I can say with some certainty that Latino doesn't mean much of anything here in Canada. Culturally speaking, it's just another small part of the grand mosaic. We make up less than 2% of the entire population, so we're politically insignificant. You're not gonna see Jagmeet Singh grooving to a cumbia, Erin O'Toole assuring Albertan Venezuelans he'll cut taxes for them or Justin Trudeau apologizing for dressing up in brownface with a giant sombrero and novelty moustache any time soon. Latinos in Canada are more likely to be middle class or higher, and thus are more likely to just fully assimilate. Why try to frantically find a way to maintain that identity in this vast tundra when you can just sit back, open a Molson's and watch Hockey Night in Canada? It's unnecessary stress.
The whole point of a Latino moving to Canada is to alleviate stress caused by the chaos back home. When my parents decided to move me and my sister to Vancouver, it was because they saw the writing on the wall in Caracas that the political situation was going to get more fucked up each day, so they wanted to spare themselves the trouble of maneuvering an ever-growing clusterfuck as they raised us. It might suck that the timing of the move has left me with a tenuous connection to the homeland, but I can at least have the privilege to ponder about what I can do to strengthen it. However, with my relationship to Venezuela converted to a privilege rather than subconsciously imprinted within me as the need to breathe, it has made the conception of being a Venezuelan less innate to me. I've read up on the news, met with ex-pats, attended Latino events at my university, even participated in a pro-Guaido gathering downtown in a misguided attempt to connect with people there (Why the hell were we rallying around this goofy motherfucker, it's so fucking stupid!). It has all frustrated me. I don't feel more Venezuelan by any of those actions. I could try harder, read more books and news on my homeland, speak with my relatives about their experiences, but I will always be tenuously connected to Venezuela. No amount of trying to be more Venezuelan will make me more Venezuelan. I shouldn't stop trying to learn more about my homeland, it's worth doing so for my own enrichment, but there's no need to have it create more angst than what I already feel.
In that respect, being Latino can become a shorthand for me to say "I'm Venezuelan but not Venezuelan" in a way that isn't succumbing to complete assimilation. But is that what it means to be a Latino? To say that you come from Latin America but are not Latin American in a truer sense? That's something that can apply to some Latinos, especially among those that are second-generation and beyond, but that wouldn't apply to those that have a clearer understanding of their own identity, those that are more Latin American in a truer sense but decide not to live in Latin America any longer. It can be convenient for me to apply a definition to the term that best suits me but it will not apply to everyone as a whole.
Back in 2016, I wrote a blog entry, The Quagmire Of The Latino Electorate, pointing out some of the complexities in the demographic as it relates to American politics. Looking back on it, I don't feel like I did truly get to how layered the issue is, and I approached it from a far more naïve perspective. I pointed out not all Latinos are Mexican, but I failed to point out that not all Mexicans in the US are the same. Some are migrants running from the cartels, others have lived comfortably in a suburb for decades. There is just as much disagreement amongst Mexicans in America as there is with Latinos in America. I operated under an assumption that Republicans are far more of a turn-off to Latinos save for the anti-communist Cubans and Venezuelans, but that's not taking into consideration how assimilation instills a sense of extreme patriotism that draws in Latinos to the GOP, along with there being far more reactionary sentiment within Latino communities of various nationalities. Worst of all, I said it would be nice if Ana Navarro ran in 2020. What kind of shit lib take was that? But at the very least I can say that I had some understanding, basic it was, of how bad it was for Democrats to be operating on Latinos as if they were a monolithic demographic.
My desire from the end of that blog post was a hope to see better conversations about Latinos, one that could speak to their political concerns in less simplistic terms. But that has not come to pass. Hillary got a solid chunk of the Latino vote but Trump won so it became MS-13 this and migrant caravan that. Democrats would cry about the kids in cages but dare mention abolishing ICE or Obama's complicity in the crisis and his deportation record and you'd be labelled a Russian bot. Liberals do not want to confront how badly they've treated Latinos, that's being divisive and ungrateful. They think that wanting to use them as a cheap source for menial labor rather than executing them on sight is leagues more compassionate. Democrats don't earn the vote of Latinos, they are owed the vote of Latinos.
