Human rights in Mexico refers to moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, December 13, 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Human Rights p, Retrieved August 14, 2014 that describe certain standards of human behaviour in Mexico, and are regularly protected as legal rights in municipal and international law. The problems include torture, extrajudicial killings and summary executions, police repression, sexual murder, and, more recently, news reporter assassinations.
The Human Rights Watch reports that Mexican security forces have enforced widespread disappearances since 2006. It also states that Mexican security forces commit unlawful killings of civilians at an alarmingly high rate and widely use torture including beatings, waterboarding, electric shocks, and sexual abuse as a tool to gain information from detained victims. In addition, it reports that the criminal justice system is largely failing victims of violent crimes and human rights violations when they seek justice and that attacks on journalists by authorities or organized crime will cause them to self-censor. The report also cites issues related to unaccompanied migrant children, women's and girls’ rights, sexual orientation and gender identity, palliative care, and disability rights.
While the Mexican government has taken action to fight organized crime in Mexico's drug war, security forces in Mexico have committed human rights violations that include extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, and torture. There have been limited efforts to investigate and prosecute these abuses. Human rights in Mexico also face difficulty in the battle to access reproductive rights and health care, and have yet to solve problems involving violence against members of the press.
Civil Liberties
Freedom of the press
Mexico is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists, it is among the countries with the highest levels of impunity for crimes against journalists. Violence against the media is a serious issue because while it seriously threatens the livelihood of members of the press, it also creates an “environment of fear” where free information is stifled, negatively affecting healthy democracy, and hinders freedom of expression.Holland, Bradley E., and Viridiana Rios. "Informally governing information: How criminal rivalry leads to violence against the press in Mexico." Journal of Conflict Resolution 61, no. 5 (2017): 1095-1119. Though the exact figures of those killed are often conflicting, press freedom organizations around the world agree through general consensus that Mexico is among the most dangerous countries on the planet to exercise journalism as a profession. The Human Rights Watch states that Mexican authorities are ineffective in their attempts to investigate criminal actions against journalists. They also report that between the year 2000 to July 2016, the Attorney General's Office reported 124 cases of journalists being killed.
A study that focused on the socialization of future journalists found that students in Mexico are more likely than students in other large countries to hold sentiments that journalism should be loyal, meaning that journalists should perpetuate a positive image in relation to the country's leaders and the policies the government sets forth.Mellado, Claudia, Folker Hanusch, Maria Luisa Humanes, Sergio Roses, Fábio Pereira, Lyuba Yez, Salvador De León, Mireya Márquez, Federico Subervi, and Vinzenz Wyss. "The Pre-Socialization of Future Journalists: An examination of journalism students' professional views in seven countries." Journalism Studies 14, no. 6 (2013): 857-874. Information and the press was often controlled in Mexico by chayote, or one-off payments, or embute, regular pay-offs given in return for twisting the stories journalists put out so they portray whatever side the bribing party prefers. Journalists were inclined to take this money as supplements to the low-wages they make and were encouraged to do so by the news organizations they work for in order for those organizations to save money. This also meant that journalists did not have to seek stories, as the government would hand them to them. Although attitudes in journalism are changing and these practices are looked down upon by contemporary journalists, these practices still affect how the general population sees journalists.Ramírez, Mireya Márquez. "Professionalism and journalism ethics in post-authoritarian Mexico: Perceptions of news for cash, gifts, and perks." The ethics of journalism: individual, institutional and cultural influences (2014): 55-63.
In a study conducted that focused on violence by criminal organizations, evidence showed that the sole presence of large and profitable criminal organizations does not always lead to fatal attacks, but attacks and killings are increased when there are rival groups live and work in the same territories. The rivalry between criminal organizations affects the control either criminal organization has over journalists and the information that gets leaked to them, which leads to threats and even lethal violence against journalists.
Nearly 100 media workers have been killed or disappeared since 2000, and most of these crimes remained unsolved, improperly investigated, and with few perpetrators arrested and convicted.
Occurrences of physical violence and threats against journalists covering sensitive issues have been frequent across Mexico's regions. To protect themselves, journalists must practice self-censorship.
Child labor According to the updated version of the U.S. Department of Labor's List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor issued in December 2014, child labor contributes to the production of a total of 11 goods in Mexico, 10 of which are agricultural goods (including coffee, tobacco and sugarcane) and the remaining item is pornography. Among the list's 74 countries where significant instances of indentured labor have been observed, 7 countries were reported to resort to child labor in the pornography industry and Mexico was one of them.
