Cinco de Mayo isn’t
Mexican Independence Day

By Pablo Jaime Sainz

If you crossed the border to celebrate Cinco de Mayo in Baja California, you might be in for a surprise.

When you compare the calendar of events for Cinco de Mayo in San Diego with that in Tijuana, you can notice that in the United States the holiday is celebrated with much more enthusiasm than in Mexico.

While in the U.S. schools organize festivals where children dance traditional Mexican dances and restaurants create specials for that day, in Mexico, for the most part, you know it’s Cinco de Mayo only because kids get the day off from school.

Most likely, if you ask a Mexican kid in Mexico what do we celebrate on Cinco de Mayo, he might not be able to answer.

On the other hand, in the U.S. children of Mexican descent are very aware that it is the Battle of Puebla, a significant day in Mexican history. Still, many Americans think that Cinco de Mayo is Mexican Independence Day. Far from it.

Cinco de Mayo, or La Batalla de Puebla, as it’s known in Mexico, took place on the 5th. of May, 1862, and commemorates the Mexican army’s victory over the French, that had invaded Mexico.

Mexican Independence Day is actually celebrated on September 16.

For Victor Ochoa, a Chicano muralist in San Diego, the classic Cinco de Mayo full of alcohol, more than celebrating, is an insult to Mexican culture.“It’s clearly a cultural violation. People don’t care about the heroes of this important date. I mean, what do the new generations of Chicanos and Mexicanos know about Cinco de Mayo? I’m afraid we are losing our cultural identity,” Ochoa said. And it’s all about marketing, he said.

When U.S. companies decided to put emphasis on a Mexican holiday, they decided for Cinco de Mayo because for non-Spanish speakers is difficult to pronounce ‘16 de septiembre.’ That’s why many Americans believe that Cinco de Mayo, and not 16 de septiembre, is Mexican Independence Day,” Ochoa said. “When we celebrate Cinco de Mayo drinking beer and other alcoholic beverages, the ones that win are the big corporations.” Instead of celebrating Cinco de Mayo drinking, Americans should learn more about the heroes of that era in Mexican history, especially about Benito Juarez.

“Benito Juarez was a Zapotec Indian, born in the state of Oaxaca, who became president of Mexico,” Ochoa said. “He had a great influence on U.S. intellectuals, and even Abraham Lincoln admired him. That’s why people should know who Juarez was.”

So why is it that Cinco de Mayo has such an important presence in the U.S. and not in Mexico?

Well, it might be because 16 de septiembre is trully the day when Mexico began the road towards independence from Spain.

Cinco de Mayo was only a won battle in a lost war: The French lost in Puebla on that day, but still were able to established a monarchy in Mexico, with Maximiliano of Austria as its emperor. It wasn’t until 1867 that the Mexican army, led by Porfirio Díaz, who later became Mexico’s own dictator, overthrew the French.

In the United States, Mexicans and Chicanos see Cinco de Mayo as a resistance, as a constant battle against racism and opression, Ochoa said. “Cinco de Mayo isn’t something that took place 150 years ago,” he said. “It’s not only a historical event that’s long gone. For me, Cinco de Mayo represents a continuous fight from Mexicans of Indigenous descent against opression and abuse and discrimination.”

This historical sense is the result of the Chicano Movement of the ‘60s and ‘70s, something that didn’t happen in Mexico, Ochoa said “In Mexico people didn’t have to struggle against discrimination as we have done in the U.S.” he said.

Mario Torero, another San Diego muralist, agrees.“During the Chicano Movement we were able to learn about our history,” he said. “It was there where we saw Cinco de Mayo as a metaphor of the struggle of the Indian against European invaders.”

Some of the murals at Chicano Park, in San Diego’s Barrio Logan, include images of Benito Juarez and General Ignacio Zaragoza, both heroes the Battle of Puebla.