My girl crush

January 8, 2010 at 6:31 PM | Posted in Ah C'mon!, Gimme a frickin break! | 8 Comments

I have loved Zoe Saldana for a few years now. Not because of her flourishing acting career but because of her strong sense of identity. In sophomore year in school, I was reading an article on her in Latina magazine while under the dryer at the Dominican hair salon. She stated very clearly that she is a black woman.

She is Dominican and Puerto Rican. She is Latina. She is a Black Latina and makes no bones about it. Being a Black Latina myself I can appreciate when an individual can say with pride and strength what they are. This is her quote:

“When I go to the D.R., the press in Santo Domingo always asks, “¿Qué te consideras, dominicana o americana?” (What do you consider yourself, Dominican or American?) I don’t understand it, and it’s the same people asking the same question. So I say, time and time again, “Yo soy una mujer negra.” (“I am a black woman.”) [They go,] “Oh, no, tú eres trigueñita.” (“Oh no, you are ‘dark skinned’”) I’m like, “No! Let’s get it straight, yo soy una mujer negra.” (“I am a black woman.”)”

Unlike other Black Latinos that will deny what they are until the day they die, ie Sammy Sosa…eh pretty much the majority of Black Latinos in the MLB, Zoe embraces what she is. The brainwashed “light is right” complex is just as, if not, more ingrained in the Latino culture than it is in Black American culture.

How is it that we have countless words for “black” and “dark-skinned”? How is it that when you turn on Univision there is not one Latino darker than porcelain? Why in 2009 was a well-known, successful baseball player bleaching his skin? Latinos are more obsessed with skin color and hair texture than any other group I have encountered. It’s sickening, it is disgusting, it is deplorable and it needs to end.

To clarify for the ignoramuses of the world: Latino is an ethnicity. One can be ANY race and be Latino. Our history was borne upon conquistadores, the slave trade, land pillaging, native raping and the like. Don’t be fooled by the JLos, Selma Hayeks and Sophia Vergaras. There are Latinas as dark as midnight and those as aryan as can be.

I am proud of Zoe Saldana. I am proud to be Latina. I am proud to Black. I am proud to be Panamanian. It is a shame that in 2010, Latinos are still not proud of themselves and the beautiful spectrum of colors and hues they come in. We are not as unified as we claim to be.

I have yet to see a damn tanned Latino on El Sabado Gigante.

Related: I’m not African-American, I’m Black.