Hispanic Fanatic

Earlier this week, the United States celebrated MLK Day. For the last quarter-century, we’ve marked this occasion with tributes and speeches that restate ideals that shouldn’t need to be restated. I’m talking about the basics: shunning bigotry, treating individuals of different backgrounds with respect, judging people by the content of their character, and so on. We really should have these concepts down by now, but we don’t.

In any case, Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy is framed within the context of civil rights. Indeed, the phrase “civil rights movement” is practically trademarked to refer to the quest of African Americans in the 1960s to gain the privileges promised to them in the U.S. Constitution.

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OK, so Season of the Witch is apparently not a runaway blockbuster. That doesn’t mean I’ve soured on giving out freebies to you, as thanks for reading my posts.

As such, I’m happy to announce a new contest. And this one is much more Latino-relevant.

The gifted writer Raul Ramos y Sanchez has a new novel coming out. It’s called House Divided, and it’s an epic about a Latino family.

Readers who comment on any my posts will be entered for a chance to win a copy of both House Divided and his earlier novel, America Libre.

Raul Ramos y Sanchez is an amazing writer and, I’m pleased to report, an occasional commentator on my posts. So I’m thrilled to promote his work and get more people to read him.

And as opposed to my last giveaway, this contest is open to everyone, not just lucky individuals in select cities. I don’t even have to like your comment; just post a response to any of my articles, and you’re entered in the drawing.

I will announce the winner of both books during the week of January 24. So let’s get those comments going, and good luck.

For the past year or so, I’ve been critical of Arizona, and with reason. But now is not the time for rehashing SB 1070 or the state’s attempts to whitewash its culture.

Instead, all of us are sending positive thoughts, good karma, and, yes even prayers to Tucson.

The assassination attempt on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords left six people dead and a dozen wounded.

We have no idea if the gunman was, as many pundits presume, motivated by right-wing vitriol or Sarah Palin’s crosshairs or some other conservative fear-mongering tactic.

However, it would be the ultimate elephant-in-the-room moment to avoid bringing up the unsavory connections.

After all, we’re talking about a psycho in a red state who took advantage of lax gun-control laws to carry out an attack on a Democrat. The guy spouted conspiracy theories that are close to right-wing talking points, and he expressed hatred for the government. Let’s face it: It’s unlikely that he’s an Obama man.

Still, we don’t know what this domestic terrorist’s agenda or motives are, and we’ll set aside the hyper-defensiveness of right-wingers who are tripping over themselves to shout, “It wasn’t us, so don’t you dare even bring it up!”

Instead, what interests me is the story of Daniel Hernandez, the young intern who is credited with saving Giffords’ life. Five days into his job, he wound up running toward gunfire, taking action to prevent his boss from choking to death on her own blood in a Safeway parking lot.

The irony, clearly, is that in Arizona, a lunatic can obtain a Glock without question, while a hero named Hernandez may be stopped by cops and asked to present citizenship papers.

It should also be noted that the maniac in question is a native-born American. I mean, I thought undocumented immigrants were causing all our crime. But here this suburban thug raised in comfort has caused more death and destruction than whole neighborhoods of illegal immigrants ever have.

It’s all very depressing, of course. But even this most grotesque of events has its black-comedy moments. For example, the gunman was apparently obsessed with grammar, and he believed that the government controlled people through the manipulation of the English language.

Who knows; maybe he would have been less crazy if he just spoke Spanish.

Thanks to Lucifurry and Ankhesen Mie for their recent comments on my posts.

Perhaps they were as surprised as I was to find out that, in 2011, gay soldiers are less controversial than undocumented immigrants.

Yes, in a final burst of lame-duck progressivism, the U.S. Congress rightfully eliminated the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Policy at the end of 2010. As happy as I am for gay-rights activists, I feel a twinge of jealousy that about five minutes before the Senate decided to give the homophobia a break, these same people said, “But those brown-skinned kids still have to go.

Even though they were willing to deal with President Obama on just about every other piece of last-minute legislation, Republicans squashed the Dream Act as if it were a pesky mosquito.

Clearly, getting tough on illegals is still a resonant theme for the GOP. This is despite the fact that it is long-term political suicide to piss off the fastest-growing demographic in America.

The approach also ignores the fact that “Americans are more inclined to support than oppose legislation similar to the Dream Act.”

So even popular appeal is not enough to pass this most modest of reforms, which “was originally designed to be the first in a sequence of measures to resolve the status of the nation’s illegal immigrants.”

Rather than a starting point, however, the Dream Act became a flash point, proving that “in the age of stalemate, immigration may have a special place in the firmament.”

Indeed, could anyone have predicted, a decade ago, that Republicans would be more willing to say nice things about homosexuals than they are to pass immigration reform that’s actually beneficial to their big-business overlords?

And the miniscule progress that has been made will soon be wiped out, because “when Republican lawmakers take over the House and gain strength in the Senate … a decade-long drive to overhaul the immigration system and legalize some of the estimated 11 million undocumented migrants seems all but certain to come to a halt.”

