Born on February 4, 1957 in Atacheo de Regalado, Michoacan, Mexico. Soon to be a hard working, dedicated, and tireless person who worked every day for a better life. This person I am speaking so highly of is my father, who is now 68 years old.  At just the age of 16, my dad took a bus from Michoacan to Tijuana. When he arrived, he found a “coyote,” someone who gets paid by immigrants to help guide them across the border. My dad and 4 of his friends walked for 10 hours straight from Tijuana to San Diego, with just water and no food. When they arrived at San Diego, they paid someone to drive them to Los Angeles. 

1973 was the year my dad crossed the border, and the same year he had luckily found a job thanks to his friend. A small company in Irvine California named Keller Engineering. The owner was a decent guy, he treated others with respect regardless of their differences. At the time, my dad had 3 years working with the company. Up until the owner of the company was leaving for vacation, and left his friend in charge. In the time that the owner was gone, everything was turned upside down. The friend was Polish, and had strong opinions on the Mexicans that worked for the company. He treated everyone terribly, going as far as kicking or hitting them. He would yell at the others, and wanted everything to be done quickly, and in his own selfish way. My dad wanted to fight back and be brave, but he really needed this job, and had to swallow his pride. 

“You Mexicans don’t know how to work, but us real Americans do.” 

Something that will forever stick with my father when he looks back at the 5 or more years he had working there. For 6 months, the Mexican people were both verbally and physically abused. It wasn’t until the owner came back from vacation and saw what was going on, and fired him. 

My fathers entire motivation was to come here to California, and live the American dream. He wanted to work hard, send money to his family in Mexico, and make his parents proud. A father who was both emotionally unavailable and mentally abusive, a mother who was also emotionally unavailable. All my dad had ever known was failure, loss, regret, and anger. Regardless of my dads past, he was still determined to always do his best. 

“What are your thoughts on president Donald Trump?”

“My thoughts on Donald Trump? Sucks. He isn’t a good president and deporting all the Mexicans who are hard working people is foolish.” 

What would you do if you were to have seen the guy that had treated you horribly for months without consequence?

“If I would have seen the guy now, the way I am now, the position I am in now I would tell him it is not necessary to treat people badly. I was a supervisor for 30 years, and that isn’t the way we are supposed to treat anyone no matter their differences. I would have also hit this guy real hard.” 

Artist Statement 

Dear people who discriminate against hispanics, we want to express the way we feel with the way many of you treat us, especially our parents. There is no reason for so many people to be racist and be against us because yet again I see you guys eating our food and celebrating our culture and beautiful traditions. I dont think it’s fair at all. Why do our parents have to go through the most unmiganible things just because you’re having a bad day. It is a concern to us that this is such a huge problem here in the United States. The country that is liberty and justice for all? Freedom? It is such a problem that no one is willing to fix. This is why we are writing to those who need a better understanding perspective to finally have some change  in this country. So many of you guys are talking about how our people aren’t hard working but yet I see my people out in the streets selling fruits, foods, room decor, flowers, and so much more. I see my people working at so many stores but yet I don’t see your guys people? Again, a huge chunk of people are the problem.

One of the most biggest forms of discrimination against Hispanics are law enforcement agencies targeting and accusing Hispanics particularly those who are brown colored people, indigenous features, and that supposedly look like “dangerous people” The law enforcement takes so much time to accuse my people and worry our families than taking their time finding those who need help or are in danger. Worry about the bigger problems going on in this country, in this world. Why do my parents get lower benefits and get treated badly? Our parents came here to fulfill their accomplishments and live the American dream, but the thing is there is no American dream because they are just greeted with hate and racism. 

Us children of Immigrants have to live in fear of our parents getting taken away from us just beacuse you wanted a president that promised “lower prices” yet we are seeing people getting separated and seeing egg prices rising. This isn’t a free country anymore. To those who tell us to go back to our country, that is something we really want to do but can’t. We have dreams to fulfill. 

Works Cited

Findling, Mary G., et al. “Discrimination in the United States: Experiences of Latinos.” Health Services Research, vol. 54, no. S2, 30 Oct. 2019, pp. 1409–1418, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6864375/, https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6773.13216.

Lopez, Luis Noe-Bustamante, Ana Gonzalez-Barrera, Khadijah Edwards, Lauren Mora and Mark Hugo. “1. Half of U.S Latinos Experienced Some Form of Discrimination during the First Year of the Pandemic.” Pew Research Center, 4 Nov. 2021, http://www.pewresearch.org/race-and-ethnicity/2021/11/04/half-of-u-s-latinos-experienced-some-form-of-discrimination-during-the-first-year-of-the-pandemic/.