Hispanic Fanatic

I’ve been asked by many white people if I have ever experienced discrimination. Their amazement when I say, “Yes,” is matched by my own surprise that they would even ask the question. Hey, ask just about any ethnic minority, and he will supply a time and place when he was slurred, dissed, or eyeballed funny because of his race and/or ethnicity.

The fact that so many white people believe this never happens is a constant stunner to me. But perhaps it shouldn’t be, because we have so many pundits proclaiming that bigotry is dead, and that there is more cholera in America than there is racism.

Well, if you don’t believe my personal experiences, just look at the results of a recent survey of Hispanics, who were asked if they had ever suffered discrimination. A full 99% said yes, and “most respondents were able to name a location where discrimination occurred.” Personally, I’m curious about the 1% of Latinos who said “there was no discrimination against them.” They either live very charmed lives or are unbelievably dense.

In any case, the number-one choice for racist acts was disturbingly specific: “Arizona was the top answer for Latino discrimination with 21%.” To put that into perspective, “a collection of other U.S. states garnered 8%.” Yes, our friends in Arizona apparently discriminate at almost triple the rate of all the other states combined. Now that’s impressive.

By the way, 18% of Hispanics said they had been discriminated against at work. And 5% of Latinos are in a dystopian hell, in that they believe “discrimination has occurred everywhere.”

So from now on, whenever I am asked this naïve question, I will simply quote the results of this survey. That should end the discussion quickly.

For as long as I’ve been writing about Latino culture, I’ve referred to us as the nation’s fastest growing minority. It’s a handy little phrase when one doesn’t want to use the more cumbersome descriptor for Hispanics, which is “sexiest people on the face of the planet.”

Well, you can imagine my surprise — nay, my disappointment — when I ran into this item online:

“Contrary to perception in some parts, Hispanics were not the fastest-growing race or ethnic group in the US last year.”

What? This is madness! We’ve been number one for so long that it is our collective birthright. So who are these usurpers to the throne?

It turns out that Asians are now the nation’s fastest-growing race or ethnic group. Their population rose by almost 2.9 percent to 19.4 million, an increase of about 554,000.

Of course, Hispanics still are the second-largest ethnic group in the United States, making up 17.1 percent of the total population. And we grew at a very respectable rate of 2.1 percent, to more than 54 million.

But somehow, this comes as small consolation.

What’s most intriguing about these numbers is that “more than 60 percent of this growth in the Asian population came from international migration.”

In contrast, Latino population growth “was fueled primarily by natural increase (births minus deaths), which accounted for 76 percent of Hispanic population change.”

In essence, Latino immigration is way down, no matter what you’ve heard. So the immigrants who do get in are more likely than before to be Asian.

So congratulations to our Asian brothers and sisters. If you keep growing at this pace, it won’t be long before you have your own equivalent of the Puerto Rican Day Parade in NYC, when you turn the nation’s largest city into a swirling party that engulfs everyone nearby whether they want to be part of it or not.

It’s something to shoot for.

Not so long ago, life was easy for xenophobes. They could slander Latinos and immigrants simultaneously, because they were thought of as one and the same. Also, there weren’t that many Hispanics around, so one could spew within the comfort of an imposing majority.

Well, the Pew Research Center just made everything more difficult for the narrow-minded among us. The organization recently announced that the U.S.-born Latino population is growing at a faster rate than the immigrant population. This means that Hispanics are now more likely to be born and raised in America, as full-blooded American citizens.

This also means bigots will have to supplement their rants about undocumented immigrants with plain old racist tirades, thus doubling their effort.

At the very least, when told to “go back where you came from,” Latinos are likely to deflate the assertion with something like, “You mean, go back to Wisconsin?”

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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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“The U.S. Census Bureau expects racial minorities / people of color to make up a majority of the U.S. population in the next thirty to forty years. Do you feel concerned or hopeful about that?”

The question comes from a survey conducted by the Applied Research Center, which asked Americans their opinions about a well-publicized fact: By 2050, if not sooner, the nation’s combined population of racial and ethnic minorities will outnumber white Americans.

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I once took a freelance gig editing a book about conspiracy theories. It was an encyclopedia of crazy shit like Mkultra and the Bavarian Illuminati and Area 51.

The book was a highly entertaining read, but it didn’t exactly keep me up at night. I just don’t believe humans are competent enough to pull off fake moon landings and shadow governments and the like. So I’m not prone to yelling, “Conspiracy!” and attributing sinister motives to shadowy figures.

But it’s not a conspiracy to say that Hispanics and African Americans have long been played off one another. And the reason for this is clear: It maintains the status quo.

After all, if America’s two largest ethnic minorities are busy fighting each other, they have little energy to combat the power structures that hinder their mutual growth.

