Mexico drug war displaces families in Sinaloa highlands

[bemildred]

Source: LAT

CULIACAN, Mexico — For generations, the extended Hernandez family tended fields of marijuana high in Sinaloa's western Sierra Madre highlands.

They sold their crops to representatives of the Sinaloa cartel for a fraction of what the drug would bring at the U.S. border and eked out a pittance.

Barefoot children never went to school; they just helped their dads with the planting and harvest. Women washed clothes in the river. They burned pine sap for light at night because there was no electricity.

But a couple of weeks ago, the fighting that has raged as the Zeta paramilitary force tries to encroach on the Sinaloa cartel's turf reached the string of ranchitos where the Hernandezes and scores of other families farmed.


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-mexico-drug-displaced-20120601,0,5267030.story

[Uncle Joe]

1. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, bemildred.

[Tumbulu]

2. So horrible!

I am so sick and tired of people thinking it is fine to support these monsters and that is what buying illegal marijuana means.

For people who need it medically- I have the idea that the dispensaries around here (N. CA) get theirs from reputable growers licensed in the area. That is the way it should be. Local, licensed and taxed.

[may3rd]

3. It also displaces body parts

but few care to look that close at the drug cartel war

[Zorra]

4. 12 years ago, when I was solo in Batopilas, in the bottom of the Copper Canyon,

a marijuana grower came over to talk to me, and was admiring my Dragonfly camp stove, proudly showed me a sample of his "produce", and he wanted to trade me like 5 kilos of weed for my stove. (Yeh, I know, that's an awful lot of weed for a campstove. What can I say?)

I'm pretty sure Batopilas is in Chihuahua, but it's not too far from the Sinaloa border.

Back in the days when the ferry to Baja still ran out of Puerto Vallarta, I think it was '85 or '86, a man offered my ex-partner and I like 20 kilos for some ridiculously low price while we were camped on a beach in Jalisco, a day before we were going to board the ferry from Puerto Vallarta going to La Paz. We thanked him, but declined his offer. When we got to La Paz the Feds tore our customized van totally apart. When I say totally, I mean totally. To this day, I think someone was trying to set us up.

Another time, on that same adventure, in the hilly jungles of Jalisco, just west of San Blas, my ex-partner and I were on a trail to an awesome natural waterslide, and were met by two men carrying rifles. They let us pass, but told us to make sure we stayed on the trail.

We did.

Lots of dope growing down there for sure. Seems like it's getting way more serious than it was 12 years ago.

(BTW, I haven't smoked herb in over 20 yrs)

[bemildred]

5. Well, the Dragonfly is a very good stove.

My favorite for minimalist travel anyway. I wouldn't part with if for anything, certainly not for cheap Mexican weed.

And you probably were being set up that other time. I've heard many such stories.

The thing here in this story is that you have the Zetas making war on the Sinaloa Cartel, taking it to their home turf, and it's clear that neither side worries much about the government. You wonder when it weill occur to the Narcotrafficantes that they might as well be the government, it's much simpler that way, and that's how most of them get started anyway.

[Zorra]

6. I lived in Mexico for maybe 7 years all told, and I make one basic observation:

Mexico is a mess, the mess appears to be somewhat a product of long term, widespread legal corruption on every level, and that mess has become a way of life.

I'm convinced that the culture of Mexico is impossible for an outsider to understand to any moderate degree.

I won't expound, because I don't understand, and it makes my head hurt when I think about it; but my heart totally goes out to the indigenous Tarahumara people, they live very simply, and all they want is to be left alone to live their simple lives.