Ethnic Avenue – The Street That Crosses All the Others

Archive for the ‘Latinos’ Category

Sooner or later, everyone encounters one of those fat guys that thinks his girth automatically makes him tough or, worse, that his fatness is roughly equivalent to being muscular.

Sadly, there’s wide pandemic of this type of wannabe-tough-guy asshole in the urban Latino and black communities, a problem I attribute largely to the popularity of football, which rewards a few linebackers–with little more ability than that of clogging up space–with the largely undeserved labels of “tough” and “athletic.”

I usually ride back here.

It’s pretty easy to know when you’re dealing with one of these idiots. For one, they’re enormous. They waddle around, often in some sort of sports gear, trying hard to look hard. And, they’re one of the more likely candidates to diagnose your staring problem. If he’s assumed any position of authority–however minor–rest assured that he fully, and regularly, trips on his power. Think bouncers, the occasional bus driver, and–of course–tow-truck operators.

There’s a TV show that relies almost entirely on these characters for its poorly staged theatrics—TruTV’s Operation Repo. The show, which features a group of (mostly Latino) male and female “tough guys” doing sham repossessions, is an unsettling reminder of why the United States and Mexico are numbers one and two—respectively—on the list of the world’s fattest countries.

It used to be that we consistently portrayed the fat guy as inferior to the fit guy.(And, often, as the bad guy.) The Blutos of the world routinely got their asses kicked by the slimmer, buffer Popeyes.

But nowadays, we celebrate the Blutos.

Not to be confused with his richer, whiter cousin—the Standard Corporate Ass-Wipe—the Latino variety is an equally abundant plague in U.S. cities—especially on the West Coast. You might well recognize him by his other name, the Alberto-Gonzales Latin Guy, named after one of the most “successful,” public specimens of the group.

Consummate Latino Corporate Ass-Wipe

Appearance & Dead Giveaways

• Otherwise regular-looking Hispanic guy, but with tell-tale signs of deep-seeded corporate asshole-ness
• Wears the office uniform, dress shirt and pleated pants, Monday through Friday
• Tucked-in polo shirt, or “golf clothes,” on the weekends
• Speaks clean English, but can’t completely rid himself of pesky Spanish influences, despite his best efforts (peak-za for Pizza, rolling the Ls in Million)
• Bilingual, but speaks poor, awkward Spanish from pretending not to speak it for years
• Deliberately engages in racially incongruent activities, like golf, to seem less ethnic
• Especially dicky to “regular” Latinos and FOBs as way of distinguishing himself from them

Additional Behaviors & Habitat

• Most likely in a corporate setting, since he only thrives in the hierarchical, structured setting of an office
• Practical, functional, status-minded education—a business degree, communications, maybe law school
• Works in safe, accessible fields (e.g., marketing, finance, administrative fields)
• More ambitious ones in minor elected office, local government
• Surprisingly conservative, impressive ability to spit out right-wing or centrist talking points
• Uses nauseating corporate speak, like “no-brainer” and “out-of-the-box” outside of the office

Ten years ago, most people couldn’t have told you what chipotle was. Shit, I’m not confident most Mexicans could have told you what it was. If you’d asked me, I probably would have guessed that Chipotle was an obscure brother of my favorite god in the Aztec pantheon—the mighty Huitzilopochtli.

The fierce Huitzilopochtli.

But these days, chipotle is everywhere. And, everyone most assuredly knows what it is. There’s chipotle spread. There’s chipotle salsa. Every sandwich, burrito, wrap, entree-sized salad has to have something chipotle. It seems that every restaurant throws a little of it into everything, just to be on the safe side. In fact, there’s even a whole bargain-bin Mexican food chain bearing the name of the pesky condiment.

For some time I’ve wondered what or, more importantly, who was responsible for polluting some of my favorite cuisines with this distracting, overpoweringly smoky taste. A little field reconnaissance, and attentive television watching, has revealed the obvious culprit.

Someone please pass the chipotle.

It’s no wonder White people love chipotle (the chili, I don’t know about the restaurant). It sounds exotic. I have an aching suspicion that they enjoy pronouncing the hard Nahuatl stop in the middle of p-t-l-e. (I mean, who doesn’t?) But above all, chipotle provides just the right amount of non-threatening ethnic zest to their food, without the inconvenient, and potentially embarrassing, “kick” of the Latino-er chilies.

Say it ain't Sosa.

Let’s face it: most people aren’t that observant anymore. They don’t see nuance. And, they’re too self-absorbed or distracted by gimmicks to notice anything about you that doesn’t directly affect them (by threatening or benefitting them). That’s why people never notice when you get a haircut or wear a new shirt. It’s the same reason television stations can feed you ever-degenerating garbage and still keep robust audiences. But no matter what you look like, one thing is for sure: people are going to notice if you bleach your skin. And, as soon as they notice, they’re going to compare you to Michael Jackson. If you started wearing a red jacket with zippers all over it and a rhinestone glove on one hand, you’d get the same result.

Something we can all learn from the White Chocolates among us is that the best way to change your race is to do it from the inside out, not the other way around. White Chocolates “darkened their skin” by wearing wind pants with one of the pant-legs raised up, break-dancing, playing basketball, and performing a variety of other racially incongruent behaviors. In the best cases, it worked like a charm.

Eminem, Crown Prince of the White Chocolates.

So Sammy, next time you want to “lighten your skin,” listen to some Save Farris, start snowboarding, and un-learn how to dance. It takes longer like this, but it’s the honorable way.