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By now, I’m sure you’ve heard about the Brown Invasion. No, I’m not talking about all those Latinos stealing our jobs, selling our kids drugs, and hooting at our wives.

Hey, that’s old news. Even right-wingers are tired of peddling such fictions.

I’m referring to the recent study that showed ethnic minorities are no longer content to live in barrios and inner cities. For example, “metropolitan New York is being rapidly reshaped as blacks, Latinos, Asians and immigrants surge into the suburbs.”

Yes, my friends, it’s a damn surge out there. Watch out, suburbia.

I used to live in NYC, and my neighborhood, although primarily white, was decently mixed. The same is true of the LA area in which I live now. It’s one reason that I’ve loved both neighborhoods.

However, I have never lived in a suburb, nor do I have any desire to do so. Every time I visit a friend who has bought a house on a cul-de-sac, I get a little jittery, like the 1950s are going to suddenly explode all over me. I expect to look over a manicured lawn and there, in the distance, see a nuclear family in black and white, playing croquet and drinking lemonade.

But that’s just my hang-up. As much as I love living in cities, it would be a sad commentary if every Hispanic thought exactly as I do. By all means, if the Rodriguez family wants to take the commuter rail, I say enjoy the ride.

Still, it’s not like Latinos are blending in effortlessly with their suburban compatriots. That old barrier — segregation — exists even when Hispanics leave the big bad city behind. Latinos tend to be “typically clustered in ethnically or racially monolithic communities,” even in suburbia. So Wally and the Beaver won’t necessarily be hanging with Juan and Maria.

But perhaps that’s in the future, and maybe there are other positive developments yet to come. For example, suburbanites may have more diversity at their key parties someday.

And perhaps the whole concept of suburban angst will have to be redefined. Maybe a couple named Hernandez will feel ennui for once.

This opens up exciting possibilities. Perhaps a Hispanic director will remake “American Beauty” or “The Ice Storm,” but with Latinos in the lead. And of course, maybe someone can take another shot at “Revolutionary Road.”

If so, can we talk Kate Winslet into playing a Latina?

Yes, I still have a monster crush on the woman; sue me.

Let me thank Sanguinity for commenting on my post “It’s Not All About the Music.” I’m grateful whenever someone provides an intellectual, well-researched point to one of my flippant asides. Thanks as well to Juhem, who stumbled upon the site and is inexplicably coming back for more. And here’s some more thanks to Ankhesen for her always great comments.

As a supplement to my previous post about the U.S. Census, I have yet another demographic factoid to amaze and impress you… or alarm and disgust you, depending upon your impression of Latinos.

According to MSNBC, this year could be “the ‘tipping point’ when the number of babies born to minorities outnumbers that of babies born to whites. The numbers are growing because immigration to the U.S. has boosted the number of Hispanic women in their prime childbearing years.”

That’s right: childbearing Latinas are the biggest threat to white supremacy. If demographers are correct, 2015 will be the first kindergarten class in which white kids are outnumbered by Hispanic, black, and Asian children.

Leading the charge will be Latino babies. Well, strictly speaking, they can’t charge. Come on, they can’t even walk. But you know what I’m saying.

As we all know, whites are projected to become the minority circa 2050. For that projection to hold, it stands to reason that minority babies will become more numerous right around… now… actually, now. Yes, it just happened.

Mark your calendars.

I’ve mentioned before that Hispanics are now the number-one minority in America. On a related note, I’m sure you’ve heard that salsa is more popular than ketchup (it’s true, more or less).

But this numerical advantage in population hasn’t amounted to much for Latinos, except perhaps to convince many U.S. citizens that hordes of immigrants are flooding the country, stealing their jobs, and oogling their wives.

Because of the complex history involved, more obvious racial differences, or just plain coolness, black people will always have the advantage of being in the forefront of the national consciousness. This will remain true even if the percentage of blacks in America continues to decline under the onslaught of an out-of-control Catholic birthrate (most Hispanics are still Catholic, which I’ll discuss in a future post).

We simply do not have the cache that black people have. Witness the fact that plenty of white people consider themselves culturally black. Many more actively want to be black, which can make for a disturbing and/or hilarious spectacle.

Witness also that a white-black interracial hook-up results in the oft-repeated catchphrase “Once you go black, you never go back.” What is the equivalent for a white-Latino relationship? “Once you go brown, you never… I don’t know… frown?” You see the discrepancy.

Now, there are advantages to being off-stage. For example, if someone tosses a slur in our direction, we are positive that he really means to be insulting and isn’t making some idiotic attempt to be down with us. Black people put up with that shit all the time.

In any case, it’s all just whining, I suppose. It won’t even matter in a few generations, because in the future, everybody will be at least part Hispanic. Don’t believe me? Sorry, but the numbers are on our side.