As the West Sinks Slowly in the West ...

As I always say, the discourse on race/ethnicity stinks to high heaven.  I'm not necessarily complaining, mind you: it's also hilarious.

The racist Right's freakout is entirely predictable, from promises to boycott the NFL to Kristi Noem's threat to send ICE to the 2026 Superbowl.  Liberals on social media get to point out that Puerto Ricans are US citizens, though that won't slow ICE down much, though many of them are evidently unaware that racist panic over Spanish language is no new thing.  I remember for example, during Dubya's second term, a similar freakout over Spanish translations of "The Star Spangled Banner."  That was before I was even on Facebook, but it was covered by the corporate media.  Then, a few years later, social media blew up when an eleven-year-old Mexican-American sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" (in English) at a pro basketball game in Texas.  The kid was a US citizen, son of a US naval veteran, but that cuts no ice with racists.  And such cases are just the most visible.

Just remember that Spanish is also a colonialist language. It's hilarious when Spanish-speaking Americans claim that they've been colonized by the gringos; it's like when the English colonial slaveowners said they were being enslaved by the Crown.  When Bad Bunny appeared on Saturday Night Live last weekend,

...the artist included some words in Spanish that he devoted to “all the Latinos and Latinas in the entire world and here in the United States”.

“More than being an accomplishment of mine, it’s an accomplishment for everybody, demonstrating that our mark and our contribution to this country will never be able to be removed or erased by anybody,” he said in Spanish. Afterwards, he said in English: “If you didn’t understand what I just said, you have four months to learn.” 

It's certainly important to remember the accomplishments of Latinos and Latinas in the Americas, including the US, but it's just as important to remember that their heritage includes horrible oppression of the people who were living here when the Spanish invaded.  If I, as an Anglo, need to be aware of the crimes of the English colonists (and I am), Bad Bunny needs to remember his heritage of invasion, colonization, and racism.  That heritage continued almost unquestioned until the end of the 20th century.  I've had numerous occasions in this blog to notice the way that the Spanish-speaking descendants of African slaves are considered "non-Western" by academics, and the American Indians simply folded into the supposedly non-Western "Hispanic" category.  (One example I haven't written about, but should: US academics writing on Mexican homosexuality classified European-trained Mexican doctors in the early 20th century as resisting colonialist Freudian theory on sexuality. This jibes with South Asian antigay bigots who cite European antigay bigots as authority for resisting changes in Indian law and society.)    Indigenous activists throughout Latin America have more and more to say about that.

I couldn't care much less about the half-time shows at the Superbowl, nor am I a fan of Bad Bunny.  (I watched a few of his music videos on YouTube and realized that I'd heard some of his music before in Mexican restaurants.  Boooooring, my dears - but my personal taste isn't the issue, I'm not a fan of Taylor Swift either, and it doesn't make me more sympathetic to MAGA.)  It's worth noticing that white players are evidently a minority in the NFL now, and that Latins are a rapidly growing part of the fanbase. That's good for the capitalists who own the sport, not so good for most of us.  Bad Bunny is immensely popular around the world, and this controversy isn't going to hurt him - probably the opposite.  The frothing of racist malcontents in the US is going to contribute to our growing polarization, and I don't know what can constructively be done about that.  The muddling of race/ethnicity on all sides is a side issue by comparison, but it still contributes nothing to clarity.

All Your Genes Are Belong to Her

I found myself grumbling crankily over liberal reactions to American Eagle's ad campaign featuring Sydney Sweeney, so here's a little more.

Another brand put out a commercial featuring a pretty actor saying “This tan? Genetics. I just got my color analysis back and guess what? Golden summer.” While susceptibility to tanning rather than burning may have a genetic component, a tan is no more genetic than a haircut, or the clothes the actor is wearing.  That's another reminder that most people don't know what "genetic" means, and shouldn't be taken seriously when they invoke it.  (Still, from a white-supremacist viewpoint, the "best" genes are the northern European ones that burn in the sun without tanning.)

But that includes inclusivity-minded liberals who think that being gay or trans is in one's genes, or that one's cultural tradition is in one's DNA, or that a man seeks the US Presidency because his DNA drives him to do it, in hopes of connecting with some hot female DNA once he's arrived. (That last one is particularly painful, since the claim comes from one of America's best liberal writers, who subscribes to a bonkers idea about what DNA does and clings to it, rather sadly, despite harsh pushback from his commenters.)

I think a similar confusion drives the liberal freakout over Sydney Sweeney.  Why not say: okay, she has good genes – so do any number of other people.  Sure, racists think that only whites and especially she has good genes. The problem is that liberals think so too: if she has good genes, no one else has them.  Remember Chris Hayes's claim, in his book on meritocracy, that once you've found the absolute best soprano in the world, there's no reason to listen to any other. Then remember A. E. Housman's comment on another classical scholar's work: "Three minutes' thought would suffice to find [that] this [is complete wackery]; but thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time."  But liberals are addicted to "Oh, how can you say such terrible things?" as the first move in public discourse; for thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time.

I've written before that people like Sweeney, far from being special, are the least common denominators of human attractiveness. They can therefore be marketed to the largest possible number of consumers.  Marketing and consumption is what they are used for - and never forget that without mass communications and the institutions of publicity and marketing, she wouldn't exist as a star.  So thousands, even millions of men, can fantasize that her smiles are for them alone, and if she was lucky enough to meet them, she'd immediately recognize their supreme value; likewise, thousands or millions of young women can fantasize about being that desirable.  On some level they all know it's just a fantasy, but it's still a rush.

If Sydney's genes are so great, though, she should be having babies - lots of babies - to perpetuate them.  She's only their temporary custodian; that's what eugenics is all about.  American Eagle's copywriters know it too: "In the ad, the blonde hair, blue-eyed actress says, 'Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color.'" (You didn't think she wrote her own lines, did you?)  The same is true of her appearance.  Her genes may give her a head start, but without workouts, makeup artists, and hairstylists, she wouldn't glow as much, and time's winged chariot is already bearing down on her.  Not to pick on her alone, this is a well-known problem faced by all people whose appearance is their fortune; the examples of Cher, Michael Jackson, and Madonna - not to mention Laura Loomer, Kristi Noem, and Lauren Sánchez - stand as a warning to us all.  

And while she's apparently a registered Republican, if she utters any heterodox opinions, her MAGA fan base will turn on her without mercy.  So far it doesn't seem that Sydney Sweeney is such a big star; no doubt she's hoping to parley her new notoriety into reaching a higher level.  That will have to be seen.