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  • SUNDAY AUGUST 19 2007 4:00 PM

I Don't Care Who You Are. Oh Wait, Yes I Do

Submitted by Bitch_PhD

Edited by Bitch_PhD

Tags: sexism, racism, fame



Pop quiz! Who is the woman in this photograph?

A. Selling her cute native wares in a market somewhere.
B. Someone's grandma.
C. Probably poor.
D. A Nobel laureate.

Answer: she'sRigoberta Menchú, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992. There was some controversy when it came out that some parts of her autobiography were (depending on your point of view) fake / composites of the Guatemalen Quiché experience, presented as having happened to her personally in order to better represent a broader truth than her own personal experience. (Interestingly, this sort of fictionalized element in the autobiography of a member of an oppressed group who knows he or she is writing not only as an individual but as a representative of his or her race isn't unique--here's another quite recent example of scholars trying to disentangle biography and history.)

The arguments over Menchú's autobiography are pretty significant, as the linked news story above hints:

Staff at Cancun's five-star Hotel Coral Beach appear to have assumed this was another street vendor or beggar, so without asking questions they ordered her to leave. Except the woman was Rigoberta Menchú, the Nobel peace prizewinner, Unesco goodwill ambassador, Guatemalan presidential candidate and figurehead for indigenous rights.


Is she "just" a typical Indian bag lady? Or is she "someone who matters"? The important thing about the story is less that hotel staff didn't recognize Menchú; it's that once they found out who she was, their treatment of her changed.

The attempted eviction, an example of discrimination against indigenous people common in central and south America, backfired when other guests recognised Ms Menchú and interceded on her behalf.


In other words, once people who "matter" vouched for her--which they did because they knew she is "important"--everything was hunky dory.

Which of course, it isn't--hunky dory, I mean. It addressed the immediate problem, but not the larger issue that identifiable members of low-caste groups are automatically assumed not to belong in five-star hotels. In Guatemala it's Mayans; in South America more broadly it's Indians; in America it might be "Mexicans" (i.e., identifable Central or South American natives); everywhere it's people who look poor.

Menchú's pretty awesome. Not least because pretty much everything she does directly involves this problem of what "representative" means. Is Menchú the representative of her people because she's exceptional--or because she's not?

Bitch_PhD is fascinated by the problem of representation and thinks that it points straight at the problem of what happens when people assert their rights by demanding that they be treated as isolated individuals rather than members of a group.

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PointBlank

PointBlank

New York, NY
November 2004

AUG 19, 2007 04:17 PM

Edit: I probably misread you.

Menchu is pretty cool, but to say that she was either lying or forming a composite in her autobiography are both simplifications.

Trahern

Trahern

United Kingdom
March 2003

AUG 19, 2007 05:16 PM

Ironically, "cute native wars" is the typo that made me read the whole thing... about which I have no comment that hasn't been read before when this kind of situation crops up.

xazapdmytinu

xazapdmytinu

Fort Collins, CO
July 2007

AUG 19, 2007 05:17 PM

PointBlank said:
Edit: I probably misread you.

Menchu is pretty cool, but to say that she was either lying or forming a composite in her autobiography are both simplifications.



Although I'm sure if Oprah had supported her she would now be hanging her out to dry...good thing Oprah's not a member of the Nobel Committee.

I feel like any place that wants to restrict the entrance of certain people isn't a place I'd like to go into anyway...personally. Although I'm sure she had good reason to have the desire to entire, if not at the very least to bring such discrimination to light.

mellon

mellon

USA
October 2004

AUG 19, 2007 05:29 PM

Ironically, if you'd done a tiny bit more research you'd know that this story is completely made up. What actually happened is that someone who was following her into the hotel was excluded because he was with the press, and he talked about it, and the story got turned into a story about her getting snubbed by the hotel, which didn't happen at all.

Not only didn't it happen, but she was pretty upset about it, because she wisely understands how upsetting stories like this can be for the people she represents.

Unfortunately, once someone in the press has told a lie, it gets repeated forever as if it were true, because nobody actually goes back and checks the facts.

Details in this article.

Ferretbite

Ferretbite

Mexico
September 2006

AUG 19, 2007 05:55 PM

I just read about this, Menchú did clarify the whole incident (article in spanish):

"Guatemala.-Nobel Peace Prize and Presidential Candidate Rigoberta Menchu denied being discriminated at a hotel in Cancun, Mexico, and stated that she would demand a clarification on the news she deemed false (...)

'None of that really happened, I stayed in the hotel, slept there and was treated very well', said Menchú (...) At some point, there was a crowd at the lobby because they wanted pictures and I was asked for a few autographs, maybe then something happened with the media, but not with me'

(...)Journalist David Romero, who hosts a local radio show in Quintana Roo, said in his program that he witnessed how last monday, staff members at the hotel where Menchú was staying 'tried to force her out' of the lobby, but were stopped by people who recognized her(...)

'I will demand a public apology, because I think it is a very irresponsible piece of news, and because it isn't true', Menchú said to the press at the popular Fair of Jocotenango(...)"

So it seems this was all a publicitary stunt by a pseudo journalist... I do agree with some of your other points on exclusion, though.

