Podcast Final Project

The host of the LatinoLink podcast shares that her grandfathers were Braceros in the 1960s and she wanted to reflect on the Bracero Program. She explains that the program allowed Mexican citizens to work in the US temporarily to address the agricultural labor shortage during World War II. She discusses the push and pull factors that influenced different immigrant communities to come to the US, such as economic hardship and limited opportunities in their home countries. She notes that despite different backgrounds, these groups all hoped for a better future but also faced discrimination and mistreatment. The host suggests that the capitalist system prioritizes profit over worker well-being, leading to exploitation. She gives examples of dehumanizing labor conditions experienced by Braceros. She concludes by questioning the benefits of capitalism for other countries and communities and invites listeners to share their thoughts. Hello everyone and welcome back to LatinoLink, the podcast where we learn about our Latino heritage and discover new ways to connect with our culture. My name is Candela Mercado-Huerta and I'll be your host for today's episode. Now before we get started, I want to let you guys know that today's episode is a bit out of the ordinary. We won't be talking about Latinidad like we usually do, but that's because I just found out some news and I wanted to share with you guys. So basically, to summarize it real quick, both my grandfathers were Braceros in the early 1960s, so towards the end of the program, and I went on this extensive deep dive, just rabbit hole after rabbit hole, and I wanted to share this with you guys and reflect about the program and see how it compares to different forms of immigration. So I hope you guys decide to join me, but if you decide not to, that's cool. I get it. I'll see you next week with a normal episode topic. So before we start, I would like to start off by giving some historical context and explain what the Bracero Program was. So according to the Library of Congress, the Bracero Program was an executive order established in 1942 and was enacted into public law in 78 and 1951. It was basically an agreement between Mexico and the United States that allowed Mexican citizens to work legally in the United States on short-term labor contracts. The implementation of the Bracero Program provided cheap labor and continued employment for Braceros who had crossed the border without applying for a visa. The program was meant to address the agricultural labor shortage in the U.S. that resulted from World War II. Bracero started only working in the agricultural sector, but eventually were moved into railroad construction, making it possible for the U.S. economy to meet the challenges imposed by the war effort. It was expected to be a temporary program that only lasted the war's duration. However, the Bracero Program was not terminated until December 1, 1964, more than 19 years after the war had ended. Once the program ended, it was found that about 4 million Braceros had been brought to the U.S. The program was initially intended to benefit the U.S. and Mexico, but the program ended up benefiting the U.S. and put Mexico in a position that required them to continue the program even after the war was over because so many Mexican men were employed through the Bracero Program. After learning about the Bracero Program, I found this quote by Manuel Gamillo, who is a Mexican anthropologist and an activist in Latin America and European societies. He said a quote in 1929, and I would like to share it with you all. And the quote is, The Mexican is usually employed as unskilled laborer. In the United States, he learns better methods of cultivation, how to use modern tools and industrial machinery to construct roads and transfer raw materials into manufactured objects. This effective and invaluable experience that the immigrants cannot obtain in Mexico will effectively contribute to the national reconstruction when they return permanently to their own country. So the reason why I wanted to share this quote is because I feel like the quote itself is very applicable in a universal thing that just doesn't apply to Mexican workers but also could be applied to immigrants from various backgrounds who come to the U.S. seeking better opportunities. I would say a good place to start when looking at these parallels is probably considering the push and pull factors that influence various immigrant communities, including Braceros, Japanese, and Chinese immigrants to immigrate to the U.S. The decision to migrate is often driven by a combination of push factors, which compel individuals to leave their homeland, and pull factors, which attract them to a new destination. For many Mexican Braceros, the push factors were rooted in economic hardship, limited opportunities, and political instability in Mexico. They were drawn to the U.S. by the promise of employment, higher wages, and a chance to improve their standard of living. Similarly, Japanese immigrants face push factors such as overpopulation, land scarcity, and restrictive social hierarchies in Japan. The allure of economic prosperity and land ownership in America's lands, particularly in California, served as powerful pull factors for Japanese immigrants seeking a better life for themselves and their families. Likewise, Chinese immigrants were motivated by push factors like poverty, famine, and political turmoil in China. The California Gold Rush of the mid-19th century acted as a significant pull factor, attracting thousands of Chinese immigrants in search of fortune and opportunity in the U.S. I think it's important to point out these parallels between these experiences because, yes, these are different groups, and youth groups have different cultures and morals and beliefs. However, they all kind of had the same pull factor in the sense that they all went to the U.S. and hoped for a better future. As a result from this, these groups also experienced discrimination, exploitation, and mistreatment. And I think that it's important to look at why is it that, although these people are or these groups are different groups, how come they experience the same thing? And I think a good place to start is probably analyzing and defining what type of system they're in. And I would like to give you guys a definition of what capitalism is. So capitalism is a system in which a capitalist class controls the means of production, purchases waste labor to produce things, seeking to realize a profit through market exchange with the ultimate goal of accumulating capital through a cycle of reinvestment in the production process, materials, labor, and personal consumption. I think using this definition of capitalism and applying that definition and looking at the Bracero Program specifically is a much more efficient way to look at this. Just because the Bracero Program on paper has a set of laws and regulations that were set to protect Braceros from discrimination and exploitation, Braceros received a work contract to be given in English and Spanish, which promised them quality housing, safe transportation, and insurance for on and off the job. However, in actual practice, none of them were actually followed. So the Bracero Program had these protocols to prevent what happened in previous workspaces from happening, but it clearly didn't work. And I think it has to do in this capitalist system that prioritizes profit over the well-being of the worker. And we can look at the type of labor conditions in which the Braceros were exposed to. According to a documentary I saw, Braceros would mention that they were being fumigated with DDT in order to kill lice or any type of germs they carried, and they'd be stripped naked in order to do so. Or when they came to medical exams, everyone was lined up against the wall, and doctors would examine them all in a room together naked, and in that they would be checking if they were physically qualified to be Braceros. And this process itself was a very dehumanizing process, and I think in that it's a process of commodifying labor, commodifying the Braceros, and in that, commodifying immigrant labor. So now looking back at the quote by Manuel Gamillo, the Mexican is usually employed as unskilled laborer. In the United States, he learns better methods of cultivation, how to use modern tools and industrial machinery to construct roads and transform raw materials into manufactured objects. This effective and invaluable experience, which the immigrants cannot obtain in Mexico, will effectively contribute to the national reconstruction when they return permanently to their own country. If we could kind of look back on it and kind of see the type of view we view capitalism and how it should benefit other countries and how it should benefit other communities, and it is intended to benefit all, but in reality, it doesn't do so. And lastly, how immigrants are intended to be permanent people in the U.S. They're intended to go back. They're intended to not stay there permanently, just like, for example, Chinese immigrants, they were doing sojourn immigration, where they intended to go back to their countries, and the Bracero Program itself was intended to be a temporary program that served short-term labor contracts, because they didn't want permanent residents from Mexico staying in the U.S. With that, I would like to end this podcast, and I hope that I gave you guys a chance or kind of a little food for thought, and you guys could look, reflect on it, give me your thoughts, tweet us, DM us, let us know what you guys think about this. If you guys are on board, or if you guys are not, you guys are like, yay, I kind of like how capitalism looks now, it's fine, give me your guys' ideas, thoughts, just because I think I'm still processing it all, but yeah, thank you so much for joining us, that was your host, Camila Mercado, and I'll see you in next week's episode on LatinoLink.