|
The Nov. 17 town hall drew a discussion from panelists who
stated they experienced anti-blackness in both their home
countries and the United States, just varying degrees. All have
vowed to change such perceptions as individuals, in their own
families, and in the community.
According to their individual perceptions, a basic, general bias
is ‘the lighter one’s skin color, the more accepted that person
will be among other Latinos.’ Panelists stated even Latinos shun
darker-skinned peers from their own ethnicity.
“Colorism and anti-blackness for me is being looked at as ‘less
than’ because of my skin color,” said panelist Mayka
Rosales-Peterson, channel strategy manager at Telesystems
and a former Miss Panama. “Being questioned when I speak
Spanish, getting those sharp looks like someone who looks like
her can’t speak Spanish. I know when I watch novellas
with my mom, makeup ads, TV shows, soap operas that are
Latin-based—there’s going to be no one who is dark-skinned. It
hurts for me as an Afro-Latina to get the anti-blackness from my
fellow Latinos.”
“I think it’s also the negative terms that we use that become
the norm,” added panelist Christina Smith, a
granddaughter of Mexican immigrants and a licensed social worker
who helps the prison re-entry population. “Terms like ‘modernita’
or ‘negrita’ and things like that—we need to address that
and not make it okay for our children, grandkids, nieces and
nephews.”
“The idea that the people who you claim to be your brothers and
sisters because of where you come from, there’s just this total
erasure of black Latinos when it comes to anything related to
the Latinx community, whether it’s immigration, difference of
pay,” echoed panelist Karla Mendoza, a Toledo-based
writer and activist who grew up in Perú. “Are we even part of
the Latinx community, because there’s always a big erasure of
that.”
“Anti-blackness is specifically that no matter what country you
go to, you will see that black people are at the bottom of
society, according to a racial hierarchy and a racial cast,”
stated panelist Veralucia Mendoza, a community organizer
who’s a member of the human relation commission’s social justice
committee.
Co-moderator Teresa Alvarado, Latino Alliance secretary,
stated the 75-minute panel discussion
should serve as “a call to action to create a more inclusive
community.” The other co-moderator Malaika Bell, director
of diversity and inclusion at the University of Toledo
and a human relations commission member, called it a “very
timely and important conversation that is usually held behind
closed doors.”
Each of the panelists spoke of growing up in a household where
colorism was not a factor, but as little girls, had a shocking
moment or wake-up call that served as a day of reckoning in
society-at-large—or how lighter-skinned blondes were the only
women they saw on TV, no one like them.
Ms. Rosales-Peterson related stories of being constantly asked
about her race while serving as Miss Panama and her own family
advising her to marry someone more light-skinned than her.
“When we talk about colorism and blackness, I don’t think it’s
anti-African-American. I think it’s anti-dark, anti-being dark,”
she said. “I think it stems from slavery. 70 percent of the
slaves who came from Africa, where did they go? They went to the
Caribbean, Central America, and South America. So, when Latinos
go into these denials that they’re not black, they disassociate
themselves so much, it’s like ‘no.’ We need to start being real,
being vulnerable, and checking our families, because they’re the
ones causing the issues and prolonging it.”
Karla Mendoza
recalled an incident in sixth grade, where a Peruvian boy was
hurling racial insults at her sister Veralucia while she was
standing ten feet away.
“I felt so helpless. I remember thinking ‘Why does he say that
as an insult?’ when I believed my whole life that black is
beautiful,” she recalled. “My parents had always done such a
good job and always defined that.”
After the Mendozas moved to the U.S. and settled in North
Toledo, Veralucia recalled being advised by other
Spanish-speaking Latinos in her class not to admit she was
black.
“That’s one of the first things Latinos hear. Children said that
to me. Where did they hear that? Because they’re eight years
old. They didn’t randomly decide they didn’t like black people,”
she said. “This is something that had to be taught to them,
where they’re subconsciously don’t want to be associated with
that.”
Veralucia went so far as to allege everyone is racist in some
way, calling it a “spectrum,” where people can perpetuate racism
or colorism in some way because their values are so deeply
rooted, even her own.
Ms. Rosales-Peterson grew up in Brooklyn, where she admitted to
“gravitating” toward other Latinos, mostly of Dominican or
Puerto Rican descent. Many of her Latino friends questioned
whether she was black and encouraged her to bury that part of
herself as a teen.
“That’s when I started realizing my own biases against
African-American people, saying we’re different, even though we
look the same, we’re not the same,” she admitted. “Being a New
Yorker, the racism with a lot of Latinos is rampant. They will
tell you to your face they’re different from blacks. It’s crazy
to me.”
Karla Mendoza openly admitted internalizing her black background
to fit in with other Latino teens in Toledo when younger,
wanting everyone else to know she could speak Spanish in order
to be accepted by other Latino kids. She also spoke of switching
back and forth between her heritages when convenient so it
benefited her socially.
But the question remains, what needs to be done to address these
issues within the current Black Lives Matter movement in
order to make a difference and promote equality, when those with
brown and black skin are facing some of the same discrimination
and racism when Latinos actively try to disassociate or
segregate themselves?
“I feel if we can get past the colorism within our own
community, our own group, then we could always be the majority,
the strong majority,” said Ms. Smith.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the virtual panel discussion
came from the panelists encouraging parents to teach their
children to self-love, while, at the same time, navigating the
tricky waters of preparing them to face the existing biases in
the world around them.
“You need to have open conversations with them about the
expectations of this world,” said Ms. Smith. “You need to have
open dialogue and let them know it’s not always going to be
peaches and cream, because it’s not.”
“As a mom of two black boys, you have to be open, have to be
honest, and you have to be real,” said Ms. Rosales-Peterson. “At
the same time, uplift them and let them know they’re strong, and
that their black is beautiful. They are proud Afro-Latinos, too,
but know that you’re going to be in a world where you’re
different. You have to have that internal knowledge that you’re
powerful beyond measure. I teach my boys that, because I don’t
want the world to teach them that.”
If parents aren’t sure how to accomplish that on their own,
Veralucia Mendoza encouraged them to seek out some of the many
helpful digital resources, such as podcasts and PBS articles.
On the Internet:
https://www.facebook.com/ToledoHRC/videos/855459184994012
Boyd-Franklin.vp (guilford.com)
Skin Color, Self-Identity, and Perceptions of Race - Discoveries
(thesocietypages.org)
Racism and skin colour: the many shades of prejudice | Race |
The Guardian
|