EDIT: Oops, looks like mellon already posted the article in English!!! My bad, I hadn't seen it blush

Gringo

Gringo

Spokane, WA
May 2006

AUG 19, 2007 06:46 PM

A. Selling her cute native wars wares in a market somewhere.



Fixed.

Still, even if this story were factual, how is staff at a hotel expected to recognize um...."mega-stars" such as Nobel Peace Prize recipients?

OhSoOrdinary

OhSoOrdinary

New York, NY
July 2006

AUG 19, 2007 06:47 PM

mellon said:
Ironically, if you'd done a tiny bit more research you'd know that this story is completely made up. What actually happened is that someone who was following her into the hotel was excluded because he was with the press, and he talked about it, and the story got turned into a story about her getting snubbed by the hotel, which didn't happen at all.

Not only didn't it happen, but she was pretty upset about it, because she wisely understands how upsetting stories like this can be for the people she represents.

Unfortunately, once someone in the press has told a lie, it gets repeated forever as if it were true, because nobody actually goes back and checks the facts.

Details in this article.



Eee....


Well... I look at it like this... Mellon 1 :Bitch_PhD 33,953,754

Better luck next time, eh?

Sevillus

Sevillus

New York, NY
May 2004

AUG 19, 2007 07:03 PM

Bitch_PhD said:


Interestingly, this sort of fictionalized element in the autobiography of a member of an oppressed group who knows he or she is writing not only as an individual but as a representative of his or her race isn't unique



Which begs the question: who appoints someone to be a "representative of his or her race"? is it a consensus of the entire race, a quorum of the race, or is the individual self-appointed?

If the latter, it all sounds like a pink and spongy euphemism for a lie, albeit a lie told by somebody we like.

thefreak

thefreak

NEWSWIRE

Gardner, MA

AUG 19, 2007 08:59 PM

OhSoOrdinary said:

mellon said:
Ironically, if you'd done a tiny bit more research you'd know that this story is completely made up. What actually happened is that someone who was following her into the hotel was excluded because he was with the press, and he talked about it, and the story got turned into a story about her getting snubbed by the hotel, which didn't happen at all.

Not only didn't it happen, but she was pretty upset about it, because she wisely understands how upsetting stories like this can be for the people she represents.

Unfortunately, once someone in the press has told a lie, it gets repeated forever as if it were true, because nobody actually goes back and checks the facts.

Details in this article.


Eee....


Well... I look at it like this... Mellon 1 :Bitch_PhD 33,953,754

Better luck next time, eh?




Get off.

-TM

Clidna

Clidna

Canada
January 2005

AUG 19, 2007 09:03 PM

I would say it's more the public that appoints someone to be such a representative... it's typically a metter of perception.

BlastProcessing

BlastProcessing

USA
OLD SKOOL

AUG 19, 2007 09:22 PM

thefreak said:

OhSoOrdinary said:

mellon said:
Ironically, if you'd done a tiny bit more research you'd know that this story is completely made up. What actually happened is that someone who was following her into the hotel was excluded because he was with the press, and he talked about it, and the story got turned into a story about her getting snubbed by the hotel, which didn't happen at all.

Not only didn't it happen, but she was pretty upset about it, because she wisely understands how upsetting stories like this can be for the people she represents.

Unfortunately, once someone in the press has told a lie, it gets repeated forever as if it were true, because nobody actually goes back and checks the facts.

Details in this article.


Eee....


Well... I look at it like this... Mellon 1 :Bitch_PhD 33,953,754

Better luck next time, eh?




Get off.

-TM



+Yeah.

mellon

mellon

USA
October 2004

AUG 19, 2007 10:49 PM

OhSo, the point isn't to score points. It's to prevent the spread of disinformation. You live in the world where the truth is less valuable and less cared for than toilet paper. Is that really what you want?

This is how the media works. This is why you see what you see on the glass teat. This is why our democracy is going down the toilet - there is so much disinformation that we wouldn't know the truth if it slapped us in the face like a dead fish (and, indeed, that is precisely what it feels like! :')

TheFuckOffKid

TheFuckOffKid

NEWSWIRE

Australia

AUG 19, 2007 11:52 PM

I'm now even more fascinated by the issue of "representation".

The_Reverend

The_Reverend

United Kingdom
September 2004

AUG 20, 2007 12:44 AM

By ''representation'', might you be referring to representations of truth? Distorting facts? Presenting a story in a muddled, ineffective way?

i think i get what you're saying.

Luddite

Luddite

Anderson, CA
December 2005

AUG 20, 2007 02:33 AM

OhSoOrdinary said:

mellon said:
Ironically, if you'd done a tiny bit more research you'd know that this story is completely made up. What actually happened is that someone who was following her into the hotel was excluded because he was with the press, and he talked about it, and the story got turned into a story about her getting snubbed by the hotel, which didn't happen at all.

Not only didn't it happen, but she was pretty upset about it, because she wisely understands how upsetting stories like this can be for the people she represents.

Unfortunately, once someone in the press has told a lie, it gets repeated forever as if it were true, because nobody actually goes back and checks the facts.

Details in this article.



Eee....


Well... I look at it like this... Mellon 1 :Bitch_PhD 33,953,754

Better luck next time, eh?



you should add up the total of "everyone" vs... *coughs*

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