I saw the breaking news from Allen and, later, the identity of the dead shooter as well as the subsequent social media pushback against evidence that he was a white supremacist. Immediately, I looked for Latino responses.
Arturo Dominguez, journalist and publisher of The Antagonist Magazine, got right to the point.
Dominguez has never minced words about the Latino embrace of “whiteness.”
There were other responses as well:
Robert Downan, a journalist at the The Texas Tribune, posted a series of tweets on the subject and also pointed to Tarrio.
Tarrio has always both fascinated and disgusted me, specifically because he is often photographed wearing “elekes,” the beaded necklaces which are part of Santeria, the African-diasporic religion in which I am a priest. One might assume that anyone who is an adherent of a faith originating in West Africa, with Black deities, couldn’t also hold racist, supremacist beliefs but sadly, I can attest to personally having witnessed virulent racism in Florida, spewed by Cuban members of my own “religious family” there. It’s why I have washed my hands of them.
I have frequently been exposed to similar racist incidents. There are a lot of people who mistakenly assume I am Latina, and thus feel comfortable spouting anti-Blackness in my presence. I assure you they immediately regret it, since I not only disabuse them of their “mistake,” I call them out for the racism. I’m not known for biting my tongue.
In 2022, Danielle Boaz, an associate professor of Africana studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, took a deeper look into Tarrio, in “Proud Boys and Afro-Cuban Religion.”
Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, chairman of the Proud Boys, arrived in Washington D.C. on January 4, presumably with the intention of participating in the January 6 Capitol attack. However, Tarrio was promptly arrested for a crime which he had committed on December 12—burning a #BlackLivesMatter banner that was on display at the Asbury United Methodist Church, a historic Black church. When he was arrested, Tarrio had in his possession two large capacity ammunition magazines with Proud Boys symbols etched on them. The following day, when Tarrio appeared in court, the judge released him from custody but ordered him to leave the District.
Except for the video immediately after his release (seen above), most photos and videos show Tarrio wearing elekes—colorful beaded necklaces that signify affiliation with Regla de Ocha/Lucumí (an Afro-Cuban religion that is popularly known as Santeria). These necklaces are typically given to devotees by a godparent as one of the first steps of initiation into the religion. The godparent will ritually prepare the elekes before bestowing them on the novice and, when worn, they serve as spiritual protectors which the godchild will wear every day. In 2018, Tarrio told Miami New Times reporter Meg O’Connor that his elekes were given to him by his mother, who is an adept of Santeria. Although Tarrio does not appear to have explicitly self-identified as a Santeria adherent, he explained the meaning of the necklaces to O’Connor and said that they helped him feel close to his culture and family.[…]
Moreover, the idea that any member of the Proud Boys is affiliated with Santeria/Lucumí is paradoxical, to say the least. The Proud Boys have described themselves as a “pro-western fraternity.” Lucumí, on the other hand, is a religion centered on the veneration of orishas—divinities who devotees typically imagine and depict as being of mixed-race or African origin. Although it incorporates influences from many different religious traditions, Lucumí was largely shaped by Africans who were enslaved in Cuba.The irony is not simply that Tarrio wears symbols of a religion that centers on the veneration of Black gods; Lucumí is based on many beliefs and practices that seem fundamentally opposed to those of the Proud Boys. For instance, the Proud Boys are a misogynistic fraternal order and several members have espoused transphobic views. By contrast, Lucumí is welcoming of gay, lesbian, and transgender persons, and women often play a prominent role as priests. In fact, some of the orishas defy Western gender binaries; they have both male and female incarnations. Furthermore, the patakis (sacred stories) of Lucumí include a tale about Chango, an orisha who embodies masculinity, dressing up like a woman.
France 24 journalist Stéphanie Trouillard profiled Tarrio in 2021.
‘A general hate group’
The Proud Boys reject assertions that they are white supremacist, anti-Semitic, racist or fascist. “I’m pretty brown. I am Cuban. There is nothing white supremacist about me,” Tarrio told Insider. He sees himself, above all, as a conservative. “I think that conservatism is what will save America,” he said. The Proud Boys are just a “group of guys that hang out and drink beer together and just have a good time”, he told Heavy. “Obviously, we’re a political group, but that’s secondary in nature.”
But on social media the picture looks completely different. On his personal accounts, Tarrio denigrates, among others, transgender people and said that the African-American actress Leslie Jones looked like a “monkey”. In 2018, his Twitter profile was suspended. The Southern Poverty Law Center classifies the Proud Boys as a general hate group known for anti-Muslim and misogynistic rhetoric.
Just to join the group requires violence. Any man who wants to be a Proud Boy must pass four initiation rites: utter the phrase “I am a Western Chauvinist and I refuse to apologise for creating the modern world, and we call ourselves ‘the Proud Boys’”, name five brands of cereals while being beaten up, get a tattoo of the Proud Boys logo, renounce masturbation and participate in fights with extreme left-wing groups. Tarrio accomplished the fourth step by punching someone he believed to be a member of Antifa in the face in June 2018. He then climbed the ladder in the organisation until becoming its leader that November. The New York Times estimates the group has between 1,000 and 3,000 members.
