this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2024
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Summary

Tensions between Mexico and Canada have escalated amid Trump’s threat to impose 25% tariffs on both nations.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum criticized Canada’s handling of border issues and claimed Canada “could only wish” for Mexico’s cultural riches, intensifying the feud.

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sought to highlight Canada’s border management compared to Mexico’s, while Mexican officials accused Canada of using Mexico as a political scapegoat.

Both nations continue efforts to persuade Trump to reverse the tariffs. Diplomatic relations remain strained as the dispute unfolds.

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[–] Fiivemacs@lemmy.ca 51 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Who cares honestly...the carrot man is just putting Canada vs Mexico like they do with poor vs not so poor. Focus on the problem, trump

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 36 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

It's telling you say this now and not when Trudeau started it....

Even before Trump’s announcement, the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, and a handful of provincial premiers had mused openly about cutting Mexico out of future trade talks, instead pivoting towards a Canada-US trade pact – a move that Mexico’s lead negotiator called a “betrayal”.

There was/is a three way trade deal, and before Trump's even in office he was openly saying US and Canada can just drop Mexico...

That's incredibly fucked when the real move is for Canada and Mexico to lock arms and force trump to the table.

They're the only land border, and a key piece in disguising products as "made in America".

[–] andrewrgross@slrpnk.net 16 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Still, this basically feels like a speed-run of losing the Prisoner's dilemma.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 13 points 2 weeks ago

This is Mexico standing up for itself.

What Trudeau did was act like a biggity bitch and played right into Trump's hands.

If America really shuts the border down completely, Mexico is the real winner. The cartels are only there to smuggle into America, and the guns come back over in exchange for drugs. Also when Obama was doing it...

Stop the flow of drugs and guns across the border, and the cartels will go somewhere else where the action is.

Like, straight up. Mexico has a win/win here, and a president willing to call Trump's bluff

[–] Windex007@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I hate to say it, because it's gross... But it's probably the pragmatic move for Canada to attempt a bilateral agreement with Trump.

His political base is fueled by trashing Mexico. Build a wall. Mexicans are taking my job. Etc etc. Trump and his supporters will absolutely cut off their noses to spite their face with Mexico.

But, they're pretty apathetic towards Canada.

It isn't pragmatic for Canada to lash itself to Mexico under these circumstances. Ultimately, it's the government of Canada's responsibility to act in the best interests of Canadians. Given the circumstances, that's probably avoiding the situation.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

It isn’t pragmatic for Canada to lash itself to Mexico under these circumstances

I'd argue the opposite. America needs Mexico, we don't need Canada.

Trudeau could have easily allied with Mexico and likely could have used shipping lanes to bypass America and been fine.

But Canada alone is fucked. And they publicly turned against Mexico and now have to agree to Trump's demands, and we all know they'll be ridiculous.

For a prison analogy, Canada just gave their Peanut Butter and Jelly away without a fight, and Mexico pulled out a shiv when Trump looked at them. trump is a bully and will focus on the easy lick that showed weakness and fear of confrontation.

I swear to God for as much shit as people give when you get a psychology degree, it's insanely frustrating when world leaders don't know the shit everyone learns in highschool from the football coach.

[–] Windex007@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

I think what you said makes a lot of sense when you're dealing with a rational actor, and if your facts were right.

Canada is the USAs largest trading partner. Full stop. #1. Canada's retaliatory tariff stick is the largest club that any nation on Earth has to hit back with. Bigger than China's by a factor of THREE.

Secondly, it's irrelevant because Trump isn't a rational actor and it's all gut feel and he hates Mexicans.

I understand why you'd think that the USA "needs" Mexico but not Canada... But that's not right. The USA "needs" illegal immigrants to work for pennies on the dollar, if it "needs" anything... And again he and his base will cut off their noses to spite their face. The exact thing that the USA economy benefits from the most is the exact thing he and his base wants to line up against.

You don't need to do any fancy psychology to understand Trump. He's a hateful spiteful bully with no comprehension of anything who melts like butter when praised.

I guess only time will tell, but I disagree with your assessment and that's why: I think you misunderstand the trading relationships that the USA has in North America and I think you're underestimating how much of his behaviour is driven by primal forces rather than any rational plan.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world -3 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Canada is the USAs largest trading partner. Full stop.

And the vast amount is stuff where America acts as the middle man...

A full 1/3 of it is fossil fuels while we turn around and keep breaking production records and exporting our own.

They also get cheap manufactured good from America.

Hence:

could have used shipping lanes to bypass America

They need to do it anyway, climate change isn't going anywhere, and artic shipping is already exploding:

https://www.thearcticinstitute.org/canada-arctic-shipping-part2/

The fastest path from Asia to Europe is that route along Canada's northern border. And it gets easier every year.

It would be faster than the Panama canal despite what it looks like on a flat map.

