From our Bureau of Unexpected Assaults on Political Correctness with some assistance from Domitilo Cascarita y Chicharrón, our resident expert on the Spanish language
Whoa! In one of the wokest of all states in the U.S., some Democrat legislators are trying to ban the use of the woke term “Latinx” in all state documents.
And they dare to argue that this term is offensive! Even worse, the sponsor of this bill is Puerto Rican! How dare he do such a thing!
Talk about “man-bites-dog” stories! This one is a real surprise. And this legislative maneuver might lead to the impeachment of every one of these renegades. Stay tuned. This bill has yet to pass.
Prepare for earth-shaking tantrums from Wokenoids everywhere. Tyrannical speech control must always gain ground, never lose it. As their hero and patron saint Che Guevara liked to say: “Hasta Lx Victorix Siempre! Ni xn pasx para atrxs! Ni para coger impulsx!” Towards victory, always!” “Not one step back, not even to gain momentum”.
From Granma, UK (The Guardian) — Yes, this story has attracted international attention
A group of Hispanic lawmakers in Connecticut have proposed that the state follow Arkansas and ban the term “Latinx” from official government documents, calling it offensive to Spanish speakers.
The word is a gender-neutral alternative to “Latino” and “Latina”, helpful in supporting people who do not identify as either male or female, proponents say.
But Geraldo Reyes Jr, a state representative from Waterbury, chief sponsor of the Connecticut bill and one of five Hispanic Democrats who put their names to it, said Latinx was not a Spanish word but rather a “woke” term offensive to the large Puerto Rican population in the state.
“I’m of Puerto Rican descent and I find it offensive,” Reyes said.
Last month, Arkansas banned government officials from using Latinx on formal documents, one of several orders issued by Sarah Sanders, a former White House press secretary under Donald Trump, within hours of taking office as governor.
Reyes said his motivations might be different but he believed Sanders’ decision was the right one.
The League of United Latin American Citizens, the oldest Latino civil rights group in the US, said in 2021 it would no longer use the term Latinx.
Good for them. People who don’t respect themselves will get no respect from others.
I have a problem with the Latinx and with the Latino label. This entire flattening out and homogenizing of Hispanics [as if we are an undifferentiated mass of people even though we are as varied as can be] is the brainchild of a leftist non-Hispanic, Jewish-American activist [whose name escapes me now] in cahoots with the Chicano community in order to galvanize all Hispanics as a political minority and a political force. Chicano groups like MALDEF and National Council of La Raza could then pretend to speak for all Hispanics from Cuba down to el Cono Sur and in that way gain political power. Washington D.C. listens to you if you can say that you represent everyone from NYC down to Florida, over to California instead of just being relegated to speaking for Chicanos in the Southwest. Another reason for relabeling us all was so that Chicanos could hide their crime statistics. When they committed crimes, the police stations would put it down as a Hispanic crime, instead of a Mexican American crime and the local newspapers would label the perp as a Hispanic [Not Mexican American] criminal.
The Latinx/Latino/Hispanic relabeling of individual Spanish speaking groups has been disastrous for us and a win for Chicanos. Overnight, we inherited all of the social ills of Chicanos. I’ve had people tell me about Hispanic gangs as if that’s a problem in the Cuban community. Fact is there are no Cuban youth gangs, but because we are now seen as a part of the same group, we are tarnished with their social problems: poverty, gang violence, out-of-wedlock pregnancies, etc…
Oh, and don’t even get me start on how this has racialized us. We are no longer white or black. We are now a third race: BROWN. And we have to disown our Spanish grandparents and great grandparents and instead embrace our nonexistent indigenous grandparents.
The term “Latin” for people of Central and South America is a bogus 19th century invention which totally ignored the huge indigenous component of a great many of those people and was apparently the idea of French intellectuals. As far as I’m concerned, it only applies to people descended from the inhabitants of the ancient Latium region in Italy, which obviously excludes nearly all “Latins” of the Americas. It’s bunk.
I hear you and I totally agree with you Asombra. Latins [read this as Latinos] are people who descend from the inhabitants of the ancient Latium region in Italy. Problem is that the United States is such an unparalleled and influential power in the world that the anthropologically incorrect Latino neologism has now crossed the Atlantic and even in Spain they are now using the term Latino. You will hear Spaniards talking about a Latino neighborhood in Madrid as if they themselves are not Latino and only the South Americans in that neighborhood are Latinos. And I’ve had arguments with Italians who claim that they are not Latins. They recoil at the idea of being Latin even though they are the original Latins. How can you deal with such stupidity?
I deal with it by rejecting it. It absolutely does not apply to most people it is used for, and even if it did, too many of them are both alien and offensive to me, and I will not accept being one of them.
Asombra,
Oh, definitely! I agree with you. Latin/Latino does not apply to most Chicanos and Central and South Americans who are clearly mostly indigenous. I live in NYC where we have an enormous Mexican and Central and South American community and I look at them at them walking down the street and most of them are straight up Aztec/Incasand/or other Native American tribes. In fact, some of these “Latinos” don’t even speak Spanish. I work with the public and many of them speak Quechua. Yet, they are placed under the Latino label.
But what I was referring to were EUROPEANS who deny being Latino even if they shown proof that they are. I’ve told you, I’ve spoken to Italians who claim not to be Latin and it’s in vogue now for Spaniards to say they are not Latino.
Italians and Spaniards can do as they like regarding this terminology, but they don’t need to to adopt it and have no obligation to do so. I certainly wouldn’t argue with them about it, since I understand the terminology has been misused so long that it is now corrupted.