"The Birth of a 'Latino Race'"

The Claremont Institute ^ | December 29, 2004 | Ken Masugi

[John Will]

Damn, I am entirely Norse-Germanic except for a unkown.
No Latin claim here.

[Melas]

I'm putting you on warning, that's an awfully tiny picture of Carmen Electra.

[Welsh Rabbit]

27 isn't old :-)

Thank you! I'm 28 and have been feeling some anxiety about getting a little older lately...

[PFC]

Latino as a "race" is absurd. According to the definition, a Latino is a person of Latin-American origin living in the U.S.

I know someone who moved here from Peru, all of his ancestors were Russian. According to the U.S. census - he is Latino. Sammy Sosa is also Latino. Descendents of the Germans who fled to Argentina - Latino. Descendents of Aztecs - Latino.

It's like saying Margeret Cho, Brittny Spears and Whoopi Goldberg are all the same race.

[cyborg]

Whoopi and all the rest are Americans though.

[Stoat]

I'm putting you on warning, that's an awfully tiny picture of Carmen Electra.

My apologies  :-)

 

[beelzepug]

"Whoopi and all the rest are Americans..."

Sorry. After the comments she made about Pres. Bush, I refuse to ever consider Whoopi an American. She could devoured by dogs, for all I care.

[beelzepug]

And didn't she an Dennis Rodman make a lovely couple? Ackk!

[cyborg]

I agree with your sentiments.

[Kurt_D]

Well... the term "Latino" is not only ambiguous but overall incorrect. People from Latin American can be of European, Amerindian, African, Asian and mixed ancestry. For instance, Argentinians tend to be mostly Spanish/Italian, while Dominicans happen to be mostly mulatto.

What about dropping the term Latino/Hispanic overall and start using, for example, "White" for Cubans of Spanish ancestry, "Black" for Blacks from Colombia, "Asian" for Peruvians of Japanese ancestry and "Mixed" for Mexicans of Spanish and Aztec heritage.

[combat_boots]

La Raza viene.............

There are affirmative action benefits to a race-related classification in the US, as long as that race isn't White. Of course, the longer this continues, the more the Whites will benefit in the end, as they will then fall in the race-related category, too...................

[Coyoteman]

My ancestry's half Italian

Some legitimate scientific subdivisions of races would list Italians and some Swiss into a group called "subalpine." Try that on the forms for a few puzzled looks.

[Ready4Freddy]

Sounds pretty mixed to me. The majority of Mexican nationals are mestizo, a Spanish-Indian blend, as it were....

I've heard many Mexicans try to distance themselves from the blends by assering that they of are Spanish stock.

I don't think Latino is mixed as in black/white mixed marriages. Latino is a distinct and proud race. I think it's the result of Spanish and Portuguese (same racial background) interaction with South American Indians.

[untenured]

The term "Hispanic," its politically correct successor "Latino," and "Asian" are all empirically meaningless. A Cuban immigrant doctor in Miami has nothing more in common with a Mexican farm worker living in Watsonville than he does with someone descended from the Mayflower. No one in Latin America says "Latino," and someone who comes here from Asia thinks of himself as Indian or Japanese, not "Asian." It is only after the racial determinists in the U.S. get hold of their offspring that they begin to think in this way.

The ideas of "Hispanic" and "Asian" were invented out of whole cloth by the Census Bureau in the early 1970s. They mean nothing except to people who benefit from their meaning so much.

[Melas]

Good man.

[seppel]

ok.

[The Cuban]

Where the heck did you hear that? Most Spanish Christians would never intermarry muslims. In fact, those that did were later marginalized during the "Blood Purity" frenzy of the 15th and 16th century.