Most of us members of the Afro-Mexican communities do not have the theoretical tools that would allow us to know and exercise our rights. This situation is exacerbated by the professional training of the administrators of justice and the nonexistence of government legislation on issues of concern to people of African descent.
(Sergio Peñaloza, unpublished presentation, 2016, Kingston, Jamaica) ${ }^{3}$
Apart from being restricted by their own limitations, Afro-Mexicans are confronted by a deeply entrenched system of attitudes of intolerance and rejection of blackness in Mexican society. They face both racism and discrimination on a daily basis, in particular when they try to venture outside their tiny enclaves to larger cities. This is one of the reasons Mexico Negro sees itself as an educational body that insists on educating the people about the unacceptability of the racial disparagements and discrimination to which they are frequently subjected, both openly and in more subtle forms.  
Ironically, the Mexican Government was not unresponsive to the United Nations recommendations for black inclusion: in 2003, it established the National Council for the Prevention of Discrimination (CONAPRED), but Peñaloza highlights with scepticism its ineffectiveness and failure to fulfil its true mandate:  
In Mexico, discrimination and racism are practices which together with daily actions and behaviour seem so natural that they are not considered discriminatory practices. And as there is no institution that punishes these acts, the possibility of eradication is remote. It is worth mentioning that the National Council for the Prevention of Discrimination (CONAPRED) has been established to eliminate racism and discrimination. However, it only makes recommendations but does not sanction and has not completed the strategy required to combat these practices which cause hurt and lead to deplorable acts. (Sergio Peñaloza, unpublished presentation, 2016, Kingston, Jamaica) ${ }^{4}$  
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