Freedom of religion The constitution declares that Mexico is a secular state and provides for the right to religious freedom. US State Dept 2022 report
In 2023, the country was scored 4 out of 4 for religious freedom.Freedom House website, retrieved 2023-08-08
In the same year, the country was ranked as the 38th most difficult place in the world to be a Christian.
LGBT rights
Same-sex sexual acts are legal in Mexico, but LGBT people have been prosecuted through the use of legal codes that regulate obscene or lurid behavior (atentados a la moral y las buenas costumbres). Over the past twenty years, there have been reports of violence against gay men, including the murders of openly gay men in Mexico City and of trans people in the southern state of Chiapas.
Local activists believe that these cases often remain unsolved, blaming the police for a lack of interest in investigating them and for assuming that queer people are somehow responsible for attacks against them.Herrick and Stuart, p. 144.
Intersex rights
Intersex children in Mexico face significant human rights violations, starting from birth. There are no protections from non-consensual cosmetic medical interventions and no legislative protection from discrimination. Intersex persons may have difficulties in obtaining necessary health care.
Other Issues
Domestic violence
The rate of domestic violence against women in Mexican marital relationships varies at between 30 and 60 percent of relationships.
As of 2014, Mexico has the 16th highest rate of homicides committed against women in the world. This rate has been on the rise since 2007.
Gender violence is more prevalent in regions along the Mexico-US border and in areas of high drug trading activity and drug violence.
According to the 2013 Human Rights Watch, many women do not seek out legal redress after being victims of domestic violence and sexual assault because "the severity of punishments for some sexual offenses contingent on the "chastity" of the victim" and "those who do report them are generally met with suspicion, apathy, and disrespect."
In September 2014, several Mexican human rights groups and International Federation for Human Rights, had filed a complaint with the office of the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, asking it to investigate the “systematic and widespread” abuse of thousands of civilians by the army and the police in their fight against organized crime.
On 26 August 2022, the Human Rights Watch reported that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s planned to formally transfer control of the National Guard—the main federal law enforcement agency charged with public security operations—from the Public Security Ministry to the Defense Ministry. This step posed a serious threat to human rights and transparency. The military, informally deployed for civilian law enforcement since 2006, has committed widespread human rights violations.
Domestic violence and rape along the U.S.-Mexico border Many feminist scholars argue that rape and sexual assault is based on the power and dehumanization of women; sociologist Sylvanna Falcón argues that rape is one outcome of militarization of the border between the United States and Mexico. The militarization of this border is largely a product of the drug war and the occupation of the cartels in the northern part of Mexico along the Texan border, and has two main elements: integration of military units into the border region and making Border Patrol resemble the military via equipment, structure, and tactics. In terms of militarized border rape, a large number of women report that being raped was the price they needed to pay in order to cross the border without being deported or arrested, or to gain their documents back. Practices like these are unique in the border region. Women often decide not to prosecute their assailants because they would be prosecuting not only the individual, but also challenging a powerful and entrenched institutional system of social control.
Some factors that enable rape in a militarized border zone are the wide discretionary power that border enforcements have while performing their job, ineffective and misguided hiring which leads to inefficient and questionable staff members, the failure to enforce and abide by law enforcement standards, a lack of reporting on these crimes by other militarized border zone officials owing to a “code of silence,” and warlike characteristics being forced onto a geographic region that makes human rights violations easier to commit especially in an area of high militarization.Falcon, Sylvanna. "Rape as a weapon of war: Advancing human rights for women at the US-Mexico border." Social Justice 28, no. 2 (84 (2001): 31-50.
Massacres
Massacres have occurred in Mexican history. In recent years they've been related to the Mexican drug war, but also include prison riots, politically motivated massacres, and conflicts in regional areas. In December 1997, a group of heavily armed Mexican special forces soldiers kidnapped twenty young men in Ocotlan, Jalisco, brutally torturing them and killing one. Six of the implicated officers had received U.S. training as part of the Grupo Aeromóvil de Fuerzas Especiales (GAFE) training program.La Jornada, "Admite el Pentagono que Adiestro a 6 Militares Mexicanos Violadores de Derechos Humanos," June 28, 1998.
Mass grave discoveries