7 | People of the Sun

CAL EXIT is in disarray. But secession movements don’t happen in a straight line. In this episode, we tell the story of the Zapatistas. They fought for autonomy for decades. And in the 90s – it finally happened. Sources:

• ABC
• MIT
• Gerardo Uam on YouTube
• Radio Zapata
• Rage Against the Machine
• 20th Century Studios
• EZLN
• WGN News
• CNN
• NPR
• UVA Miller Center
• Associated Press
• ABC
• Bloomberg
• CNN

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Nineteen. On December thirty one, the President of Mexico, Carlos Salinasti,
gathered with family and friends at a luxury resort in Oahaka.
He and his guests sipped glasses of expensive champagne as
the countdown to midnight began, the one that's close to you,
because midnight is Salinas wasn't just celebrating the new year.

(00:30):
He was also marking a big political victory a second
time in seven. At the stroke of midnight, his new
trade agreement with the United States and Canada would go
into effect. It was known as an AFTA. Pretty nineteen
ninety most modern Mexican presidents had been lawyers, but Salinas

(00:57):
he was an economist educated at Harvard, and like many
economists at the time, he imagined a future in which
the world was more and more interconnected, and after was
a big step towards this vision of globalization. If Mexico prospers,
the US and Canada will prosper. That is why this

(01:17):
is not a win loose solution, but a win win
win situation for the three countries in the northern part
of the American continent. The party continued into the early
hours of the morning, but at a round two am,
a military aid stepped onto the terrace and handed Sealina's

(01:38):
a note. The Secretary of Defense was on the phone,
and the news was urgent. As most of Mexico was
ringing in the new year. Thousands of rebels with mats
and guns had taken over San Cristo Las Casas, it's

(02:00):
town in the southeastern state of Chiapas. They called themselves
the Sabbatista Army of National Liberation or the Easy l N.
They had occupied government buildings, freed prisoners, and even captured
a local radio station. Here's moist Zuniga. He was in

(02:20):
San Cristobal that night. I remember that in the early morning,
about one am, I guess, we heard that there was
a demonstration of Indians in the center. But they said
that they were worrying about La Clavas and that they
were carrying march. It was not really known what was

(02:44):
going on, if they were violent groups that were going
to harm society. And that's when we turned on the radio.
Scratchy broadcast repeated the same message over and over. It's said,
in part, we are a product of five d years

(03:04):
of struggle, first against slavery, then during the War of
Independence against Spain led by insurgents, then to avoid being
absorbed by North American imperialism. But today we say ya basta,
enough is enough. The rebels wore face masks to hide

(03:26):
their identities, but their goal was no mystery. The broadcast continued. Therefore,
and in accordance with this declaration of war, we call
on our stop at least a military with the following
orders to advance to the capital of the country and
defeat the Mexican army. From interval presents an awfully nice

(03:52):
this is the last resort. I'm shoot this gun. Episode
seven People of the Sun. At the heart of the
call les idea is a simple promise the California will

(04:15):
be better off on its own, But somewhat paradoxically, Marcus
and Lewis also expect the relationship between California and the
US to remain super close. Here's Marcus, so we said,
you'll have California's citizenship and you'll retain your American citizenship.
If you want to renounce your American citizenship, that's on you.

(04:35):
But we will never make that a requirement to join California.
And Marcus and Lewis's ideal version of call legs, California
would retain many of the benefits of being a part
of the United States. Californians would stop paying federal taxes
but could still collect Social Security. The U. S Military
would continue to own and operate basis in California and

(04:56):
take possession of their nuclear weapons. If you look at
the literary basis in California, it's not that much land,
it really isn't They could keep them, and they could
pay US money to keep it here, and they could
keep the nukes there. And finally, the California and US
economies would remain closely linked. Here's Louis Marinelli. If you
look at the history of the United States of the

(05:17):
last several decades, they've been very favorable towards things like
free trade in North America, and so there's no reason
for us to expect that just because it's an arbitrarily
now international border, that all of a sudden, the trade stops,
the food stops. If all this were true calls, it
does seem like a win win situation for California's more

(05:40):
local control, but with a lot of support and protection
from the US. Still, some experts are skeptical that it
would work out that way. Here's Stephen marsh, author of
the Next Civil War. Why would the United States government
pay pensions to California's when it's not raising tax revenues
on California citizen. I'm it's too This is what I

