $9 million plus contract, at a time that the university is raising tuition and cutting back academic programs. Arizona is near dead last in the per capita spending per child and the educational system is a disgrace. The TUSD Mexican American Studies program was an exception and doing something about the horrendous dropout problem. Students wanted to learn.

   But in Arizona it is a crime to learn about Mexican American culture. It is a crime for Latinos to get an education. Charlatans such as former chair of the TUSD Board of Trustees Mark Stegeman say that Mexican Americans who employ the farm worker hand clap belong to a cult and that the use of term la raza is equivalent to Deutschland über alles.

   Sean and his fellow teachers have been called racist, separatists, and assaulted while the media turns the other way and fails to check these lies.

   The hardest part of the struggle is the stress on one’s family and relationships. Friends find ways to avoid you. It is a feeling similar to what cancer patients have described to me. The victim is blamed.

   Then there are the egos that tear at the little headway you make. You understand how Sisyphus felt, rolling the immense boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down. Egos are the worse enemy, people who normally share your goals but rationalize their behavior and distort reality.

   Lastly, there are the mistakes you and your cohorts make. You can’t take them back and must go forward lest the boulder run you over.

   December 5th will honor this struggle; it is our opportunity to fight back!

   It is being sponsored by CSUN MEChA and the Asian American students. The entertainment will blend both cultures. It is especially appropriate that the Asian American community be present since the Japanese American community was singled out and over 100,000 were sent to internment camps. They know the consequences of xenophobia.

   December 5th will also honor the big guy, Sean Arce, who has not given up and has willed the struggle.  Arce, the other defendants, the community and the students have fought against all odds. We should be at the event to let him and all the Tucsonenses know that they are not alone and that we will be with them til the end.

   We shall endure. We have no other choice but to fight back!

   Please order your tickets or come without them. $5 for students and $10 for others. No one will be turned away. Call 1-818-677-2739 leave a message or make a donation via PayPal go to http://saveethnicstudies.org/ and punch the “donate” button on the upper right.