Colonialism

the colony…

“Nobody knows how far a people can go when they are harassed” - Pedro Albizu Campos.

The goal of this chapter is to contextualize the culture, the time, and the place that gave birth to Toño Bicicleta. How has Puerto Rico’s embattled history of colonialism manifested itself in the daily lives of the Puerto Rican people? How do they survive? What do they value? Does their society value them?To understand this is to begin to understand the errant, anarchic embrace of Toño Bicicleta. We also start to draw parallels to different places and cultures and how they embraced similar anti-heroes like Toño Bicicleta. The comparable figures in US culture would be John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde.

After 400 years of Spanish colonial occupation, Puerto Rico is invaded by the United States in 1898. At the conclusion of the Spanish/American war, Puerto Rico is sold to the United States. One year later, hurricane San Ciriaco decimates the island’s crops. The U.S. uses this opportunity to devalue Puerto Rican currency and change the previously self-sustaining island economy into a one crop economy, that of sugar. Farmers no longer own their land and food must now be imported from the U.S. at a significant tariff. The population suffers, resentment of the colonial power grows, the nationalist movement is born.

There is rampant mistrust in institutions and the police who enforce their laws. The Jones Act has a stranglehold on the economy and the Gag Law has outlawed basic expressions of national and cultural identity. A thwarted independence revolution saw thousands of Puerto Ricans arrested and two towns bombed in broad daylight, the only time in American history the U.S. bombs its own citizens. The media is highly partisan, reporting with specific agendas and alliances that are grounded in either U.S. statehood or Puerto Rican Independence. After decades of oppression, the population hungers for a uniquely Puerto Rican figure who stands against corruption and cronyism. With the swing of his machete comes Toño Bicicleta.