(06:01):
mean by they're not serious. That's not a serious proposal.
So the problem with this debate, of course, is that
it's all hypothetical. So today, instead of speaking and hypotheticals,
we're going to tell you the story of a place
right next door to California, where people fought for their
autonomy and actually one As many of you are aware,

(06:22):
there's a revolution happening in southeastern Mexico and a state
rich and resources but poor and standard of living. There
are those who will no longer accept the poverty that
the current system offers them. These people are known as
the well. January one, a revolutionary group known as the
Sapatistas seized control of large portions of the Mexican state

(06:46):
of Chiapas. They pledged to transform the way the region
was governed. Nearly thirty years later, much of Chiapas is
still under Sapatista control, operating independently from the Mexican government.
It's a dootle that Marcus Ruis Evans says is a
direct inspiration. I have personally always supported the Zapatistas. Their

(07:08):
movement is similar to the Calxit movement in a couple
of regards. California's at the edge of America. We are
the furthest away from the capitals can be. We are
a markedly different culture than the rest of Americans, and
we too have our resources sucked out in order to
benefit America, while we don't really see the benefits of that.

(07:30):
Is it possible for California and the US to remain
close allies after calls it? Can California be independent and
still get the benefits of being part of the United States?
Or is that all just too good to be true?
The story of Chiapas gives us insight on the question
what's it actually like to live in the shadow of

(07:51):
a huge country that you just declared independence from. Is
it a story of friendly neighbors or something else. To
get started, we need to give you a little bit
of background. Who exactly are the Sabatistas and why did

(08:12):
they rise up against the Mexican government back To do
that story justice would require an entire podcast of its own,
but for this episode, what's important to know is that
Mexico has been heavily shaped by a colonization. The Spanish
began settling the area over five hundred years ago, searching

(08:33):
for gold and spreading Catholicism, and just like in the
United States, these colonists subjugated and displaced the millions of
indigenous people who originally inhabited these lands. By the lay
eighteen hundreds, Mexico was living under a dictator named port
Video d S. D S succeeded in growing the Mexican economy,
but he did so in part by confiscating land from

(08:56):
poor indigenous farmers and turning it over to allies and
four investors. The theft of their lands created profound suffering
amongst Mexico's indigenous people. For centuries, they had farmed the
land communally. Now without lands of their own, many had
no choice but to labor on plantations under often brutal conditions.

(09:17):
The DIA's regime collapsed in triggering what's known as the
Mexican Revolution. Put simply, it was a civil war, with
multiple factions battling for control of the country for over
a decade. One of the leaders who rose to power

(09:38):
during this time was a farmer named Emiliano sat you, yes,
my president, what is your name? I mean out of
the earth, that strook with a cry, the robin hood
of Mexico. The man with a circle of out his name.

(10:01):
I'm a jetting in his hand, fire in his blood,
taking by storm and holding my fury. And where he rode,
they conquered. What you're hearing is a trailer for an
old Hollywood film called Viva Sapata. It stars Marlon Brando
in skin darkening makeup as Mexican folk hero Emiliano Sata.

(10:21):
Here's Alex Kaznavis, author of Sabbatista's Rebellion. From the Grassroots
to the Global. Emiliano Sapata is still regarded as the
most authentic, most untarnished, purest hero of the Mexican Revolution.
He grew up to be essentially the Mexican version of
a cowboy, right, rode horses, all that kind of stuff,

(10:43):
Very dashing, but he also grew up with a keen
sense of justice and seeing the incredible injustice. In early
twentieth century Mexico in the lead up to the revolution,
Sabata represented the poor, mostly indigenous farmers of southern Mexico.
This primary goal was to take land back from the
rich and return it to the peasants who would originally

(11:05):
owned it. In nineteen seventeen, Sabata achieved his biggest victory
Article seven. Mexico enacted a new constitution, and one of
its provisions, Article seven, included many of Sabbata's ideas. Article
seven essentially stipulates land reform, so the redistribution of land

(11:25):
that's been left idle, that's owned by large landowners. But critically,
it allows for land to be collectively owned. It's a
huge victory. Article seven made a huge difference in the
lives of poor farmers, especially Native people. By three million
Mexican families lived and worked on communal lands made possible

(11:47):
by Article seven. Then came President Carlos Salinas. In Salinas
called for the end of Article land but actions this
meant that the communal lands on which millions of Native
people had been living would be divided up and sold off.

