arctotherium Profile picture
Jan 1 16 tweets 9 min read Read on X
Anti-Mexican immigration thread. Many American right-wingers have started defending Mexican immigration, often by comparison with MENA types in Europe. This is a mistake. First, Mexicans are just not very smart. On white American norms, they tend to score around 90. Image
Mexicans are most responsible for the racial transformation and hence dumbing down of America; for roughly 30 years (until 2008) hundreds of thousands crossed the border annually (mostly illegally, about 1/2 of total immigration) and they also had exceptionally high TFR.Image
Mexican immigrants to the United States are actually negatively selected, and those that return to Mexico are positively selected. It would be too strong to say we're getting Mexico's dregs, but they really aren't sending their best. Image
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As a result, it's not a shock that Mexicans tend to be poor (about as poor as blacks) and not very educated, even by comparison to other Hispanic groups. Keep this in mind for future charts that refer to Hispanics rather than Mexicans (about 60% of US Hispanics are Mexican). Image
Mexicans are roughly as poor as blacks, but have more kids and live longer than whites, and hence are a huge fiscal drain given the extreme redistribution towards the poor and old plus high public education costs in the US. Image
Hispanics are not as criminal as blacks, but are still around twice as criminal as white Americans, even with 1/4 of Hispanic criminals classified as white in official stats. Image
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As such, it's not shocking Mexicans tend to distrust everyone (including other Mexicans) and areas in the US they move to tend to become less trustworthy. Image
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Often times you see people saying Mexicans are Western Christians and hence more assimilable than (usually) Muslims and sometimes Hindus. Mexicans themselves tend not to see it this way. In early 2025, there were weeks of Mexican race riots in Los Angeles. Image
Like many groups, Mexicans have a self-serving mythology of US history in which half their country was stolen by gringos but built and populated by Mexicans after 1848. Reality is the Mexican cession was almost empty and ~all Mexican-Americans descend from post-1900 migrants. Image
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Mexico itself is corrupt, dysfunctional, and half-run by cartels, which spills over here through the diaspora. The iron law of immigration is that it makes receiving countries more like sending ones. You can see this in, for example, the conduct of both political parties. Image
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One effect of this is that successful firms really struggle to grow in Mexico, which screws up the entire economy. Image
Politically, Hispanics are not as anti-white or anti-American as blacks/Asians tend to be, but are still quite left-wing and pro-socialism, affirmative action, immigration, and redistribution. Them moving more Republican doesn't change this, it changes the party. Image
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Hispanics (mostly Mexican) are not especially "socially conservative" [a term I hate, but most understand] either. Similar views on abortion/LGBT to whites, and very high rates of bastardry. Image
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Almost $60B in remittances annually, which makes the US forex balance (the main reason to care about a structural trade deficit) worse to no benefit. The Mexican govt publicly views the diaspora as a fifth column within the US. Image
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In my view, the negative impacts of Mexican immigration have been muted by the fact that Mexicans often stick to Spanish-language enclaves and are not very involved in national politics or culture. But this will change in generations born here.
As a matter of pragmatism, there are too many Mexicans for anti-Mexican rhetoric to be electorally viable (it makes sense to try to integrate those that can be into coalition, who tend to be whiter, upwardly mobile, and often Protestant) and most of the damage already happened due to ultra-high immigration and fertility 1977-2007 or so. But I feel the need to set the record straight.

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More from @arctotherium42

Jun 21
Thread with excerpts from the 'Pretorians' section of TR Fehrenbach's "Fire and Blood: A History of Mexico" (1973). In 1821, postcolonial nation-building seemed easy; the only example was the USA. But the US was homogenous, well-led, free, and already had an identity. Image
Mexico was the reverse, with no history of self-rule, the criollo/casta/indio split, and no great leadership. The two major factions were the 'continuistas' (conservatives) and the 'reformistas' (liberals). Image
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Mexico was the reverse, with no history of self-rule, the criollo/casta/indio split, and no great leadership. The two major factions were the 'continuistas' (conservatives) and the 'reformistas' (liberals). Image
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Read 20 tweets
Jun 21
Excerpts from TR Fehrenbach's "Fire and Blood: A History of Mexico" (1973) on the Mexican War of Independence. The Mexican criollos were far less impressive than their South American counterparts, and produced no leaders equal to Bolivar or San Martin. Image
Where the South American criollos quickly declared independence upon the French conquest of Spain, the Mexican ones dithered. Acting quickly, the local peninsulares coup'd the government and the criollos accepted it. Image
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With the criollos basically accepting Spanish domination, leadership of the independence struggle passed to men like Miguel Hidalgo, who turned it from a (hopefully) bloodless coup to a social and race war. Image
Read 12 tweets
Jun 21
Thread with excerpts from the Colonial New Spain portion of TR Fehrenbach's 'Fire and Blood: A History of Mexico' (1973). His view is that New Spain would have remained permanent divided and stagnant if not for the northern frontier. Image
The true frontier of New Spain was not the thinly-populated and stagnant (almost identical when the Anglos showed up as in the 17th century) New Mexico, but much further to the south, in the arid regions only a little north of the Valley of Mexico. Image
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The frontier lacked civilized Indians who could be reduced to slaves, and was instead populated by energetic mestizos and criollos, working owned ranchos for a market rather than owning huge estates for prestige. Image
Read 16 tweets
Jun 20
A few excerpts from "Years of Peril and Ambition: US Foreign Relations 1776-1921." Several terms from the Treaty of Paris, especially that Britain would abandon its Great Lakes forts and the US would have the right to navigate the Mississippi, were not upheld. Image
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Americans who moved into Spanish Louisiana retained "allegiance to the United States and displayed open contempt for their nominal rulers." Imagine that. Image
An 1810, American immigrants to Spanish West Florida seized control of Baton Rouge, proclaimed an independent republic and requested annexation by the US, though this failed. Image
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Read 15 tweets
Jun 15
More excerpts on Colonial Mexico from TR Fehrenbach's "Fire and Blood" (1973). Fehrenbach saw the discovery of silver in Mexico, mostly in the arid north, as a disaster, as it led to Spain administering Mexico as a loot box rather than developing the productive economy. Image
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The thinly-populated, but silver-rich North became a military frontier. Image
The suspicious Spanish Crown gave those born in Spain, the peninsulares, a monopoly on offices (and commerce) in New Spain. As offices were the main route to upwards mobility, the local creoles resented this. Image
Read 22 tweets
Jun 15
Thread with excerpts from the colonial Mexico portion of "Fire and Blood: A History of Mexico" (1973). Image
The Catholic Monarchs who united Spain reined in the aristocracy, abolished serfdom, disempowered the Castilian parliaments, and ended all noble presumptions to royal powers and revenues, creating a new bureaucracy (with a new army) to run the state loyal to themselves. Image
Spain combined this modern bureaucratic state and army with maintenance of privileges for the old nobility and an almost medieval religious mindset. Image
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Read 25 tweets

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