Drinking Songs Debated

As I sat in my car early Sunday morning in a predominantly Latino neighborhood waiting for a friend to come home, I observed a man arrive at the residence across the street. He walked alongside the house and tapped on a window. Moments later a young woman emerged. For no apparent reason, the man became hostile towards her. It soon became clear that he was intoxicated, expending the final effects of his alcoholic binge from the previous night. I wondered from what drinking hole the misguided man stumbled out from. Perhaps it was from a place where rancheras and Lupillo Rivera songs are rotated on the CD player.

The incident reflects just how accurate is Agustin Gurza’s story depicting a long, detrimental cycle that plagues the Mexican and Mexican American (“Harmless Drinking Songs?,” Oct. 14).

As a former avid boozer, I am quite aware of the obsessive impulses to display your manhood that could occur when binge drinking and certain music are combined. The DUI statistics that Gurza cites are fitting as well.

I admire Gurza’s courage in his critical assessment of behavior that is mostly accepted and often encouraged.

I am sure that some in our community will find Gurza’s view un-Mexican and soft, but it is a condition that must be exposed, and detoured, and it begins with courageous voices--much more courageous than those who for their own interest continue to glorify a backward way of life.

VIC MORALES

Montebello

Where do I begin? Half-facts, unexplored realities, dictating from the good old U.S. what other cultures should be and, even worse, the “responsibilities” of an artist. Unbelievable.

Perhaps it’s as simple as Pepe Aguilar said: People at his Universal Amphitheatre performance were just diggin’ a classic tune.

I saw Anthony Hopkins play a cannibal, I didn’t want to eat someone’s leg. Lou Reed sang “Heroin,” and I’m not a junkie.

I have a lot more faith in the youth of Mexico.

JOHNETTE NAPOLITANO

Hollywood