Comment by syzar
4 years ago
It depends on skin color. Rabiblancos like Raphael Cruz (Ted Cruz) and Marco Rubio come across as white in both appearance and accent. In the U.S. those who speak Spanish who are darker skinned would be referred to as “Mexican” even though millions of them have roots in Central and South America. In the past we pretty much referred to anyone who speaks Spanish as Spanish. This why it’s a bit complicated when a person who speaks Spanish is actually from Spain. Such a person who has a light skin tone should be considered white but might be called Mexican.
That's the first time I come across the term "rabiblancos", it seems it's something they say in Panama to refer to rich white people of European origin, sounds derogatory. I suppose a more common term would be "Criollos" or in french Creole.
Well calling "mexican" to everyone with a darker skin who speaks spanish it's plainly as racist as calling any asian person "chinese", etc.
AFAIK the term Latino in USA refers to anyone from South America (including Brazil), which would exclude Spain, Italy, France... while Hispanic technically includes people from Spain as much as from any other spanish speaking countries from South America (so it would exclude Brazil).
How Americans distinguish races is a little bit odd to me. I was born in Brazil, but I am dual citizen of Brazil and Italy (some distant relatives come from there). Besides, my grandmother (my mom's mother) is German, daughter of a Serbian man and a German woman. On my father's side, I have black ancestors, albeit I am caucasian (dark hair, light skin). What am I then, an aberration? I prefer much more how races are distinguished in Brazil. It is purely you skin color, so if you have light skin you are white (asian people included), if you have dark skin you are black and that is pretty much it. Your heritage doesn't matter that much to distinguish your race. I believe this stems from Brazil having laws forbidding segregation in the 1930s, albeit for racists reasons, given that the goal was to mix black people with white people so the country would be whitened.
Latino is not restricted to South America. It also covers Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. It also extends to people who can trace their origins/ancestry to those places, not just people "from" there. For example, Marco Rubio is from Miami, but his parents came to the United States from Cuba, so he would be considered Latino.
I grew up in Panama. I’m white in the classical American sense. I don’t have a Spanish accent. English is the only language I speak. Both my parents are white from the United States.
Wikipedia tells me that Ted Cruz's father was born and raised in Cuba, but his father was Spanish (from Canary Islands), and his mother was born in Delaware, with irish-italian parents. Why would you say he comes across as white? He is white. That's why I mean with the use of "white" in USA, he's not WASP so he's not "white" but comes across as "white".
His name is Raphael and not Ted. I am talking about perceptions and not facts. Yes he is white but he may not come across that way if he went by Raphael and had a bit of an accent.
Well that is interesting, as Raphael has Hebrew origin but it's actually an English name with that spelling. In Spanish it's Rafael and in Italian Raffaello, so not sure why if he went by Raphael he would be perceived to be non-white.
Also, you say that with a non-american accent he would be perceived as non-white... so what if he went with Raphael which is actually also a German name, and he had a German accent? or a French accent? Or an italian accent? Would he also be non-white?
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