We must counteract gentrification

In his last My Turn, Robert Silver continued harping on the domicile law, actually accusing alleged violators of being felons. Worse, he implies that voter rolls be purged or the results of the upcoming election might be contested.

Undermining trust in elections and implying that the opposition is lying about being a citizen of the electorate reminds me of something bad. Especially today.

Taos is at a crossroads. No exaggeration — unless we counteract gentrification the continuity of Hispanic culture in Taos will be broken in this generation. Five-hundred years of historical memory on this land will end. We are witnessing the final act of the prolonged trauma of conquest and colonization — the complete elimination of the original cultures and 100 percent of the land occupied by outside interests, except for marketable cultural tokens and disposable, cheap, landless labor.

Robert admits this is taxation without representation; unfair to local people; that town decisions and policies impact everyone in the county; that this law excludes all working-class, generational and middle-class persons from democratic participation.

This law is the quintessential gentrification law, by definition racist and classist, it concentrates power in the hands of a minority, elite enclave of amenity migrants, like Robert, who can afford the real estate prices they helped raise beyond the means of local Taoseños — 55 percent of the county population. I am disappointed that just by giving so much credibility and space to a law that hurts local people Robert contributes to the polarization of our community.