What Do a Top-Shelf Vodka and Illegal Immigrants Have In Common?

What Do a Top-Shelf Vodka and Illegal Immigrants Have In Common?

They’re both participants in the reconquista, illegal immigrants as the foot soldiers and now a vodka purveyor as its cartographer.

Entertaining little dust-up over this ad from Absolut, depicting (very roughly) Mexico along the lines of its early 19th century boundaries. The ad was targeted at Mexican consumers, “based upon historical perspectives and … created with a Mexican sensibility,” according to the company’s blog.

Did the folks at Absolut really think someone in El Norte wouldn’t get wind of it? The ad predictably played into “Aztlan” conspiracy theories. The company has apologized (perhaps it has gone down-market enough to fear boycotts by the Lou Dobbs crowd). The reconquista is laughable in so many ways, among them its premises a) that Mexicans in the US are doing the Mexico government’s bidding, and b) that territory means much any more.

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yave begnet

I wonder how badly Absolut ends up after this. Judging by the comments I saw when this first broke last week, every restrictionist in America has a bottle of Absolut in their pantry that they promptly poured down the drain upon hearing of this assault on America’s dignity. Are restrictionists that uniformly alcoholic, I wonder? If so, the threats to dump the vodka are probably empty …

Or perhaps it’s just another tempest in a teakettle to divert attention from the failing economy, endless war in Iraq, and the ongoing quest to deport all of America’s low-wage workers. Absolut will issue a bland apology and take the publicity to the bank. As it should.

James Magid
James Magid

I thought this meant that the Swedes wanted to take over the western united states and mexico. To which I say…um…something encouraging in Swedish.

Consul-At-Arms

The reconquista is only a threat if it’s let alone and sheltered (and fed, and watered) long enough that it becomes a real threat. Even at this late date, it’s more significant as either a longer-term potential threat, if allowed continued ideological sanctuary, and as a political bugbear.

The other two points, a &b, invite a response. Mexicans in the U.S. may not be consciously doing the Mexican government’s bidding, but examine what they in fact do: a) remove themselves from Mexico’s unemployment equation; b) send home remittances which constitute a pillar of the Mexican economy; and c) function as a safety valve for the political, even revolutionary, forces which would endanger the political (and socio-economic) ruling class in Mexico.

Your point b is perhaps the most curious slip of all. Territory means quite a bit to both those who stand and live on it (or are charged with defending it), and to those who covet it.

Perhaps Temple University is one of those learning institutions which exists solely in cyberspace, having evolved beyond the mundane bricks and mortar of mere physicality.

I’ve quoted you and linked to you here.