There’s a lot more driving Mexico City’s gentrification than bad gringos

by David Agren.

The acerbic signs and graffiti criticizing gentrification in Mexico City’s fashionable neighbourhoods were certain to capture international attention. 

“Spanish is spoken here,” “Mexico for Mexicans,” and, “Go home,” read three of the screeds.

Social media couldn’t get enough of the disorderly protests – with the familiar masked vandals infiltrating yet another march and smashing up storefronts. The Mexico City police were curiously absent. An easy narrative of Americans abroad wearing out their welcome, while ICE cruelly rounded up Mexican migrants in cities such as Los Angeles. 

The Department of Homeland Security jumped in with its own snark, posting, “Oh,” above an X Post with protester graffitiing the words, “Not your home,” and a protester waving a sign in English admonishing, “Pay taxes, learn Spanish, respect my culture. 

Much of the international media, meanwhile, focused on the core matter of gentrification, which has spread through leafy neighbourhoods such as Roma, Condesa and Juárez – among others – over the past 15 years, driving up rents and forcing some long-term residents to move as their homes became short-term rentals.

The easy hook for any story on gentrification are…