It only got worse once it came to the primaries. With Bernie gaining in popularity, the concern became less about the human rights violations committed at the border and more about how irresponsible it is to propose socialist policies and trigger ex-pats' collective trauma. Cuba could no longer be praised for anything anymore, relationships had to be kept frozen with them. Nevermind that the literacy program Fidel Castro implemented was objectively good, and that Obama said as much, Sanders saying that meant that he wanted to execute Chris Matthews in Central Park. He could say that he doesn't support Castro's authoritarian regime but that wouldn't change anything, he was a comrade with a capital C for commie scum. And that's not even getting into how Medicare For All was made out to be as a program to import a horrific Chavista healthcare system to America. It became nothing more than a revival of Cold War fearmongering.
Relentless as the smear campaign was, Bernie ended up with the greater percentage of the vote among Latinos, thanks to having better policies with regards to minimum wage, workers rights, health care, immigration reform, police reform, marijuana legalization, climate change, foreign policy, and so on. The incredible ground game headed by Chuck Rocha and not treating Latinos with utter contempt might've also helped too. But he didn't win Florida. And those are the only Latinos worth listening to.
Biden won Florida and most of the primaries afterwards, with significantly less Latinos by his side. He's been significantly worse on all of the issues stated above, immigration especially, cosigning on stricter border protection measures that have enabled ICE to do some truly awful things. When challenged on his record by voters, he disrespects them, insults them; the most infamous example of such was telling an immigration activist to go vote for Trump. Now that he was the nominee, one might assume that Biden ought to consider trying to improve with Latinos as they are crucial in the Democratic coalition. But that would require listening to Bernie, and he's a dirty socialist, so instead they've no longer become crucial to his path to victory. Latinos were no longer worth playing with for Biden, his eyes diverted to the better toy of winning back suburbanites.
What that meant for Latinos as a demographic was a narrowing of the scope. No longer did the Dems need to cover up their horrific record on immigration (especially when all they can do is virtue signal with a comparison to Trump). Now all the pandering was specifically for the Florida crowd, fighting's Trump's comparison of Biden to the socialism of Castro and Maduro to Biden responding to Trump by comparing him to the authoritarian character of Maduro and Chávez. This whole election was devoid of policy much like the last but it became much more insidious and aggravating to witness thanks to a global pandemic exacerbating the misery at an exponential rate. Immature displays, platitudes and culture war attacks that offered no substantive alternatives, no true relief. But you know, it's your duty to vote in this most important of all elections.
Is it no wonder then that Biden and the Democrats have hemorrhaged significantly with Latinos? They refused to accept that their monolithic view of them was incorrect and opted instead to create a new one. But the one that they decided to form was never going to go for them. Take away that these Latinos are virulently anti-communist and bought the "Biden is socialism" bait without a second thought. These Latinos are more reactionary, more machoistic. Why the hell would they want to go with the pussy maricónes that are the Democrats? A bunch of whiny cucks that will cancel you if you call the darkest friend you know mi negrito out of endearment? The sort of gringo de mierda that insists on calling you Latinx? Fuck that! Trump Train all the way, baby! I want to make as many off-color jokes as I want while I watch Elliott Abrams fly a drone to bomb the shit out of Miraflores! My mother told me that Latinos love themselves a beret, a caudillo, a strongman. You can say Trump is the other side of the authoritarian coin with Chávez but that's more appealing to them than the Dems think.
But Democrats don't learn, they double down. Rather than accept their mistakes with Latino outreach, liberals decided to play a cynical game of identity politics, saying how great it is that black people supported them en masse while the Latinos didn't pull their weight. Why not have the minorities fight amongst themselves rather than destroy our institution for failing them once more? So now we can talk about the differences between a white Cuban and a brown Puerto Rican? It's now we can discuss a little bit about the effects of assimilation? It's now that we can get to discuss about the complexities of Latinos as a demographic as we see the Republican shift happening right before our eyes? Oh wonderful, I'm so glad we can get into it! But guess what? It doesn't fucking matter anymore. The wheels are already in motion. Since the Democrats don't care to expand the electorate with policies that appeal to more Latinos (especially those in the working class of which there are a lot of), Latinos are going to tune out more, and so the Democrats are left to fight for a smaller pool of Latinos that will mostly despise them. All these conversations will amount to deflection, excuse-making for their inability to make fundamental changes, and a way to further divide their multicultural coalition to render them into oblivion. No need to reflect on how you turned an election that could've been a landslide into being down to the fucking wire, you can just prop up some intellectual to say "Should've seen this coming black folks, just look at the Italians! You can't trust them Hispanics!". Good fucking job, you freaks. I hope you have fun being Mitch McConnell's bitch for another 6 years.
