It rages my insides and even saddens me sometimes how Latinos are depicted in the media. Every time we cover a story on legal or illegal immigration it’s been customary for the news to use b-roll of what they portray to be a Latino person, and yes it’ll probably a group of brown “typical” Mexicans. This is exactly why people who do not live in places where the influx of Latinos are prevalent have this notion that all Latinos look and work this way. News Alert: They don’t!

The beauty of our culture is that we come in all different colors and have very diverse cultures among our race. We are tanned, white, black, and some of us are even blond! However, the media tends to ruin this picture of a Latinos by giving the general audience a tainted vision that Latinos particularly Mexicans come here to steal jobs. The truth is that most of Latinos and especially Mexicans are hard working people who only seek to succeed. They are humble people who seek better opportunities at the price of their exploitation. Others might argue and say it’s the 21st century and people don’t think like this anymore. Unfortunately, people still do think this way. Just today I was watching a documentary where one man addressed Somalis as rats who multiple like wildfire! I was just astounded that an educated adult would speak this way of anyone.

On another note, when we address the issue of illegal immigrations the media are always inclined to portray immigrants from only Hispanic origin. What ever happened to the illegal immigrants that are from Europe for example, Italy, Poland, and even Portugal? You don’t necessary had to have “crossed the border” to be an immigrant… right? There are tons of people who come into the United States with visas and simply decide to not move back to their native country. Are they not defying the law? I don’t argue the reason why people might do this. It’s simple: We have a better living style compared to other countries. People migrate here well the majority of people do, for better work, education and a better life for their kids to mature in. My issue lies in the double standard that treats immigrant Hispanics as criminals and thieves. Yet those emigrating from Europe and other parts of the world are over looked. If laws are to be implemented to enforce the influx of immigration into the United States then I believe it should apply to all immigrant groups and not just one in particular.

I am addressing this because I myself have been a witness to this ignorance and I feel it is time for you to tackle it as well.

What do you think? 

Years ago when the first Latinos arrived in the Northeast, they were predominantly Puerto Ricans. Thus all Latinos to the Americanos were Puertoricans,or as they said, "portoricans". In the 60's came the Cubans, whom at the beginning garnered a lot of sympathy from the Americanos. In the 70's and 80's, the "other" Latinos started arriving in droves, mostly Mexicans who were more than willing to work in whatever type of demeaning employment that was available, much like the Untouchables of India. And of course, the great majority of them did not have "micas", thus their wages were lower than the prevailing wages of the time. Many were men who lived, and to some degree now, ten or twenty or more in a household. Unfortunatelly, like many Latinos, they like to party and drink hard and thus giving the impression that they are uncivilised. Another thing that went against the Mexicans, was their demonstrations and flying and showing their national flag most prominently. This, of course, drew the ire of the Americanos. Therefore, their prominence in the demonstration, makes the Americanos think that all Latinos are Mexicans, however much mistaken they are. An analogy of this type mistaken belief is with us, the Latinos, who refer to all Orientals as "Chinos", which of course is incorrect. A good example would be the former president of Peru, Fujimori, who is of Japanese descent, to whom the Peruvian people refer to  as "El chino".
Hopefully, the above statements may help clarify the misconception that not all  Latinos are Mexicans. As with all nationalities, there are good and bad amongst all.