Thread by @Sil_Lai

@eleven8 The majority of Cubans and Brazilians are of African descent and are dark. The reason you don't know this is because of the whitewashing of these countries media and who is allowed to accumulate power in Latin countries - Mestizos, or mixed race people...like a JLo.

@eleven8 Latin American countries suffer from the same issues around colorism as in the U.S., which is why every Miss Brazil is of white descent. Many powerholders in Latin American/Caribbean countries are descendants of European immigrants brought over to manage land & businesses.

@eleven8 Brazil's population is 50.7% Black. The poorest people in that country are, you guessed it - the descendants of enslaved Africans who have dark skin. Fat Joe was sloppy in his statement, but in fact many pardos or Mestizos have enough African ancestry to qualify as light-skinned

@eleven8 And Cuba DEFINITELY has a large population of clearly African descended people. However, Americans think of this mixture as different than Black people with Native American and White ancestry because they speak Spanish. It's bullsh*t.

@eleven8 Yes, some Latinx are white, but in Cuba, it's the ruling class who are mixed or white. You just whitewashed an entire country. Celia Cruz? AfroCuban. Faizon Love? AfroCuban. MLB player Jose Contreras? AfroCuban. A lot of Cubans are BLACKETY 👏🏾 BLACK 👏🏾 BLACK👏🏾.

@eleven8 A quick primer on AfroCubans. You can research every Latin American and Caribbean country and come up with the same thing.

nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/cu…

@eleven8 And Haitians and Dominicans share an island, separated by a border & culture imposed on them by French and Spanish colonizers and their racial mix is the same. Predominantly Black.

@eleven8 Adding: The fact is race is an identity that a person can self-opt into, depending upon phenotype. A lot of people in Latin American countries who would be categorized as Black in the U.S. claim mixed or *white* race on census forms. This is bc of deeply ingrained anti-blackness