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I lived in Texas in the 80s and whites knew the people from Latin America were not ethnically or cultural white but "Mexican", mestizo or mixed race and low class and ethnocentric.
The 80s is late. That was after the Chicano movement when Mexicans reinvented themselves as minorities. They first became "hispanic" in the 80s.
In earlier decades they were adamant that they were white. Mexicans used boast that they were the "Sum and Substance of the White race".
Quote:
Mexican Americans did not object to the segregation of Blacks or challenge the assumptions of White supremacy. On the contrary, they supported strict segregation of Whites and Blacks in the schools and in public facilities. The basis for their claim for social equality was that they were also white...
A group of Mexican Americans, mostly urban and middle class, founded their own organization in 1929 in Corpus Cristi, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)...LULAC sought to set the racial record strait. In a 1932 article in the LULAC News titled "Are Texas-Mexicans 'Americans'?" the author asserted that Mexican Americans were "the first white race to inhabit this vast empire of ours." Another member of LULAC boasted that Mexican Americans were "not only a part and parcel but as well the sum and substance of the white race."
As self-constituted Whites, LULAC members considered it "an insult" to be associated with Blacks or other "colored" races. In 1936 a LULAC official deplored the practice of hiring "Negro musicians" to play at Mexican bailes because it led to "illicit relations" between Black men and "ill-informed Mexican girls." He urged fellow LULAC memebers to "tell these Negroes that we are not going to permit our manhood and womanhood to mingle with them on an equal social basis".
The 80s is late. That was after the Chicano movement when Mexicans reinvented themselves as minorities. They first became "hispanic" in the 80s.
In earlier decades they were adamant that they were white. Mexicans used boast that they were the "Sum and Substance of the White race".
My point isn't to disagree they more recently played themselves as minorities, but that they've always tried to play it both ways, and are on no one's side but their own. Mexicans themselves and everyone else knew they were not white but whites just tolerated their presence or imposition. It was obvious to anyone in 1979-1980 moving to Texas from the north that they were different. It was obvious to Americans in 1848 the people and culture in Mexico were not compatible with Americans so they gave Mexico back the rest of their country lost in the War.
This thread is spot on, except that I think too much blame is being placed with the "minorities" themselves in this "flight from white" phenomenon. Given the incentives put in place to declare non-whiteness, they are behaving rationally. Most of the blame ought to go to those who created the incentives and continue to encourage this behavior. This blameworthy group is comprised mostly of leftists with power in politics, media, academia and finance. They are predominantly Euro-American and disproportionately Jewish.
Given the incentives put in place to declare non-whiteness, they are behaving rationally. Most of the blame ought to go to those who created the incentives and continue to encourage this behavior.
The Civil Rights act was an experiment from the 60s that went sour. Legislating inclusion has backfired. Now being a minority has been cheapened to the point where it's a joke. All kinds of people who used to scream that they were white have rediscovered themselves as "people of color" and they invented a whole host of new ethnic terms.
"Hispanic" is such an objectively ridiculous concept, that it's a wonder how anybody ever took it seriously. I also don't think it's something that they themselves actually believe in. It's just politically convenient to have statistical numbers. It literally means nothing to be "hispanic".
They should just end all race-based incentives and protections. They aren't achieving what they were supposed to achieve. The moment the government stops doling out federal funding for discriminated minorities, these new fangled minority groups would lose interest in the identity politics of victimhood.
I have been asked to expand my thoughts. I grew up in Alabama in the 50's. Born in Boston in 1945.
As I have said, my sister is Chinese. Half Chinese, actually, since we have the same mother. But when we moved to Alabama, her father was already lost to history and we never saw him. She never knew him.
Sis was white because the rest of her family was white. But also, she was white because she was not black. If she had been a member of a Chinese family, she still would have been white. Because she was not black.
There were only those two possibilities - black or white - because there were only 2 systems. Two drinking fountains; two school systems; 2 sides of town.
Sis's Tahitian friend shared her brown skin and had been adopted by a white family, so she was white, too.