Writing for Time magazine in 2022, Professor Tanya Katerí Hernández addressed the crux of the Latino-white supremacy issue—the airing of which often makes many Latinos uncomfortable.
When it comes to racism, Latino culture encourages a mindset of racial innocence in which real racism is only what White-Anglo-English-speaking U.S. residents perpetrate. Any anti-Black sentiment and action that Latinos partake in is dismissed as a cultural misunderstanding, an extension of pre-existing racism within the United States, or an uncommon momentary lapse. Racism is not what Latinos do.
But they do. In fact, Latino anti-Blackness is not contained to the U.S. 90% of the 10.7 million Africans forcibly brought to the Americas as survivors of the Middle Passage, were taken to Latin America and the Caribbean, in contrast to the 3.5% taken to what we now call the U.S. After the abolition of slavery, state actors and white elites maintained color hierarchies and exclusion with a racialized logic regarding the inferior intellect of Black people and cultural inadequacies of Indigenous communities. This racial logic continues to be perpetrated today to such an extent that it materially constrains Afro-Latino and Indigenous from socioeconomic advancement.
When Latinos enter the U.S., their racial baggage comes along with them and continues to be passed along to younger generations as part of Latino culture. As an Afro Latina raised in the U.S., too often I’ve heard a relative say “Look behind the ears,” fearing a newborn infant has the potential to develop a dark skin tone. But Latino familial vigilance against Blackness does not stop with the inspection of ears. There is a vampiric attention to sun exposure that may deepen the darkness and thus “worsen” a child’s appearance.
Even Latinos who are thought to be blessed with European features are policed by their families when it comes to dating and marriage. The obsession with mejorando y adelantando la raza, or “improving and advancing the race,” by marrying lighter (ideally whiter) partners means each potential suitor is sorted out for taints of Blackness.
In a 2022 Essence interview, Hernández stated:
My family is from Puerto Rico and I have traveled around much of Latin America and the Caribbean, and what has always been very disconcerting to me is the way in which Latin Americans and Caribbeans talk out of two sides of their mouths when it comes to race. Out of one side, there is this sense of superiority compared to the United States as being more racially evolved, “We don’t have racism, or at least not racism like in the United States. We’re all mixed so we can’t possibly be racist. We don’t see color, blah, blah, blah.” Then, out of the other side of the mouth is this mitigating commentary about Blackness as negative. But, how can you be professing to be so racially evolved while at the same time there’s all this anti-Blackness being spoken?
Anyone who wants to gain a deeper understanding of racism, colorism, and white supremacy in the Latino community needs to read Hernández’s book, “Racial Innocence: Unmasking Latino Anti-Black Bias and the Struggle for Equality,” published in August 2022.
For a deeper look into the issues she raises in her book, check out this 90-minute program at The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem last January. Hernández was joined by South African legal scholar Penelope Andrews. It should clarify any questions one might have about this messy reality.
Sociologist Dr. Mario Mercado Diaz wrote this piece on “Latinx Whiteness” and choice for the North American Congress on Latin America back in 2020. The title says it all: “To My Fellow BoriBlancos: When We Say ‘Down with White Power,’ We Also Mean Our White Power.”
Instead of characterizing race and whiteness as belonging to the social structures and culture of the United States, White Puerto Ricans must acknowledge and confront anti-Black racism within their own communities.
What do White Latinx gain from distancing themselves from whiteness? In the classroom and in conversation with other White Latinxs, I have seen White Latinxs carry out an estimation or calculation to determine if they are White-White. Often it’s biological: body appearances and lineages. Other times it’s a question of nationality and birthplace: the archipelago or the diaspora. Sometimes it’s a question of language. These calculations are proof of how White Latinxs can utilize social characteristics to remain in a space of racial ambiguity. While they can claim they are racialized by way of ethnicity, language, class or birthplace, White Latinxs still benefit from having white skin in a white supremacist society.
Afro-Latinxs, however, are “fixed,” in the words of Fanon. Afro-Latinxs are Black by “default,” while White Latinos have the privilege to determine how they will identify and present themselves. As shown in this essay, White Latinos can distance themselves from blackness through discursive and performative actions. I have yet to find the term “white guilt” in the White Latinxs framework and vocabulary, probably because it’s reserved for White Americans.
Identifying as White-White carries with it the implication that, as a White Latinx, you are responsible for the histories of violence and oppression sanctioned by white entitlement and narcissism. It’s a heavy acknowledgement that even White Americans try to shy away from. Because of this, White Latinxs can claim ethnic, sexual, gender, class, and other types of oppression to deflect the white category. I use Kimberlé Crenshaw’s TED talk on intersectionality to foster discussion on how we exist at intersections of oppression. While you might be gender-oppressed, your white skin color and college education allow you to access important resources and networks.
As someone who has spent over 50 years fighting to exterminate racism and to build bridges between Black Americans and Black and Blanco Caribbeans alike, I realize that we still have a long way to go. However, the fact that we are airing out the problem, instead of remaining silent, is a good start.
Join me for more in the comments, and for the weekly Caribbean News Roundup.