[–] Windex007@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

That's a really interesting interpretation of trade

[–] Fiivemacs@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

Interesting, I don't follow politics for the most part but it's being shoved in my face by overly loud individuals so I'm playing a bit of the catch-up game on all the bs they all keep doing.

Thanks for the extra info

[–] dgmib@lemmy.world 37 points 2 weeks ago

Dear Mexico,

How about instead of fighting each other because our mentally disturbed neighbour is threatening us with Tariffs. Let’s instead increase trade with each other to strengthen our economies and let the Americans enjoy the shithole they just elected themselves into.

  • Canada
[–] i_stole_ur_taco@lemmy.ca 17 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Sheinbaum then dug deeper, adding that Canada “could only wish they had the cultural riches Mexico has”, pointing out her country has civilizations dating back thousands of years.

Canada also has civilizations dating back thousands of years.

All of them were brutally murdered and robbed by European settlers. I don't think Mexico gets to play the rich indigenous culture card here because they did all their murders a couple hundred years earlier.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world -4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

What?

Mexicans may have some Spanish ancestry, but it's not the same as US or Canada where the vast majority of people have zero indenginus heritage.

Do you really think it's the same?

[–] grte@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

"Some". Better than 80% of the country has Spanish ancestry and basically everyone speaks Spanish. I suppose the local indigenous people just found those Spanish colonists so goddamned attractive and loved their language better than their own.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Better than 80% of the country has Spanish ancestry

Yes...

Just like most descendents of slaves in America have "some" white DNA, it just wasn't by choice.

https://www.science.org/content/article/people-mexico-show-stunning-amount-genetic-diversity

There's a touch of Spanish in pretty much everyone by now but that's nowhere near the same ballpark as Canada and America where the majority have 0% indenginus ancestry.

the local indigenous people just found those Spanish colonists so goddamned attractive

That there was widespread rape...

https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/cambridge-world-history-of-violence/gender-and-violence-in-early-america/0F1321203BAE9551E6E77527EAA33830

Like, it's cool if just legitimately don't know about this as long as you learn.

It's not exactly covered in k-12, that doesn't mean you can't learn about it now tho

[–] grte@lemmy.ca -2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Just like most descendents of slaves in America have “some” white DNA, it just wasn’t by choice.

That there was widespread rape…

Sorry, are these your arguments that Spanish colonialism wasn't a genocidal settler colonial project like other colonies in the Americas? Because you're doing a pretty poor job if so.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

You're saying the descendants of rape victims who have a tiny percentage of colonizer DNA (as a result of those rapes generations ago) are as bad as the descendents of colonizers that have zero indenginus ancestry...

And I'm honestly at a loss of words right now on how I can make it any simpler.

[–] grte@lemmy.ca -1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Are you trying to say that trying to eliminate cultures via rape (but also murder, lets not act like none of that happened) means we can't label Mexico as a settler colonial state? Is Spanish spoken by nearly everyone as just some sort of historical accident?

[–] Silverseren@fedia.io 13 points 2 weeks ago

Both leaders lack the spine to stand up to Trump. Its kind of pathetic.

[–] ThePowerOfGeek@lemmy.world 8 points 2 weeks ago

And us Americans in the middle of all this are going: "Well this is weird! Usually we're the ones pissing off our North American neighbors!"

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 7 points 2 weeks ago

Is this an anglophones stick together kind of thing? I mean this isn't a very productive statement to be fair but Trudeau is trying to throw Mexico under the bus to appease Trump here and they decided to put Steinbaum's statement as the headline.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world -2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

There's plenty of finger-pointing to go around on this one with both countries, but I think Ms. Sheinbaum might remember that many of Mexico's "cultural riches" were looted.

[–] Linktank@lemmy.today 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

Just curious, for the sake of clarity. Do you mean they were looted from Mexico, and therefor are no longer available to Mexico as a source of trade/pride whatever. Or do you mean that Mexico looted them from other places and so has no right to brag about them in the same way that the British have never done anything of note aside from stealing from other cultures and then NOT USING ANY OF THOSE SPICES IN THEIR FOOD!? Okay sorry I got sidetracked.

[–] grte@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 weeks ago

Looted as in Mexico is the product of settler-colonialism like the rest of the Americas.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago

The Spanish came, stole as much from the Aztecs, Maya and other peoples that they could, then founded Mexico.

Then, for centuries, they did things like dig up graves to loot even more. And the people they subjugated are so poor and desperate that they're often the ones looting their own ancestor's graves on behalf of Mexico's "cultural riches."

The U.S. has a lot of "cultural riches" from various indigenous groups too. They also didn't generally donate them.

[–] PP_BOY_@lemmy.world -3 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Call me when millions of Canadians are fleeing the country en masse like they are in Mexico. Nice "cultural riches" you've got, there.

[–] MCasq_qsaCJ_234@lemmy.zip -3 points 2 weeks ago

I'm just saying that the Mexican government cut almost 30% of culture, including archaeological sites.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io -3 points 2 weeks ago

I mean isn't that like 90% the US's fault?