I never actually spoke to a black person until 1963, when I joined the navy. The first black person I ever spoke to threatened to 'kick my ass' if I picked a bunk near his, but the second one was pleasant. That should give you an idea of how completely segregated we were. We white people and black people didn't know each other - not at all.
I visited my home town in 1985. I was looking over the old park - the one where whites only played - and happened upon a black lady supervising her child. We were the same age and grew up at the same time in that town of 12,000 and did not know a single person in common.
Black football teams played on the same field as white football teams - but they had it on Thursday and we had it on Friday. I did hear some friends talk about going to the black (Negro) games and there was never any trouble. Just sort of a curiosity. I don't remember ever seeing a black person at a white football game, but I also cannot imagine that anything would have been said.
See, we didn't actually fight in the 50's. We had a movie theater and they didn't. So they didn't go. I never heard of black and white people fighting, because we almost never interacted.
Today, I am very open with my black friends. My neighbor is black. She has a college degree and I don't; her house is bigger than mine; her children have now finished college, and she and I talk about every issue you could name including race relations.
Last year, I was asked to speak at the funeral of a black lady who I have known for years. I was the only speaker. As I met her extended family I was surprised to find both black people and white people claimed her a relative - even if through marriage.
Interracial dating is so common now, that no one ever looks twice. We have a few interracial couples in our subdivision.
The Internet is full of people who think they know something about Mississippi, and they are nearly always wrong. If there is one thing I have learned it is this: You cannot kill a myth with a fact.
There are people who identify as ladino & thus with the conquistadors. Their also exist those that in the past were known as Afro-Saxons, Anglo-Indu-ss-oos, Francais de couleur, Hamitic Hypothesizers & what not; then you had your Pocahantas partisans & other avatars of "authenticity"; can't forget about the octoroon & quadraroons hallers & ballers; not to mention the Atraki pan-khalifis (as well as many other massah stamped & approved globalist plantation political identities without even going into Disraelis & the connections with settler southern Africa).
The fact of the matter is that despite all the post-racial plantation propaganda, those of that class & caste still exist, & that is because THE CURRENT GENERATION WANTS THEM TO.
It remains to be seen if the up & current generations will continue to look up to them as a role to be modeled after.
Affirmative Action and all race-based civil rights protections and federal funding were designed to attone for historical discrimination and exclusion that was experienced by non-white minorities.
But In the pre-civil rights era, when it was a real disadvantage to be a minority, who was a minority?
This is a very important historical question that has to be discussed in debates about Affirmative Action. What was the concept of race in the 50s?
Fortunately, we don't even have to read books about this because the people who were alive then are still around. Elderly people learned to use their computers and are part of the City Data community.
We have first hand accounts of the era of segregation right here on City Data.
Let's take a look.
Here's a man who grew up during segregation in Alabama:
In the segregated South, when being white was a legal privilege. Who was white? Who had white privilege? Listener2307 swears that not only his Chinese sister, but even the Tahitian girl at school was white. Seems like the concept of racial whiteness was much broader back then. Lots of people who were darkskinned or otherwise not European were actually regarded as white.
Leovigildo remembers the 40s and the 50s in segregated Florida:
Cubans somehow evaded segregation, even the black ones.
His account is funny because lots of people today swear that "hispanics" were on the back of the bus with black people. But according to him, they got nasty looks if they sat in the black section of the bus.
Here's an account from a Texan woman who went to a segregated white university in the 50s:
Wow. So the Latin students weren't "Latino/Hispanic/Latinx" minorities back then. Not even the Latin girl with the "smokey ancestry". The overly prejudiced students at her univesrity thought that was cute and even called her "the black one" endearingly.
In Dallas, Mexicans were white and went to schools with white children. How did they arbitrarily become minorities in the 70s?
This man grew up in places that had large populations of people of Spanish origin:
He never heard the term "hispanic" until the 70s, and affirms that he and everyone he knew considered them white. "Mexican" had no non-white connotation. It was like calling somebody Polish or Irish.
This is history that needs to be discussed today now that being a discriminated minoirty is a protected status with benefits. Why, In the post-civil rights era, are there are so many minority groups? We have seen an explosion of new ethnic concepts that didn't exist historically. Where did modern identity politics come from?
