Se robaron hasta la comida de gato Y todavía se están lamiendo el plato

March 22, 2022 5:59 AM

Residente released This Is Not America, a harsh look at U.S. imperialism in Latin America. Latinorebels published a strong analysis of the song, video, and their context, including the relation to Childish Gambino's This Is America (previously), name-checked in Residente's song. CW for the video: police violence, gun violence, shootings, cadavers.

Here's a side-by-side translation. Residente's wikipedia entry.

posted by signal (14 comments total)

Thanks for posting.
posted by kfholy at 6:40 AM on March 22, 2022

Great video. Great post. This may be one of the few arguments in which I'm genuinely pretty sure both sides are right. But, this response is really thoughtful. Thanks!
posted by eotvos at 8:14 AM on March 22, 2022

You had me with the Alfredo Jaar billboard at the beginning, thanks!
posted by SystematicAbuse at 8:59 AM on March 22, 2022

Thanks for posting this. Fantastic video with so many allusions and echoes. Las venas abiertas de América Latina to a beat.

Also rewatched "This Is America," which still chills and amazes me. What a work.
posted by the sobsister at 9:40 AM on March 22, 2022

“ in which I'm genuinely pretty sure both sides are right. “

Both sides of colonialism/imperialism?
posted by oddman at 9:44 AM on March 22, 2022

Both sides of colonialism/imperialism?

Yikes. Now I'm worried that I misunderstood one or both things in a bad way. I meant both sides of despair over US state violence and also hope for rebellion combined with a broader definition of America.
posted by eotvos at 9:46 AM on March 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

I fear MeFi drove off the PoC that could comment on this video with clarity and nuance back in the summer of 2019. I do think Gambino's video doesn't explicitly ask it's audience to do anything about the oppression of black people. It's a statement of what is, not what should be done. Residente's video is more explicit. A call to resistance.

I read eotvos' comment as addressing the final paragraph of Dr. Jorge Juan Rodriguez V's article. Residente's video is unambiguously anticolonial. Not much room to argue for both sides there.
posted by Mister Cheese at 10:44 AM on March 22, 2022 [4 favorites]

Here in Chile, we have a new president, Boric, who's the youngest sitting president in the world and in Chile's history. A little over a decade ago he was leading a student protest movement with hundreds of thousands of 'pinguinos' (a reference to their school uniforms) in the street demanding change. Recently we had two years of 'estallido social', with millions of people on the streets.
Part of what they were protesting against was the neo-liberal social model that we're the poster boy for, with educational, pension, and health systems siphoning a lot of public resources into private hands. These usually involve foreign capital.
Protests are met with state violence. In the past two years, more than 400 eyes were destroyed by the riot police shooting tear-gas canisters and rubber bullets with metal cores directly at people's faces. Many people were killed, blinded and disfigured.
Boric ran on a leftist platform, promising reform on these and other issues, with a strong feminist component, as well as recognition and empowerment of Chile's native peoples.
There's been a lot of talk, on both sides, about Allende, the U.P., the '73 coup, etc.
All of this is to say that the underlying message and images of This Is Not America are as relevant as they've ever been.
posted by signal at 11:30 AM on March 22, 2022 [13 favorites]

astonishing art.

I predict a hot summer.
posted by zenon at 11:42 AM on March 22, 2022

holy shit - the whole video was really powerful but the soccer stadium scene. Damn.
posted by youthenrage at 12:13 PM on March 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

English translation.

(Eu só sei traduzir em espanhol no Google, não em português. E minha compreensão de leitura precisa melhorar.)
posted by kirkaracha at 1:08 PM on March 22, 2022

I think to frame this in terms of U.S. imperialism is to fall into precisely the U.S.-centric framing that Residente is railing against. For starters, colonialist brutality in the Americas dates to 2.5 centuries prior to when the United States were even a twinkle in the Founding Fathers' eyes. And even if we look at contemporary state violence, it can't be understood outside the context of a homegrown, internal classism/racism fueled by colonial and neocolonial extractivism in which the U.S. is currently the largest, but far from the only, player.
posted by drlith at 1:23 PM on March 22, 2022 [4 favorites]

worth a throwback listen to the clash's sandinista. especially washington bullets.
posted by j_curiouser at 2:36 PM on March 22, 2022

“I think to frame this in terms of U.S. imperialism is to fall into precisely the U.S.-centric framing that Residente is railing against.”

Except in this BBC interview, Residente says “Porque la mayoría de las situaciones que presento en el video están conectadas con intervenciones de Estados Unidos.” so he is writing it from that perspective.
posted by doctord at 2:37 PM on March 22, 2022 [5 favorites]