It hurts me because I feel there could have been some use to these conversations at some point. If there had been a book, a movie, a comedy special even that talked about the nuances with Latino identity that could be sufficiently engaging to mainstream audiences, maybe there could have been at least a recognition of the problem, an understanding of its existence, an opening to explore it further. Instead what we're left with are animated movies about Día De Los Muertos as the furthermost introspection into our identity. But that is operating on a similar naïvete I had four years ago. It assumes that pop culture has an influence on politics rather than vice versa and also assumes that there wouldn't be tons of bad-faith arguments by liberals made to pollute the discourse and defang it of any potential to make a positive impact.
What better example of liberals polluting the discourse than Latinx, a term that corrodes my soul worse than sulfuric acid could ever hope to do so on my flesh. It's pitched as this bold neologism that destroys the patriarchal supremacy of the Spanish language. It's able to make transgender and non-binary Latinos feel included don't you know? However I see more gringos use Latinx than I do Latinos. Latinx does not make sense to most Latinos, it sounds clunky as hell. What does Latinx really do to contribute to any discussion about Latinos and their political interests? What does Latinx do about getting better healthcare, or raising the minimum wage, or abolishing ICE, or ending the war in Afghanistan? What does it do to help a Latina that can't get a rape baby aborted in a red state? What does it do for a transgender Latino that gets gunned down by a white nationalist? It's woke busybody bullshit to force down one's throat, the embodiment of the Democrats's fecklessness and contempt towards Latinos. You will be called Latinx and you will fucking like it, you goddamn worms. We're doing intersectionality and we doing it right!
It's puzzling how ubiquitous Latinos are in American culture and yet how simultaneously invisible they are. More people speak Spanish in the US than French in Canada and yet you'll never see America adopt it as their second language. Well known Latino celebrities are abundant and play up their exotic element but they're recognized as either being assimilated sufficiently or part of a certain stereotype. So much of the culture is appropriated to the point that Taco Tuesday becomes a phrase as American as apple pie. Such a large impact and yet the conversation surrounding our identity remains shallow. Just think about how Cesar Chavez is one of the most prolific Latino activists in the US yet most Americans aren't quite that familiar with him and are caught off guard when he comes up on their calendar. Not that I can claim to be any better, I'm not exactly an expert on him either. I had to Google that Cesar Chavez Day is March 31st, and that not even half of the states recognize it. I suppose it's harder to appropriate him as a figure under the structure of neoliberalism so it's better to ignore him.
Latino feels like it can work as a term because there is a sense that there is a commonality within Latin Americans when they get subsumed into the US and abroad. Certain perceptions emerge of who you are, cultural signifiers are formed and engaged with amongst each other, and of course we all share a language. Further than that, we also exist in a cultural limbo, where you neither truly become integrated as a collective nor are unable to fully assimilate. While there's a truth in the notion that Latinos are the new Italians in America, it can never fully become the case. The border's too close to make that term disappear. More Latin Americans and Central Americans are going to come to the US whether they like it or not, so the category will have to stay to separate them from those that have assimilated. Likewise, Latinos will exist as a cultural signifier rather than an ethnic identity. There will be third-generation Latinos that don't know shit about the land that their ancestors came from, they'll have never stepped a foot south of the border in Mexico, and they couldn't speak Spanish if they tried, but they'll still call themselves that because it will feel more right than saying they're Caucasian, or American. But there will also be Latinos that will be ultra-nationalistic to both their homeland and America. It remains incongruent. So then what the fuck does it mean to be a Latino?
For me, the term Latino is one of perpetual purgatory outside of the homeland, brought about by capitalist forces that realize that that if they cannot rule over the Global South then they can divide and conquer them so that they can never take over and become a part of upending their imperialist hegemony alongside the working class. Even if demographics are such that Caucasians become outnumbered in America, Latinos are left disorganized and disenfranchised as a diaspora that will forever be in conflict with itself as to what it means to live up to that term in a truer sense collectively and with social and class divides that cannot be bridged so easily. But I suppose in a simpler sense, it just means you come from Latin America.
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