[mandelbrotwurst]

why is it considered racist? I can think of some arguments against the term but am having a hard time figuring that one out. Maybe because they perceive it as having been coined by people from outside their group and/or changing the topic to focus on gender > racial justice?

[rosterface]

Yes, that’s why they consider it racist. For the most part it’s a term from white academia. I don’t think anyone really wants to be told that the words they’ve used to describe themselves for generations must be changed, especially by people from another ethnicity all together.

[keerthiko]

Thanks for this interesting data point. Would you/they prefer to just be called latino? Is this common sentiment among Mexicans outside of your family?

I can see latinx only being preferred by non-gender-conforming individuals to whom it applies, as opposed to when referring to individuals rather than to communities (families, neighborhoods, food, etc).

[rosterface]

I think more specific is always better. I’m of Mexican descent, I prefer to keep that identity. I’ve actually noticed people in the US sometimes struggle to say that as if being “Mexican” is a bad thing; it’s not, don’t be afraid of the term.

Latino and Latina are also fine. Hispanic as well although that has a slightly different meaning.

I think it’s best to call people by the terms that they use themselves. Foisting a new term on someone to describe their ethnicity doesn’t seem like it would ever be a good idea.

[sverige]

It's funny because I have been ridiculed for calling myself Swedish or Swedish-American instead of white. Somehow some people have even thought that's racist.

But it is a strong identity in my family, and, for example, I really don't want to be lumped in with the people of Bavarian descent who made up about half of the town I grew up in. I'm nothing like them culturally.

Honestly, "white" isn't an ethnicity and it is borderline insulting to think others can know all about me by my skin color, but I've given up on the idea that my opinion on this will make a difference. It is nice to say it out loud for the first time in years, though.

[9nGQluzmnq3M]

With all due respect, if you were born in the US and grew up speaking English, you have a lot more common with those "Bavarians" than you do with Swedish people in Sweden.

[umanwizard]

I was going to leave a similar comment, but decided not to. Anyway, I mostly agree with you -- I never refer to myself as "X-American" where X is some European country, because first of all I don't care much about it, and second I know how ridiculous it sounds to people who were born and raised in country X.

On the other hand, I also think the Swedish-American OP has an understandable point. Cultural group identification is a natural, strong human urge, and it can be a bit arbitrary and not objectively correspond to actual observable culture or to ancestry.

I wouldn't tell someone living in Serbia who identifies as a Croat that that's nonsense because from an outsider's perspective their culture is 99% indistinguishable from that of a Serb. They have their own reasons for identifying as part of that group, and it's important to them. And similarly I don't really think it's illegitimate for Nth generation white Americans to feel that they are "Swedish" or "Irish" in some way that means something to them. (With the understanding that, yes, they are culturally quite different from someone actually raised in Stockholm or Cork).

[sverige]

Probably true in some ways, yes, though I grew up with relatives who came here from Sweden. And I definitely identify more as American than Swedish.

At the same time, though, should we then say that all English-speaking Americans have more in common than whatever ethnic stock they came from in another country, whether Mexicans or Asians or whatever group? Or do you say that just because the Bavarians are "white"?

[yellowapple]

> I’ve actually noticed people in the US sometimes struggle to say that as if being “Mexican” is a bad thing; it’s not, don’t be afraid of the term.

It's more that people likely don't know for sure that you're actually of Mexican descent. You could've descended from any number of Central or South American nationalities, so going with something properly broad like "Latino" is going to be much more reasonable than running the risk of labeling someone as "Mexican" when one actually descends from, say, Colombia.

This is similar to the reason why most people just stick to calling white people "white" or black people "black" instead of trying to guess something more specific.

[rosterface]

This would be after I told them I was Mexican. Some people struggle to say it.

[yellowapple]

Oh. Well then yeah, that's kinda silly. Maybe just force of habit?

[rexarex]

The term came from South American feminists I don’t think it’s racist at all...

[mywittyname]

It's taking the identify of Hispanic culture, and redefining it to fit into the political ideals of the liberal American culture. Essentially, it's usurping the identity of minorities groups.

If you don't like using Latino, there's already a gender-neutral English word works just fine: Latin. Alternatively, Hispanic works just fine too.

[darkpuma]

'Latin' in America has a subtly different meaning, in that it includes Italians, the French, etc. It's a distinct concept from 'Latin American' which by convention refers to people from Latin America only and excludes other Latin people, particularly those from Europe. One might logically think that an Italian immigrant who came in through Ellis Island would be a 'Latin American', but by convention he isn't because he didn't come from a Latin American country.

'Latin' is more inclusive than 'Latin American' but by the numbers both are more inclusive than 'Hispanic' which generally excludes Brazilians, and other Latin American speakers of minority languages.

Incidentally, the whole "Latin" thing was invented by the French for geopolitical reasons. Recognition of a "latin race" common among the French, Spanish, Italians, and Mexicans, as a means of balancing the scales in what these Frenchmen perceived as their struggle against the Anglo-Saxon and Slavic races.