Journalist Arturo Dominguez challenged the white Latino in an article that some may consider harsh. It is a discussion well overdue using his tone.
Arturo Dominguez challenges the white Latino
Arturo Dominguez did not pull any punches in his article “White Latinos Don’t Exist, Wannabes Do (OPINION),” where he exposed a subtle racism problem within the Latino community. He discusses it with Politics Done Right. The first two paragraphs of his article were the perfect setup.
I am a light-skinned Latino. I am not white. Whiteness isn’t just based on skin color. It’s a mindset. A thought process based on the superiority within American and Western European societies. Whiteness is not welcoming to people like me despite my looks. My last name doesn’t allow me all of the privileges White America enjoys. My appearance, however, can sometimes prevent me from being profiled by police, that is, until they run my plates and/or see my name.
I’m not here to argue that light-skinned Latinos don’t benefit from white privilege. We do more times than not as we traverse our everyday lives, but it ends there. That so-called privilege we are thought to benefit from rears its ugly head when we try to buy a car, get a mortgage, apply for a job, or interact with police. We all know what it’s like once white bosses see our names. In fact, it has been discussed at great length and some have even whitewashed their names on resumes and applications to prove that they weren’t given a chance because of their Latinidad.
Mr. Dominguez received a lot of pushback because he was unapologetic in ripping off the scab. As a black Caribbean Latino, I was delighted to read such a piece. It is more than a discussion piece. It is empowering.