How did we go from a black/white dichotomy to the notion of "people of color"?
Why are people of Spanish origin minorities today? Why do we even call people "hispanic" or "Latino"? A person with a Spanish surname is considered a minority today and gets called a "person of color" even if they're totally white. How did that happen?
If Chinese people were white in Alabama, why are they known as the "model minority" today?
These are questions that are politically relevant in all discussion of identity politics. It needs to be understood that we have minority groups today that were politically fabricated. They have also come up with victim narratives that no one alive back then seems to remember.
Why is this surprising? Not every idiot went to college like today. You have some real dumb ass people in college now.
Affirmative Action and all race-based civil rights protections and federal funding were designed to attone for historical discrimination and exclusion that was experienced by non-white minorities.
But In the pre-civil rights era, when it was a real disadvantage to be a minority, who was a minority?
This is a very important historical question that has to be discussed in debates about Affirmative Action. What was the concept of race in the 50s?
Fortunately, we don't even have to read books about this because the people who were alive then are still around. Elderly people learned to use their computers and are part of the City Data community.
We have first hand accounts of the era of segregation right here on City Data.
Let's take a look.
Here's a man who grew up during segregation in Alabama:
In the segregated South, when being white was a legal privilege. Who was white? Who had white privilege? Listener2307 swears that not only his Chinese sister, but even the Tahitian girl at school was white. Seems like the concept of racial whiteness was much broader back then. Lots of people who were darkskinned or otherwise not European were actually regarded as white.
Leovigildo remembers the 40s and the 50s in segregated Florida:
Cubans somehow evaded segregation, even the black ones.
His account is funny because lots of people today swear that "hispanics" were on the back of the bus with black people. But according to him, they got nasty looks if they sat in the black section of the bus.
Here's an account from a Texan woman who went to a segregated white university in the 50s:
Wow. So the Latin students weren't "Latino/Hispanic/Latinx" minorities back then. Not even the Latin girl with the "smokey ancestry". The overly prejudiced students at her univesrity thought that was cute and even called her "the black one" endearingly.
In Dallas, Mexicans were white and went to schools with white children. How did they arbitrarily become minorities in the 70s?
This man grew up in places that had large populations of people of Spanish origin:
He never heard the term "hispanic" until the 70s, and affirms that he and everyone he knew considered them white. "Mexican" had no non-white connotation. It was like calling somebody Polish or Irish.
This is history that needs to be discussed today now that being a discriminated minoirty is a protected status with benefits. Why, In the post-civil rights era, are there are so many minority groups? We have seen an explosion of new ethnic concepts that didn't exist historically. Where did modern identity politics come from?
How did we go from a black/white dichotomy to the notion of "people of color"?
Why are people of Spanish origin minorities today? Why do we even call people "hispanic" or "Latino"? A person with a Spanish surname is considered a minority today and gets called a "person of color" even if they're totally white. How did that happen?
If Chinese people were white in Alabama, why are they known as the "model minority" today?
These are questions that are politically relevant in all discussion of identity politics. It needs to be understood that we have minority groups today that were politically fabricated. They have also come up with victim narratives that no one alive back then seems to remember.
Very refreshing to see a different angle for a change.
There is NO dichotomy like the dichotomy between the descendants of slaves and whites. Talk of racism and its impact is largely an issue of black and white....or should be. Hispanics are seen as "hard workers", while Asians are viewed as "intelligent". Whites don't associate anything positive about black people....other than sports and entertainment. Blacks are seen as inferior by a good percentage of whites and that is an inherited belief passed down from generation to generation.
Our problems are not "minority" or "people of color" problems. When our problems get lumped in as minority or people of color problems, those other groups will loose respect for blacks because when blacks complain about a problem we have with racism.....they likely don't have the problem in degree or kind as blacks do and hence....they may think we are embellishing it or making it up because its not that way with them, they may thing, and they are minorities too.
I think its just laziness or muddying the water. America just threw all groups in with blacks....women, Latinos, gays, etc. More people benefit from the struggles of black history and policies....than black people.
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