Yesterday afternoon there was a small protest in Santa Ana opposing the military recruiting tactics taking place in high schools in poor areas. The event was from 10-2 p.m. and there were a bunch of High School kids, college kids, and community organizers (like OC Mujeres and Families Speak Out!).
I spoke to Carla Osorio who was quoted in the OC Register story regarding this event, and she is the Community and Labor Chair of the MEChA organization on the UCI Campus. Carla told me that the turn out wasn’t as high as she would have liked, due mostly to the fact that the event was practically spontaneous.
The U.S. Military is targeting poor kidsâ€â€that’s a problem twice. Poor. Kids.
When I picked up the OC Register and read the story by Marla Jo Fischer, I was confused. The print edition of the story included a pie chart that breaks down the military by race.
The issue is: military recruiters entice poor children to put their lives on the line with monetary incentives. The Register’s response: No way! Look at this pie chartâ€â€67% of the military is white!
It’s a sad fact, but it’s way too easy to confuse race and wealth in Orange County. When the Register reporter was writing her story about military recruiters targeting poor kids, she knew that if it was happening in Orange County, it was happening to our ethnic minoritiesâ€â€mostly Latinos. But where is the pie chart that shows the social class of our military? Not all white people are rich, Marla Jo. Or how about the pie chart that shows the ethnicity of Orange County men and women serving in the U.S. Military?
This “news†story is very misleading.