Speaking as an American of Irish ancestry, let me assure you: Siento tu dolor. I, too, am not unfamiliar with the sensation you feel when you see our fellow-Americans taking a reasonably important, but not overwhelmingly relevant, event from your ancestors’ history – and turning it into a booze-drenched bacchanalia of cheap alcohol, and bad decisions. Some of you have probably tried to reason with them, explaining to anybody who would listen that the holiday is not even that big a deal in Mexico. Don’t tell me, let me guess what happened: they looked at you, grinned in that slack-jawed way that only the catastrophically drunk can manage, and ordered another shot of horrible tequila.
…Well, whaddya going to do? This is the way of it. At least they’re not drinking the good stuff…