(12:08):
The Mexican Congress quickly approved his proposal. Why would Salinas
do this? By the nine eighties, debt crisis has hit Mexico.
Mexico has defaulted on its I m F loans, and
by the nineties, as NAFTA is under negotiation, the North
American Free Trade Agreement all the capitalized interests behind n

(12:29):
after saying, you know, you cannot have an article that
essentially stipulates that property that the land is subject to
appropriation and redistribution. So in order to play ball, Salinas
has to essentially remove Article seven from the Mexican Constitution.
And this is arguably the spark that lights the fuse.

(12:54):
Salina saw NAFTA as good business for his country, but
as one activist told The New York Time, quote, the
Free Trade Agreement is a death certificate for the Indian
peoples of Mexico unquote, which brings us back to the Sabatistas.
Inspired by the example of Emiliano Sapata, they rose up

(13:14):
and took the land back. There were many dead in
the market. The Sapatistas went into the houses of the

(13:35):
mestizos in the center of a cocingo, and the army
went in after them and also mowed down the messtisos,
the labnos, if that's what you can call them. So
on January one, Sapatista rebels took hold of San Cristo
de las Casas and several other towns in Chiapas. The

(13:56):
response from President Salinas was quick in brutal. The army invaded,
hunting down rebel fighters and forcing them back into the
surrounding mountains. Here's MOI, says Suniga again. That afternoon, the
afternoon of the first of January, they left. We only

(14:16):
saw the Sapatista's walking towards the mountains in the south.
I felt a strangeness and a kind of respect, because
they looked very small, physically poor, like little chiitas made
up cloth. You could see that everything was self made.
The rambles of the Mexican army would come down with

(14:38):
two or three machine guns. The soldiers were physically much bigger.
You could see that not all of them were from Chiapas.
You could see a lot of soldiers from the north
of Mexico. The easy land was mostly local indigenous farmers

(14:59):
and labor. This they were far outmatched by the Mexican army.
But moisess could see that the rebels had something. The
military did it something to fight for. Their very existence
was on the line. You could hear in the words
of the rebels radio transmission. We call on all our
brothers to join this call as the only way to

(15:22):
avoid starving in the face of the insatiable ambition of
a dictatorship of more than seventy years. Here's moistas Unia.
More than anything, I heard a lot of determination and
a lot of reason in their words. I knew they
were right because I had seen that poverty. The army

(15:43):
was never able to stop the uprising in Chiapas. Finally,
after years of fighting, they gave in Mexico passed a
law stating that quote indigenous peoples could practice autonomy within
the framework of a united nation. The Sabatistas had on well.

(16:13):
The first time I went to Chiapas is um. After
a long long bus ride, we came into San Cristoval
de Las Casas, and San Cristoval is a town right
before you really go into the jungle. This is Martha Gonzalez.
She's an activist and author and the lead singer of

(16:34):
the Los Angeles rock band Getz and Uh. I remember
coming in and it was a beautiful green, luscious everywhere.
It's just beautiful. It was a little foggy, the sun
hadn't really come out yet. There were a lot of
Sapatistas everywhere, and we were met at the kind of
like the very top of that hill because our stuff

(16:55):
was going to be searched. They wanted to make sure
we didn't have any guns and any alcohol or drugs.
And by the late nine nineties the story of the
Sabatistas was known around the world. The rock band Rage
Against the Machine wrote multiple songs about the uprising. One
of them, People of the Sun, was nominated for a Grammy.

(17:17):
Martha was one of those who traveled to Chiappa's to
see how the uprising was working in practice and to
learn how she might replicate Easyelan tactics back home. The
idea was not that you can become sapatista. It was
more about what can you do from your own trenches,
and so that was completely empowering, and I think we've
been trying to live that philosophy ever since. The Sabatistas

(17:41):
had enacted as system that looked really different from what
had come before it. It was a radical form of democracy,
with most big decisions made directly by the people. They
also declared what they called the Women's Revolutionary Law. So
one of their laws is that you know, woman has
a right to join the army if she's so wishes

(18:03):
to h woman also has a right to have as
many kids or no children, if she so wishes. Most importantly,
the SPASS took steps to protect the cultures and languages
of Native people, something that the Mexican government had tried
for generations to eliminate. The Mexican government has always espoused
that folks are aren't Mexicanos, right, and the implication here

(18:26):
is that the indigenous are extinct, that they are dead,
and that we now live in a post indigenous world. Well,
that's not true. The Sapatistas, the value systems that they
set have everything to do with their histories, in preserving
their histories, preserving their languages, their way of life, their
connection to the land. And this is what they decided

(18:49):
to focus on. In many ways, the easy l End
delivered on their promises. They restored land to the citizens
of the regions they liberated. They've tried to build a
more inclusive and just society, and they stood up for