The optimists among us insist that change is still possible. In fact, President Obama recently told Congressional Hispanic Caucus members that “he’ll renew his push for comprehensive immigration reform in 2011 — even though such an effort would face even longer odds in a Congress where Republicans control the House.”

But quixotic efforts aside, no one expects the issue to be resolved in time for, say, the 2012 elections. That means it will once again be open season on the undocumented (and by extension, Latinos) during the presidential campaign.

If only we were as popular and universally beloved as gay people are… yes that’s sarcasm.

Let’s start this New Year with some quick facts, courtesy of the 2010 U.S. Census:

• The resident population of the United States is now 308,745,558, a 9.7 percent increase over 2000
• Latino population growth for the decade was around 29 percent
• Non-Latino population growth was about 4 percent
• The fastest-growing states were generally states with large Latino populations

At the great risk of pointing out the obvious, it’s clear that Hispanics are a big reason that this country is growing at all. Keep in mind that immigration, both legal and illegal, has been declining ever since the Great Recession began, which means that Latino population growth would be even greater if not for the quirky anomaly of a total economic collapse.

So Latinos are driving America’s growth. Depending on your perspective, this is either a positive development for multiculturalism or the final stage of the dreaded Brown Invasion.

One thing that it indisputably means, however, is that Hispanic influence — on everything from political movements to pop culture events — will only increase in the new decade.

It may also mean the death of a particularly pernicious tactic: Scapegoating Hispanics for America’s ills.

But hatred is a strong and insatiable monster, and as Angelo Falcon, president of the National Institute for Latino Policy, has stated, “Turning our population numbers into political and economic power is not an automatic or simple thing to accomplish.”

So expect the fear-mongering to go on for a while, even as Latinos become more numerous, and we segue from exotic pioneers to next-door neighbors.

By the way, the U.S. population grew at its lowest rate since the Great Depression. So without Hispanics, the United States would be in danger of becoming one of those teetering industrial nations, like Japan or Italy, where stagnant growth is causing widespread concern about the future. That’s not really the case here.

You’re welcome, America.

Thanks to everybody who entered the contest for Season of the Witch passes.  I’m happy to announce that the winner, chosen more or less at random, is Corinna. She will attend a special screening of the film here in LA and, hopefully, report back to us if it sucks or not.

I will resume my regularly scheduled rants with the New Year. And I hope you will continue to read and comment and rage and laugh with me into 2011.

See you soon.

Usually, at this time of the year, I take a short break from my ranting and raving to celebrate the holidays. That’s when I just post something to the blog such as, I don’t know, a video of a dog on a trampoline or the like.

Well, this year my holiday hiatus is different. Taking a cue from my fellow bloggers (most of whom are better marketers than I am), I’m running my first contest on this site.

Here’s how it works:

Readers who comment on this post (not any of the previous posts) will be entered for the chance to get passes for the Nicolas Cage movie Season of the Witch, which comes out next month.

You may ask, “What does Nicolas Cage have to do with Latino issues?” It’s a fair question, but I would point out that a dog on a trampoline has little to do with immigration reform, so let’s not overthink this one. It’s just a fun contest.

In any case, I will choose a winner at random from the commentators on this post. If we get a lot of responses, I may choose more than one, so increase your odds by commenting early and often.

The winner(s) will receive two passes to see the movie on January 6, 2011, in one of the following cities:

Los Angeles

San Jose

Chicago

Houston

Miami

Phoenix

If you win and attend the movie in Phoenix, I’m going to go ahead and assume that you oppose SB 1070.

So what should your comment be about? Well, that’s the beauty of the contest. Say anything you want.

Tell me that I’m brilliant. Tell me that I’m a moron. Inform me that all Latinos are extraterrestrials bent on world domination.

Or better yet, get into the spirit of the thing. Tell us if you believe in witchcraft. Pass along that creepy ghost story, or share if you’ve had a supernatural experience. Or you can just discuss your favorite Nicolas Cage film (mine is Adaptation).

The only thing you have to include in your comment is the city in which you intend to see the movie, so I can plan accordingly.

Now let’s get those comments flying, people. I want to give away these passes, and I can only do that if I get responses.

If you win, I’ll email the passes to you. By the way, I’m the only one who will see your email addresses (unless you specifically want to share it in the body of your comment), so don’t worry about that.

I’ll check back over Christmas to see how we’re doing, and I will pick a winner by New Year’s Day.

Until then, have a happy Festivus.

In 1989, Charles Stuart murdered his pregnant wife. To cover up his crime, he told police that a black man had done it. The cops, and pretty much everybody else, believed him.

Then the lie unraveled, and Stuart killed himself by jumping off a bridge.

Stuart is perhaps the most infamous example of someone who commits a crime or indulges in bad behavior, and then pins the blame on a black man. In fact, there is a history of people who have embraced this very effective ploy.

However, the gambit seems to be played out. In 2010, making up some story that an African American jumped you is so cliché. Contemporary Americans have paid attention to the political zeitgeist, and thus informed, decided that the most logical scapegoat is a Latino male.

For example, Heidi Jones, a weather anchor for ABC’s New York City affiliate and an occasional forecaster on Good Morning America, has recently been suspended from her job and has been arrested for lying to the police.

