When the President decides to publicly state that this is America and you should be speaking English and not Spanish, it creates a polarization between Hispanic people and white Americans. Thus begins the many ignorant rants of “this is America, don’t speak Spanish, speak English” from white people who believe we don’t have a right to be here as much as they do.
I shouldn’t feel ashamed to speak my native language in public just because Margaret from Texas thinks English is the only language that people can use in the U.S.
Mi Idioma no es tuyo para criticar; my language is not yours to critique.
I am tired of seeing ignorant people getting in the faces of Hispanic people to tell them that they need to stop speaking Spanish in public. There’s sweat on my forehead, and my feet are giving out, Estoy cansada. I am tired.
If you can gawk and fan-girl over Justin Bieber speaking (broken) Spanish in "Despacito," you can deal with the Spanish I use in public to tell my mom that we need polvorones and mantequilla.
To express my tiredness, I've compiled a myriad of videos to highlight how ridiculous people look while telling others they matter less because their vocabulary consists of another language.
With the anger every person in the video presents themselves, it seems as if they're jealous that people can have things that belong to them only.
If you all want us to share, I mean, we can teach you.
I mentioned this article to a close friend because I usually always expect my friends to understand my point of view as a Hispanic woman (I probably shouldn’t), regardless of their race or ethnicity. I showed him what I already had of my article and video and his eyebrows raised at the clip where a principal tried to ban the Spanish language from being spoken.
I asked him why he had raised his eyebrows thinking he was just as appalled as I was. He was not.
He said, “I can see where the principal is coming from actually.”
Confused, I said, “in what way?”
“Well-” he said, “-I feel that it would be unfair to everyone else. If a student that can speak multiple languages disagrees with a teacher and things get escalated, that student can curse out the said teacher in a different language. It’s unfair to the teacher who doesn’t know what is being said to them.
"It’s also unfair to other students who don’t have the advantage of speaking another language and don’t get to express their discontent with the teacher freely," he continued.
Most professionally I can say, I don't care. I don't care that the ignorance is so big that the reason kids won't be able to express themselves verbally in Spanish is that "it's not fair other kids can't insult the teacher in a different language." Trust me; even if we tried, we can't. Why? The idea of a multi-language nation threatens people so much that they will report kids for having conversations with their friends in a different language.
Just as it isn't "fair" that my classmates don't speak another language, it's not fair that I have to hold my tongue when I or any other Spanish-speaking person wants to express ourselves but we can't because we get dirty looks.
The idea that Spanish is an angry language is unnerving. My Spanish is not some wild animal you can try to tame because you don't like it.
My Spanish is mine, and you're not taking it.