(19:11):
Native rights. But there has remained one big obstacle to
the Sapatista success Mexico. Here's Alex Kasnavish again. The Mexican
government is an entirely duplicitous and insincere partner, and it's
really clear from the beginning that they are not the
ones entirely pulling the strings either. There's this infamous memo

(19:32):
that gets released by the Chase Manhattan Bank that says
the Mexican government must demonstrate territorial integrity and control in Chiapas.
What they're saying is, you have to crack down and
destroy this uh to demonstrate that you are open for business.
The army constructed military bases in Sapathista territory, and the

(19:52):
Mexican government provides funding to paramilitary groups that routinely attacks
Sapatista supporters. Meanwhile, the Mexic Second government has failed to
provide basic services to the residents of Chiapas who are
still Mexican citizens. Almost Chiapas is a literate. Access to
healthcare is limited, of indigenous communities do not have running

(20:14):
water in their homes. The reasons why are pretty clear.
The Sapatista uprising was a huge political embarrassment to the government.
It undermined confidence in Mexico just as it was trying
to pitch itself to foreign investors, and the value of
the Pesto plummeted. In short, it destabilized Mexico and humiliated

(20:35):
its leaders, which left them in no mood to help
the people of Chiapas. Yeah, so, what is the story
of the Sapatistas tell us about Calexi? What kind of
relationship can California expect with the United States after it

(20:58):
declares independence. Here's Stephen marsh He thinks the relationship is
going to be, well, whatever the US wants it to be.
The state that you're succeeding from has to agree to it.
The Americans would have all the power, right, Like they
could just say, actually, we're not going to pay you anything. Ever,
And what will California be able to do? Nothing? Nothing?

(21:19):
If the U s decides to shut off the Internet
in California, it can, right. All the cards are in
one hand here, and Chapa's citizens are still reliant on
the Mexican government for many social services. California is kind
of in the same boat. It has huge dependencies on
the US, trade, security, water, infrastructure. In a dispute, California

(21:43):
could turn to the United Nations, but the US HOLDS
veto power over important votes, including California's ability to join
the UN. At all, Americans tend to think, well, who
cares about the u N. But like, if you don't
have UN recognition, then you don't have I p addresses.
Your money is no good. If you want to have
airplanes land in your airports, you need the u N.

(22:07):
The power and balance would get worse if, as Marcus
has suggested, California gives its nuclear weapons back to the
United States. If it was America said well, we're gonna
take our nukes, people here would probably say, fine, go,
we don't want them here anyways. No, we don't think
there will be a physical threat from America because we
are peacefully and legally succeeding. Why would America try to

(22:29):
conquer us when they just voted us out? A majority
of their Congress just said get out. In the early
nine nineties, just as NAFTA was trying to unite North America,
the former Soviet Union was collapsing as a nation split
into smaller countries. Ukraine agreed to turn over its nukes
to Russia in exchange for security guarantees. I don't have

(22:50):
to tell you where that decision led them, Russia unleashing
an assault on Ukraine from multiple directions. Damer Putin declared
that Russia would use all weapons systems available to US
to defend the country. He wanted to, in fact, re
established the former Soviet Union. The narrative in Ukraine publicly

(23:13):
is we had the world's third largest nuclear arsenal, we
gave it up for the signed piece of paper and
look what happened. All to say, it seems like there
are a lot of ways the relationship between California in

(23:35):
the US couldn't go wrong after calgs in. But beyond
all of that, Stephen marsh doesn't understand why Marcus and
Lewis would want to remain so close to the US anyway.
I mean, it's it's a strange thing to want to
have it both ways. I mean, either you are a
California and not an American, or you're an American, right
And as you can see from talking to the leading

(23:56):
California separatists who imagines double identity papers forever everyone, you
may not hate America quite as much as it's required
to actually want to succeed. Which brings us to a
really important distinction between cal Exit and the Sabatistas from
Marcus and Lewis call exit is a legal argument, a
moral argument and an economic argument. They believe California would

(24:19):
be better off on its own. But as Moisess noticed
back on January first, the Sapatistas we're fighting for something
way different, for survival. If there's anything I've learned from
this podcast, it's that succeeding from a country is a
big deal. It's going to involve some people getting hurt.

