Dear White People in My MFA Program,
Over the last semester, I may have said some inflammatory statements that made you uncomfortable. Inflammatory statements about race — I know, I know, who talks about race in a creative writing MFA program? How gauche. I realize that this was not a good or cool thing to do, that your safe writing space was interrupted by an uppity Latino with a big mouth. So let me apologize for all of the statements that I made:
I’m sorry for saying that the one Latin@ character you wrote in workshop was both clichéd and racist. I see now that if you write a maid character, OF COURSE she would need to be Mexican. Have you ever seen a non-Mexican maid? Ha! The concept doesn’t even make sense! And if you have a Mexican maid, she should OBVIOUSLY speak broken English. How else would the reader know that this maid character was Mexican — a trait that impacted the story at every turn and wasn’t just because she was a maid. And you’re right, white people in my MFA program, to tell me that it wasn’t really offensive. You would know, after all. And I should be happy that there was Latin@ representation in fiction in the first place.
You were right to say that because I don’t have an accent I’m not really Latino, just tan. I was simply holding on to family pictures and stories and accented aunts and grandmothers and the way my cheekbones sit and my preference for salty, garlic-y food and my last name and family trees and you know, that sort of stuff. In fact, I am honored, HONORED, that you’d bestow the title of “White” upon me. It’s really what I’ve wanted for my whole life!
Mea culpa! Thank you, THANK YOU, for explaining to me that White Privilege isn’t a thing. I now realize that white people have just as many problems as people of color. Just as many and basically the same kind. We’re all just Jay-Z with our 99 problems (Don’t worry! I won’t finish the line because we are all united in our fight against misogyny — a fight that has absolutely nothing to do with race). I mean, if there was such a thing as white privilege, would we have so many people of color in our program? (We have two. Which is a lot when you think about it. I mean, our program only has, like, 65 people in it.)
Lo siento por calling you “Cracker ass honkey gringo motherfuckers” and suggesting that we stop accepting white people into the program until we have a higher representation of people of color. I was hungry when I said those things. And I took some time and thought about your point that I was being “reverse racist” and decided that you are correct in that, too. Oh, and sorry for calling the phrase reverse racism “stupid whitey bullshit that doesn’t exist.” Again, I was really hungry.
You opened my eyes when you asked how I could call myself Latino when you, a white person, speaks more Spanish than I do. You are actually way more Latin@ than I am! I’ll tell my grandmother you’ll be taking my place at Thanksgiving this year. She’ll be so thrilled to have a fluent Spanish speaker that she’ll forget all about me. Play your cards right and maybe you’ll get invited to the Christmas photos!
Finally, I’m sorry for bringing up race at all. I was just playing the race card. I was being overly sensitive. I am too pale to really be speaking for other Latin@s. Why derail our conversations about bell hooks with talk about being one of the only people of color in the room? I was drunk/hungry/tired/cranky/trying something new/playing devil’s advocate/just messing with you.
Sorry again,
Wyl
