JOHN LEGUIZAMO, FAT JOE, ADAM GOMEZ LATINS WAS THE SLAVES 🤷🏼♀️🤷🏼♀️, ARE THEY STEALING BLK HISTORY
6I've learned that Latinos were the first slaves in the Americas, but because we died off or became too rebellious, the Afro-Americans cruelly and regrettably took our place. In addition, Jim Crow laws were used against us, and we were also lynched. Without a doubt, we were not subject to the same oppression as Black people.
Leguizamo: Dude, it’s just such pride. All these organizations - Latinos are getting very organized and getting uppity. That’s right, we’re getting uppity. It’s so great to see us celebrate ourselves, when the society at large is not. We are basically living in a shadow parallel world. Here in New York, we’re equal to Whites in population. Whites are 32% - we’re 31%. You wouldn’t know that from looking at The New York Times, New York Magazine, New Yorker or anything going that’s media here - you would not know that we were equal to Whites in population. You would think we’re like this marginalized group. So, to have the New York Latino Film Festival here celebrating us, making sure we get our props for the work that we’re doing and creating, it’s so important.
Leguizamo: Our [Latino] buying power is $3.4 trillion dollars of buying power that we have. We are a third of the U.S. box office - we keep the U.S. movies going. We’re a third of subscribers on streaming. We’re a third of sports fans, but we’re less than 4% of the leads in movies, less than 1% of the stories being told, less than .09% of the executives making the decisions. That’s Hollywood because I know Hollywood, but I know when I talk to my Latin brothers and sisters, it’s in the tech industry, it’s in medicine, it’s in banking, it’s in the corporate world, as well. They’re telling me a lot of executives tell me, “I’m good enough to train the future executives, but I’m not good enough to get the promotion.” That’s where in lies the systemic racism and that’s what I’m trying to do with this show.