Jones claimed that a man tried to rape her while she was jogging in Central Park a couple of months ago. After investigating her claims, however, “investigators found inconsistencies in her story and could find no witnesses or suspects” and eventually got Jones to admit that she had “spun the tale as a ‘plea for sympathy’ because of trouble in her personal life.”

Jones has been charged with two counts of filing a false police report, and she faces a year in jail or a thousand-dollar fine.

One’s first reaction to this is disgust. Jones’ actions are incredibly harmful to real rape victims, many of whom often face hostile accusations of making the whole thing up. Here we have a public figure who has fabricated a sexual assault, providing ammunition to misogynists everywhere.

Pity is also a common reaction. How messed up must this woman’s existence be to create such a grotesque tale “in a plea for sympathy to counter some unknown setback that she was experiencing in her personal life”?

Once we get past those responses, however, we see the modern twist on the Stuart trope. Jones knew that to have any credibility, her fictional rapist had to be Hispanic.

Saying the guy was black seems suspicious, because that’s what Stuart and other liars claimed. However, a white perpetrator strains credibility, because… well… you know.

So Hispanic it is. After all, we make handy targets in political ads, and we have been blamed for everything from skyrocketing crime rates to the housing collapse. As such, creating a Latino thug who jumps women in the dark is a logical choice for the imaginary crime victim.

Lisa Navarrete, a spokeswoman for La Raza, commented on Jones’ hoax. Navarrete said it “reflects the mindset of many more people who think that if you want to make up a story and you want people to believe it, you should blame an African American man or a Latino.”

Navarrete is mostly correct. However, she’s clearly stuck in the past when she claims African Americans are as likely to be the object of a false claim. I mean, it’s not 1989 anymore.

Remember on Seinfeld, when one of the characters (usually Elaine) would get all freaked out over some minor slight? Much of that show’s comedy flowed from conniptions over mild social transgressions, such as neglecting to send a thank-you card or issuing improper credit for the big salad or speaking too close to one’s face.

Well, you’ll be delighted to know that such petty behaviors have their own sociological term, but only if they are directed at ethnic minorities.

In such cases, they are called acts of racial microaggression, and they are “brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color.”

Microaggression is what occurs when security guards follow black people around stores, or an Asian American is told he speaks English well, or a Latino is mistaken for a day laborer. It’s the little things, subtle behaviors that a person may not even notice — unless they are directed at you.

In its nuances, microaggression is different from some racist nut screaming epithets and yelling at us to get out of the country (I believe that would be considered bugfuck macroaggression, technically speaking).

There are also microinsults and microinvalidation, and the truly alarming concept of microassault. I assume that last one involves bigots with tiny fists.

Just about any ethic minority can give examples of microaggression from his or her own life. These are moments when we are told (not overtly, of course) that we don’t belong.

The existence of this concept is undeniable. But does that mean racial microaggression has any real power? In other words, is this a real problem, the infamous death by a thousand cuts, or is it just fancied-up whining?

An argument can be made that, yes, a person repeatedly subjected to innuendo and between-the-lines insults will soon believe that he or she is inferior. But one could also say that such jabs are too weak, even when accumulated, to do any lasting damage.

I would be interested to know if anyone has done any research on the real-world effects of this phenomenon. I would also like to know if people who indulge in racial microaggression are accidental racists.

In any case, the punishment for such behavior could not be clearer, nor more severe.

That’s right: No soup for you.

She was found in a box in Mexico.

It was an inauspicious start to life, but from that humble beginning, she has grown into a kindhearted and affectionate individual. And she has finally learned that a true lady does not defecate in the living room.

Our new dog is a mutt of multiple breeds. We know, however, that the two primary breeds in her bloodline are, of all things, Boxer and Dachshund. It’s a truly unique, and logistically weird, combination (how did her parents get together?). But it makes her a Boxhund.

I’ve written before about my fondness for the canine species. They possess all of the positive traits of humanity (love, loyalty, joy, etc) with none of our negative characteristics (bigotry, greed, jealousy, etc).

When my wife and I decided to get a rescue dog, we assumed that he or she would be a local stray, found on the streets of Los Angeles. We were surprised, therefore, when the rescue group’s coordinator revealed that our puppy was discovered shivering in a parking lot just over the border.

Evidently, when it comes to taking care of animals, nationalities and borders don’t matter — and nor should they. Volunteers and vets with the rescue organization are not concerned where a dog originated, or on which patch of land she took her first breath. They simply strive to ensure that every animal finds a good home, and my wife and I are indebted to them.

This humanitarian process doesn’t work the same way with people. In fact, it’s noticeably easier for a dog to immigrate to America than it is for a person. Of course, as a Mexican national, our dog had to endure the usual bureaucracy and red tape, but I assure all the nativists out there that she is in the country legally.

Now, one could argue that our dog is performing tricks that an American puppy would gladly do. Maybe she’s driving down the minimum wage for dogs who are able to hold their “stay” command (it’s currently half a Milkbone).

But I have no intention of returning her to Mexico. It’s good to have a fellow Hispanic in the house.

It’s funny, however. You barely notice her Latina accent.