The Discrimination Against Hispanic/Latinx People Essay Example

I’m writing this letter to use my voice to fight against the discrimination against Hispanic/Latinx people. I also wrote this letter because I want to drive for change, and also since you can make the change by cosponsoring certain bills or maybe even sponsoring bills that you can create based on this letter. Out of all the people I could’ve written to, I didn't choose you because you have the power to make the change, but more specifically because you can most likely relate to this topic because you’re also born to parents from Mexico. Essentially I feel like you and I share this feeling for driving for change against Hispanics/Latinx because that is who we are. 

First, let us get started with the type of discrimination used against Hispanics/Latinx.  A lengthy and detailed research paper from Pew Research Center titled, “ Majority of Latinos Say Skin Color Impacts Opportunity in America and Shapes Daily Life '' talks about the experiences of Latinos experience in America based on the color of their skin.  A staggering statistic from this article it's that 62% of Latino adults have said that having darker skin has hurt their ability to get ahead in the United States.  57% of Latinos say that skin color shapes their daily life experiences, and 48% of Latinos say that discrimination based on race is a huge problem in the U.S. However, Lastly is that 59% of Latinos adults say that having lighter skin helps their ability to get ahead in the U.S. From all these statistics you can the most predominant form of discrimination towards Hispanics/Latinos is colorism it’s more of darker-skinned Latinos that face more discrimination rather than lighter-skinned Latinos,  who still face discrimination just far less than darker-skinned Latinos. It’s important to find new ways to go against discrimination toward Hispanics/Latinx because you don’t know the impacts this has on them and their life. 

Furthermore, this paragraph is going to be more about the impacts of discrimination towards Hispanics/Latinx people but more in-depth because it was slightly mentioned in the last paragraph. Without using any statistics I would like to share a point of view to start. I think there are many impacts of discrimination on Hispanics/Latinx for one I would say, it would be the opportunities they take. For example, let's say a Latino was to work at a store as a cashier, and some person checking out doesn’t like what they’re doing and says something offensive to the Latino, and nothing was to happen to the person that made the offensive comment, which tends to happen more often. Since they didn’t get in trouble for saying their offensive comment, nothing is stopping them from doing it again, besides ethics, to maybe a different race besides Hispanic/Latinos. Essentially what I’m trying to get at is that there is no accountability for people that say these things in any environment. Meaning they could continue the hate speech continuously without getting into any legal trouble. Moving onto the last paragraph I’m going to talk about how we could drive for change for less discrimination amongst Hispanics/Latinos. 

As stated in the previous paragraph I’m going to say how we collectively could drive for change. To increase the level of accountability for those who say these discriminatory things by adding more legal punishments to make the person more aware of their actions.  The main reason for this request is because most when people say discriminatory things to others “hate speech” it doesn’t reach the point where can be criminalized, and most of the time it never reaches a hate crime. According to fbi.gov, they defined a hate crime is a criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender's bias against a race religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.  Also hate speech can’t be criminalized only when they incite violence or criminal activity against a person or group. They have also stated that “hate” itself is not a crime because they are mindful of protecting the first amendment's freedom of speech. My freedom of speech is a great honor to have, but there are times when I  feel like there should be limits. By limits, I mean that people shouldn’t be able to say slurs and discriminatory phrases that would offend others. Also adding to the legal troubles, maybe there are ways to send these people to some sensitivity training as a form of “punishment”, so when they come out of this training they can be more aware of the things they have said. That being said I wish there would be more punishments for those who hate things towards Hispanics/Latinos and everyone else for that matter.

In this last body paragraph, I would like to talk about how discrimination toward Hispanics/Latinx people has affected my family. My parents usually and still do have to deal with customer service. As you can probably infer, they have been discriminated against multiple times by people that would make stereotypes against them or just flat out say hateful things because of their ethnicity and origins. The most frequent question they ask time is like “where are you from”. At first, they may seem like a question but as you look deeper it's more of an unnecessary question because people don’t need to know where they come from in any given situation. The infamous “go back to your country” happened to my parents, which is one of the disrespectful things you can say to a Hispanic person because all it’s going to do is make you feel bad. It would make them feel like they aren’t wanted or needed. Even though all these my parents continue to work at their jobs because their hate won’t stop unless they’re punished for it. Most of these issues developed when we were in Georgia, and ever since moving to California my parents have honestly been treated a whole lot better and for that, I’m forever grateful. 

Hopefully, after reading this letter you would feel a bit more motivated to enact change that would forever change the lives of Hispanics/Latinos and others for the better. Also, I would love to see what you would have to say about this letter by sending a potential response.