La Cucaracha by Lalo Alcaraz for September 14, 2014

Hipsters can take the jab, but women might not be too pleased with the stereotype of loudness.

I always love someone who can make fun of himself or his own ethnic group.And golly gee, someone who’s embarrassed by that will surely never return.What a loss.

“I still can’t understand why Latinos feel they must come to the U.S. for salvation and quality of life, and then ram their patriotism to Mexico down our throats.” And this is a “good” Republican!!!

They come here for a better life and still love their home country because it is their home country— just like the English, Swedes, Irish, Italians etc etc etc do. Why doesn’t that upset you, “good” Republican?

Lalo is using the usual slander. Rule #1: Anyone you don’t like or agree with, is evil. Rule #2: Make emotional accusations but never offer proof. Rule #3: If asked for proof, see rule #1.

Lalo writes like and has called himself a Mexican but he’s not.

It has been well established that Lalo calls himself a Mexican like other folks in the US call themselves Irish, or Italians, or Chinese, or Brazilians, or any other number of ethnicities. But you keep coming back to your utterly discredited point. Which simply highlights both your tunnel-visioned antagonism and your general foolishness.

Lalo is an embarrassment.

Taking the “insult the person” route you profess to hate so much, eh? Oh, wait, that’s only when you’re the one feeling insulted. You dish it out and dish it out but when a spoon is headed your way, you cry and thrash around in that highchair of yours.

And he lumps all Latinos (“the Latino vote”) as being against the Republican Party – it should be insulting to those Latinos who actually think for themselves.

Two points:1) There is nothing in this strip that claims all Latinos vote against Republicans. The claim is that the Republicans sure do a lot to discourage Latinos from voting for them.2) To imply that Latinos who vote against Republicans are not thinking for themselves is itself an insult. People vote for those who they think will make their lives and country better. And Republicans have been very loudly declaring that they want to make Latinos’ lives worse, from immigration to reproductive health (yes, a strong majority of Latinos believes in a woman’s right to choose) to same-sex marriage (and yes, the majority of Latinos also support same-sex marriage) to economic policies. But I suppose you’d say that white Southerners generally don’t think for themselves when they vote Republican, right?

Lalo apparently thinks that Latina women shout as a matter of course.

This frame in Lalo’s strip smacks of sexism.

I still can’t understand why Latinos feel they must come to the U.S. for salvation and quality of life, and then ram their patriotism to Mexico down our throats.

Again, two points:1) Nobody is forcing you to celebrate these holidays or to participate in their love of their ancestral country. Are you one of those people who simply can’t stand to even see the sight of someone enjoying something you disagree with? I can imagine you also fuming about seeing two women or two men kiss on the street (“They shouldn’t flaunt their sexuality!”), but being perfectly fine when it’s a man and a woman.2) I expect you also rant against St. Patrick’s Day and Columbus Day (an Italian holiday). Heck, I expect you rant against Easter and Christmas, because these are just forcing a religion down everyone’s throats. Or at least to rant against those with Swedish ancestry rooting for Sweden in a soccer match. But no, I lied, I don’t expect these things at all. Because your beef is clearly with brown people. And white people’s ancestry is just a happy part of our national fabric, right?

…blah blah tacos hipsters etc.…

I’ve had quite good hipster tacos, and excellent non-hipster tacos. Here I think Lalo’s just poking fun at what a fad that fancied-up tacos have become. But you’re free to try to score points off it.

This has been a public service parsing of indie’s dyspeptic rant. We now return you to your regular comic-viewing.

Illegal alien children do not belong here. DEPORT THEM ALL.

mdavis doesn’t want to follow the US’s own laws on refugees. MDAVIS IS AN IGNORAMUS.

Oh, indie, your attempts at creating the boundaries of discourse here are precious. Particularly when you yourself are hardly a paragon of non-derogatory remarks. Exhibit A: your first post of today. And now you insist on proving once again that as far as you are concerned, the gander’s going to try and run far away from whatever it has decided is good for the goose.

As far as me being “slavishly” on Lalo’s side, well, first there’s that really unfortunate use of terms. Second, you’re the one who’s entrapped in your ongoing reflexive hatred and rage toward this strip. Third, you must not read my posts, because—as one for-instance—I agreed with you that the Latina Voice Workshop panel in today’s strip feels sexist. But I suppose that doesn’t fit your neat little narrative. If I’m on any “side,” it’s the side of historically oppressed people, and working people, and people fleeing from violence. Which puts me, apparently, on the opposite side from you.

And it’s shocking—_shocking_, I say!—that you won’t take responsibility for your own actions. It’s what you demanded of Michael Brown, right? (Though not, apparently, of Darren Wilson.) Or, say, of Central American refugee children? Shall I go on?

The fact is, your paper-thin skin seems incapable of even a little bit of poking and prodding. It’s cute that you seek to rally others to your side to—what?—silence me? Allow your spite and vitriol to go unchallenged? Sorry, little bully, the playground doesn’t only belong to you.

See folks?Not interested in discussion, only winning.

Umm…where were you engaging in discussion with me? You sound suspiciously like someone who thinks it’s not fair when he gets lapped on the racetrack. Particularly when you have completely ignored my overtures for actual discussion on several occasions. So here’s a true, genuine question (like lots of other true, genuine questions I’ve asked you): What in your books qualifies as discussion?

What you took as an insult was a real, honest-to-goodness question. Which brings us back to that micron-thick skin of yours.

And if you notice, I didn’t say that the word “liberal” is an insult. What I said is that you wielded it in a way to try to negate what I was saying. You engaged in the dictionary definition of an ad hominem attack, I suppose to try to make your argument seem stronger.

But it seems yet again that you’d rather just flaunt your inflated sense of hurt and indignation than actually give a positive definition of what qualifies as discussion. Maybe the sticking point is that whole “positive” thing?