Hispanic Fanatic

My wife is pregnant.

Yes, it’s pretty great news.

Our daughter is due in January. We’ve never been parents, so by next summer, I’ll be one of those annoying first-time fathers who believes the most important thing in the world is his baby’s capacity for drool. Just wait, I’ll be blogging about it day and night. This may cut into the readership of the 19.3 million mommy bloggers out there, so I apologize in advance for usurping their authority.

But with all the hectic preparation for the child’s arrival, and careful time set aside for crippling self-doubt and solipsistic panic attacks, I’ve barely had time to ponder the political ramifications of this kid. That has to change.

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My mother never hit me.

In Latino culture, of course, mi madre was a bizarre anomaly. We can all conjure up the image of a furious Hispanic mother, beating her kids with chancletas for some minor infraction.

In fact, say the word, “chancleta” or “chancla” to a Latino, and he or she will probably think of the weapon, not the footwear. Their original purpose appears to be secondary.

Yes, it’s all very humorous, all those little ninos and ninas cowering as they get whapped repeatedly. Except that it’s really not funny at all.

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I’m happy to announce that Lucy in Dallas has won the contest for passes to see the upcoming Ben Affleck movie Argo.

With hope, Lucy in Dallas will report back to us and let us know if Affleck is indeed playing a Latino in this movie (his character’s name is Mendez). If so, we’ll have a debate on what that’s all about.

I mean, he doesn’t look like a Mendez to me…

Changes are coming to the way we do business here at Hispanic Fanatic world headquarters. Before I get into all that, however, let’s squeeze in another movie contest.

All you have to do is comment on one of my posts (including this one) and you’ll be entered for the chance to win passes to the upcoming Ben Affleck movie Argo, which will be screened in the following cities:

Dallas, TX

El Paso, TX

Houston, TX

Los Angeles, CA

McAllen, TX

Miami, FL

Phoenix, AZ

San Antonio, TX

San Jose, CA

Based on true events, Argo is about a life-or-death covert operation to rescue six Americans during the Iran hostage crisis in 1979. And best of all, the lead character has a Latino name (Mendez)!

If you win, I’ll email you the passes. By the way, I won’t make your contact info public, so don’t worry about that.

I’ll announce the contest winners in the next week or so. In the meantime, let’s get those comments flying.

We all know the grim statistics. Hispanics are less likely to graduate high school than other ethnic groups, and Latinas, in particular, still have higher rates of teen pregnancy and fewer college degrees than other young girls do.

So what can be done about this appalling situation? Well, perhaps something as simple as giving Hispanic girls a camera is a start.

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Recently, I wrote about America’s love affair with guns. One argument that Second Amendment proponents use, to great effect, is that an armed citizenry prevents government tyranny.

Indeed, there are many Americans who believe that a “disarmed society is an obedient society…in which, at the extreme, people obey their own government’s orders to follow the line into the gas chambers.”

Well, that certainly is an unpleasant image.

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A year ago, I wrote about how the Great Recession hit Latinos hard. At the time, I was hopeful that the worst was behind us. Perhaps that was my natural Hispanic tendency to be optimistic.

After all, Latinos “are worse off, but they are still more positive about where the country is going” compared to most Americans. In particular, “Latino small-business owners are among the fastest growing and most upbeat [groups] in the nation,” and they “worry less about job security and are more positive and humble.”

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Perhaps it’s appropriate in a week in which the state of Arizona is revving up its police force to shout, “Show us your papers.” And they do mean anyone.

I’m talking about identity and the issues that erupt when we apply that word to ethnicity and or politics.

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Many Americans insist that prejudice is extinct in our post-racial society, where we have a black president and everything. Of course, the officially sanctioned use of racism (ala Jim Crow laws) is a distant relic of the past, and no governmental or academic institution still exhibits racist behavior.

Nope.

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I was in the first generation of kids who grew up with Sesame Street. Even at a young age, I recognized how rare it was to see fellow Latinos on television, much less a happily married, well-adjusted couple like Maria and Luis.

I wasn’t even traumatized when Grover would get all quiet, lean in to whisper to a little Hispanic child, and then start shouting and waving his spindly arms around. Seriously, he did that a lot.

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