(24:39):
So the question from Marcus and Lewis is our Californians
really angry enough at the US to endure all the
sacrifice The cal exit is probably going to require, Like
are you really willing to say you're not an American?
Or do you just hate the government, which, of course
is like, you know, as American is alple pie. There's

(25:05):
one more reason for Californians to worry about their future
relationship with the United States. The era of globalization, the
driving force behind NAFTA, may be coming to an end.
In a few moments, I will sign the North American

(25:25):
Free Trade Act, and the law after will tear down
trade barriers between our three nations. On December eight, US
President Bill Clinton held a semony to celebrate the ratification
of NAFTA. We cannot stop global change. We can only
harness the energy to our benefit. Now we must recognize

(25:45):
that the only way for a wealthy nation to grow
richer is to export. That, my fellow Americans, is the
decision that Congress made when they voted to ratify NAFTA.
But things didn't go according to plan. Mexico's economic crisis

(26:07):
deepen today, with stocks dropping sharply and the face so
still under fire. The crisis has grown despite ten billion
dollars in a from Mexico's partners in Nada. After and
after the world's economies became more and more connected, but
globalization was deeply destabilizing for working class people, not just

(26:27):
in Mexico but around the world. Here's Alex Kasnavish again.
So it's the idea that you can actually make your
cost of production that much cheaper by sourcing it somewhere else.
What happens if we can source our labor off shore
where they don't have labor rights. If I have to
deal with environmental restrictions in the United States, maybe Haiti

(26:48):
won't care about them to the same degree. I think
it's quite accurate to think of it as a race
to the bottom in terms of social standards, environmental standards,
labor standards. This was never a audol that was meant
to actually improve social conditions of life for the world's majorities.
Whole industries were outsourced from one country it's another. Unions

(27:09):
were gutted and changing economic prospects unleast massive immigration. These
economic turmoil is hardest on Mexico's population, and officials worry
there will now be a sudden increase in Mexican migration
to the United States. By the backlash was well underway,
and after was perhaps the worst trade deal ever made.

(27:31):
The United States racked up trade deficits totaling more than
two trillion dollars Canada. Politicians like Donald Trump were no
longer promising a more integrated world. They were promising the opposite.
Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign
affairs will be made to benefit American workers and American families.

(27:56):
From this day forward, it's going to be only America first,
America First. Maybe back in the nineties, California could have
expected a warm welcome into the global economy after Calx,

(28:17):
But today the world looks a lot. Different countries are
shutting their borders, enacting trade barriers, restricting immigration. Today we're
in an era of nationalism, or put another way, the
era of anti globalization. I am the president of Antico
position movements in Russia. We supported the working class. This

(28:42):
is an economic this is a politics, and this is
a common Italian relationships. Next time on our season finale,
we speak to Alexander Jonov, president of the anti globalization
movement of Russia. Yonov helped Louis Marinelle opened the California
embassy in Moscow, triggering a massive scandal that crippled the

(29:05):
Callex That movement back in today in Marcus Ruiz Evans
is trying to rebuild. But the story of Cals, Russia
and Louis Marinelli is far from over. It is vitally
important for millions of rational, normal people living in California
the state as we know it never becomes an independent country.

(29:27):
Independence would unbind California from the only thing that has
kept it from completely deteriorating into a third world communist state.
That one thing is the United States Constitution. Can cal
Exit recover? Will America have a national divorce? And what
do we need to do to save the United States.

(29:49):
That's all coming up on the last resort. The last
resort is an Interval Presents original production from Awfully Nice.
From Interval Presents. The executive producers are Alan Coy and

(30:10):
Jake Kleinberg. Executive producers from Awfully Nice are Jesse Burton
and Katie Hodges. Written and produced by Jesse Burton and
Dana Bulut. Associate producer is Suzanne Gaber. Project management by
Kadi Kama Kate, Editing, sound design and mix by Nick
Sabriano and Keiana McClellan of Bang Audio. Post original music

(30:31):
by my Boy Manta Way, Yuki and Me, shoot Test Scott,
theme song by me, shoot Test Scott and Sweet. Sound
fact checking by Lauren Vespoli. Script consultation by William Bauer.
English language dubbing by Esteban Silva. Operations lead is Sarah You,
Business development lead is chefe Ellinswig, and marketing lead is
Samara still Special. Thanks to Ulysses Escamilla Harrow, I'm your host,

(30:53):
shoot Test Scott. For a full list of the sources
used in this episode, please check the show notes. Make
sure to follow right in review. You the last Resort
on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Stitcher, or wherever you
get your podcasts. Thank you for listening. I wrote the Wars.
We do wrong when we wont I wrote the Wars. Yeah,