re: #5 Sionainn

Isn’t there a cultural difference between the Spanish New Mexicans and the Mexican New Mexican as well as language differences, etc.?

Yes, just as my own family members have always been fast to proclaim ourselves Spaniards and hotly deny any insinuation of being Mexican.

Spaniards are White.
Spaniards are cultured and educated.
Spaniards speak Castilian, a true romance language.
Spaniards often came from Noble families.
Spaniards were granted their lands in the New World by the King himself!

Mexicans are mixed race (they bred with the “help” (native slaves)).
Mexicans have no true culture, just a jumbled up hodgepodge of Spanish, French, and Native behaviors and superstitions, and are uneducated.
Mexicans speak a bastardized version of Espanol with many words acquired from the French and Native cultures mixed in.
Mexicans are peasants and are the descendants of savages and slaves.
Mexicans overthrew the Spanish Colonial authorities in a revolt by an armed rabble made up of the offspring from the lower classes, Mestizos and Amerindians and then stole the lands granted to the noble families.
Etc.
Etc.

In other words, it is just another type of racism.
Much is made by the traditional “Spaniard” families of their “racial purity” which has been assiduously self-enforced for generations. They do not consider themselves to have anything in common with “Mexicans” and do not want to be mentally or verbally associated with them by other people.

Not that these beliefs of superiority are limited to Northern New Mexico, there are still many enclaves and families of “Pure Spaniards” within Mexico itself. :(