Read the summaries of Joseph, Kyrsten, and Maggie and the corresponding articles. 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/18/mexico-woman-murder-student-ride-hailing-service-cabify

https://www.vogue.com/article/emmy-awards-latino-representation

The articles that Kyrsten and Joseph chose both discuss violence in Mexico: femicide and murder. Mexico appears to be a violent country.

• How does the portrayal of Mexico and other Latin American countries in the media shape your views of these countries and its people?
• Is there any apparent bias in the articles that lead you to believe that Mexico is more violent than it seems?

According to the the article Maggie chose and from what you have seen in everyday life, Latinos are not as represented in Hollywood and in other occupations.

• How do you think we can improve the representation of Latinos in the workforce?
• What will the effects be on Latin American identity in the United States if the representation of this part of the world is improved?

https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2017/09/19/world/americas/19reuters-un-assembly-brazil.html

In this article the Brazilian President Michel Temer talks about the rise of nationalism in many countries around the world. Also about how protectionism is not the solution to many of today’s problems. Protectionism is the practice of restricting or limiting trade between certain countries through tariffs or other methods.

President Temer states that limiting trade will only hurt other countries such as Brazil which is coming out of a major recession. Also that the planet is in desperate need of our help with the rise of global warming and the only way to help the planet is by working together. This goal wont be accomplished if all we are doing is imposing tariffs on one another. Corporations have been responsible for the destruction of our ecosystem and only the leaders of our world have the power to stop them. Working together should be are main goal to make the world a better place for everyone.

Working together can be seen with Venezuela and how countries are supporting its transition to a democratic state. By supporting each other we can help others achieve the happiness they deserve.

Freddy Bernal, Venezuela’s minister for urban agriculture, visiting a rabbit farm.

Strange, Hannah. ‘They put bows on them’: Venezuelan plan to encourage rabbit-eating amid food shortages goes awry as people adopt them as pets. Telegraph. 14 Sept 2017

Within this Telegraph article by Hannah Strange, she talks about the Venezuelan food crisis and how they plan to deal with it by encouraging the people to breed rabbits for meat. The Venezuelan president called this attempt to help his people from the crisis, Plan Rabbit, and Strange writes that he thought that this would be a great idea to implement a new alternative food source to the people that is less expensive than other mainstream meats like beef and chicken that has become extremely expensive. It started out as a trial held by Venezuela’s minister for urban agriculture, Freddy Bernal. He have 15 communities baby rabbits to grow and breed and then collected the rabbits again to count them. What came back to him was very surprising to him because many rabbits came back with names and bows on their heads and were treated as pets instead of potential food.

After seeing that the rabbits were being treated as pets, Bernal decided to try to adjust the way that people viewed the rabbits, from pets to food. He also insisted on switching to goats to take the place of cows within the crisis. This food crisis is causing an economic collapse within the country and has caused record levels of malnutrition in children states Strange. She also states that the average Venezuelan has dropped 19 pounds due to the food and economic crisis. As a result of this, many people are leaving Venezuela in search of a new life and the president of Venezuela blames this crisis on the opposition that is against the government while analysts blame it on the inflammation of the currency within Venezuela as it is now inflated up to 700%, and the drop in imports that the country basically live off of.

This article shows that the people in Venezuela, although in a economic and food crisis’, seem to be unaffected mentally throughout this time of crisis as they don’t really take the opportunity to provide food for themselves but instead keep their sanity through making a pet out of what should have been a stable’ish food supply given to them by the government. The article has some pictures that show how the officials are reacting to how the people are treating these animals as pets but they seem to be humored by the citizens reaction to the rabbits instead of mad or some other justifiable emotion that would come from a plan not working the way that it was planned to.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/09/14/put-bows-venezuelan-plan-encourage-rabbit-eating-amid-food-shortages/

Garcia, Patricia. We Need to Talk About the Emmys’ Latinx Problem. Vogue. 18 Sept 2017.

In this Vogue magazine article, the writer Patricia Garcia mentions that there were no Latinx winners or even nominees at the Emmys on Sunday. Garcia points out that Hollywood is very proud of themselves for this being the most diverse Emmys ever, but how can this be true if there aren’t even Latinx nominees? A Latina has not won an Emmy in a decade and a Latino has not won an Emmy since the 90s. Garcia points out that part of the problem for there not being any Latinx nominees is because Latinxs are cast in the same roles repeatedly. Latinos are typically casted in shows about the drug trade, while Latinas are “house maids or feisty maneaters,” (Garcia Vogue). Garcia also mentions that Latinx participation in Hollywood is lower than it was 70 years ago.

This article points out that there aren’t many Latinx actors in Hollywood. One of the most well-known Latina actress in today’s age is Sofia Vergara and she is a trophy wife whose beauty is often mentioned in the TV show. Another issue the Vogue article argues is that not only are there few Latinx actors, but also few Latinxs in Hollywood period. This includes directors, screenwriters, and other behind the scenes people. Garcia also mentions that the Latinx population is the largest growing minority in the U.S., but they are unrepresented.

This article connects to the class’ them of identity. With there being so few Latinxs in Hollywood it can make it hard for children to feel that they can be in Hollywood. When a child only sees Caucasian actors and actresses, it might make them feel ugly and wish they could have blonde hair and blue eyes. These children could experience low self-esteem later in life and feel as if they are not valued in the States because Hollywood does not mention them. Hollywood and the media are important because it is what is seen all day and it seen as the epitome of beauty. Hollywood and the media is constantly shoved down throats, so how is it supposed to make children feel when they do not see someone who looks like them on magazine covers and in their favorite movies or TV shows? Latinxs will never feel accepted as part of America if they do not see themselves a part of American culture.

https://www.vogue.com/article/emmy-awards-latino-representation

65 Percent of Mexicans View U.S. Negatively, Survey Finds

In this New York Times article, it mainly talks about the general Mexicans’ opinion towards U.S right now. According to Pew Research Center, which has done a survey among 37 countries, Mexico shows the biggest drop in positive views towards the U.S.  People’s negative opinions of the U.S strikes up to 65 percent this year from 30 percent last year. As the research center puts it, the increase in the unfavorable view towards the U.S mostly relates to the President’s Trump’s policies and his signature campaign promise. For instance, up to 94 percent of the Mexican people oppose his plan of building the Great Wall across the Mexican and U.S border and only 5 percent of the Mexicans support the president and believe he is doing the right thing. Despite the unfavorable view towards Trump, most of the Mexicans still want to immigrate to the U.S.

This article is interesting and indicative, not only because it tells us a lot of people unfavorable attitude towards the President Trump, but also indicates us that, despite the not-so-optimistic political situation between two countries, people still want to settle down in the U.S. This survey of the recent repeal of DACA. a lot of undocumented immigrants are facing the problems of deportation. I think this is detrimental to the people who were brought here since they are children and they have lived in the place 20 years. It’s not their fault of coming here and become an undocumented immigrant. If those people are to be deported to the country where they have no emotional or mental connection with, they would feel a sense of loss of national identity. They are strangers to their homeland! They have already been rooted with the ideology of being American and the emotional tie they formed with the country is hard to cut through. To put it another way, Deporting them would be like to the send the children away from their adopted parents, who they spend 20 years with to the biological parents, who they left 20 years ago.

Deporting those “Dreamers”, indeed, would help the President Trump keep his campaign promise, but the benefit only rests on that. I could not see any more advantages of implementing this policy, so do the Mexicans.