A soldier with the Texas National Guard allegedly fired a gun near the U.S.-Mexico border, hitting a 22-year-old man across the border in Mexico.
Mexican authorities and an advocate for human rights say the bullet crossed the border from El Paso on Saturday near the Bridge of the Americas.
It then struck the man in the leg in Ciudad Juarez.
According to the Border Network for Human Rights (BNHR), that man was not attempting to cross the border, but practicing sports with a group.
sigh I wish people wouldn’t treat Texas like one homogeneous culture. It really isn’t. The major cities tend to lean liberal, but between gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the fact that the Democrats seem to no longer be interested in fielding candidates that actually stand a chance, it seems like there’s not much anyone can do.
Well I’ve been living in Texas for almost 20 years. Mostly Houston and now DFW. Originally, I’m from California and I lived there for 12 years. I’m going back to college so I can afford to leave Texas.
Yes, the major cities are more liberal, especially Houston. But confederate flags abound! It’s only been getting worse since 2020. It’s a shame because Houston is the most culturally diverse place I’ve ever been. But be that as it may, this is the South. This is the home of racists.
The Mexicans won the last time there was a battle at the Alamo. They may not want to repeat that.
I’ve lived in Texas all my life and while it is far from a “shithole”, I am unapologetically disgusted by my home state’s current political climate.
When I was growing up (in DFW), I got a liberal (as in the tradition sense, not as a political spectrum) public education which I look back on to fondly. We were taught about sex (starting in 5th grade) and encouraged to be aware of racial issues and the root causes of hatred and encouraged to be friends with all our peers and egalitarian towards people of any color. Gayness was not mentioned, but also not condemned, and I definitely had gay friends and knew at least two gay couples in high school who were open, supported by students and teachers, and happy.
My own childhood outside of school was one of amazing freedom and self-responsibility. My parents’ rule was “be back for dinner”. We all had bikes, and we would range dozens of miles a day on them. We did crazy, stupid, amazingly fun things all by ourselves as children. We got in trouble, we got hurt, but we learned how to be self-reliant and entertain ourselves and we never did anything “criminal” nor were we ever threatened by anyone.
I saw my state elect a liberal female governor who was amazeballs and famously stuck George W Bush with her barbed tongue.
But what always existed, underneath, was what we called the “Old Boy Network”, which really was just code for white, wealthy, privileged, bigoted men. Clayton Williams, who infamously ran for governor, was a prime example of the type.
So, while Texas was - and I think still will be - on a grand trajectory towards being an enlightened, liberal, egalitarian state in my childhood, it got twisted up and corrupted (I point my finger at Reaganism and Religious Extremism as the starting points, at least in my awareness) until we now have a hateful little troll as governor, a shitbag full of cronies, and voters who think Donald Trump represents the ideal American who should be president (again).
I love Texas, or loved it, but now I am dismayed by it - by the hatred and the ignorance that it just seems to be oozing now. I hate the fact that this has happened to my state and after spending my entire adult life voting and speaking against this trend, I now just want to leave.
Unfortunately, I can’t think of any other state in the Union I would leave to. They all have problems. The symptom of Texas is just one of the most visible of the disease that affects our entire country.
Hatred and fear of the other, the least American value I can think of, has finally blossomed, nurtured by people who would rather see this country descend into war than dare teach that the powerful people in this country have treated the powerless people in it very, very badly for a very, very long time.
