The nationalism with which Donald Trump wants to build a new border wall has fueled patriotic engines in Mexico, there are government calls for “national unity” and social networking initiatives to boycott American products and raise three-color flags as profile pictures.
Under hashtags #TodosSomosMéxico or #MiPaísEsMejorPorque, senior officials, artists and netizens promoted on Twitter a Mexican phrase with ” #Mexicoisthebestcountryintheworld” or “OnlywhatismadeinMexicoiswelldone.”
Members of President Enrique Peña Nieto’s cabinet even posted the flag of Mexico as their profile picture, among them the chancellor, the spokesman of the presidency and the secretary of finance.
Numerous Mexicans did the same on their Twitter, Facebook and Instagram profiles to demonstrate against the wall that US President Donald Trump wants to build at the expense of Mexican funding to prevent the arrival of immigrants who enter the country illegally.
Mexico is usually a nationalist country when it is attacked. Throughout our history, we have defended our flag and we embrace a nationalism that could be irrational,
declared Dámaso Morales, an expert in international relations at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
On Monday night, Peña Nieto defended “national unity” in Mexico as a “great asset”.
It should be the cornerstone of our strategy and our actions, both inside and outside the country. Today as never before, I am proud of being Mexican.
declared the president.
However, according to Morales, it is a “political opportunism”, which generates a fictional, discursive unity that makes Mexicans forget the structural problems of their country. Even though Peña Nieto has been greatly criticized, he managed to unit the country.
And American products?
Mexico allocates more than 80% of its exports to the United States, but Trump could remove The US from the free trade agreement with Canada and Mexico, and he threatened carmakers that take their subsidiaries to Mexico with high rates.
Thus, initiative started to circulate on social networks to boycott US companies with labels like #AdiosProductosGringos, #AdiosStarbucks #AdiosMcDonalds or #AdiosCocaCola .
Analysts question the scope of this virtual boycott, but they confirm the return of th “anti-Americanism.”
According to experts, repairing bilateral relations is going to take a long time because the damage is already done.
Morales stated that the “xenophobic, discriminatory, exclusive positions and everything that defines Trump worries because it is the most powerful country in the world and it could start nationalist movements in other countries worldwide.