On January 20th, a five-year-old Ecuadorian boy and his father were approached by masked men representing the federal government. The boy watched his father be detained by these men and was then brought to his front door to be used as bait. The boy was also detained.
On that same day, a five-year-old Mexican boy got a call from his big sister. The two talked about their respective school days and about how much they missed each other. His big sister hadn’t heard the news yet about the little boy in Minnesota. At that moment, all the little boy in Texas knew was that she wasn’t as excited about his clear Pokémon backpack as he was.
When the news broke about Liam Conejo Ramos, I don’t remember being outraged or driven to action. I shared information, of course, and kept up with any updates I could, but the only things I felt seeing Liam’s face was grief and fear. My baby brother turned six on January 22nd, two days after Liam’s detention. Growing up visibly Latine in America is difficult, even without masked law enforcement questioning your citizenship, and I want nothing more than to protect my baby brother from the same fate I had; Constantly defending himself, his family, and his community’s right to simply exist. I saw Liam’s Spider-Man backpack and rabbit hat and realized, for the first time, that I can never protect my brother and children like him the way I’d like to.
What I can do, however, is offer comfort and advice.
To Liam and to Tony, as you grow and explore the world, you will realize two things: there is beauty, and there is danger. There is beauty in the Spanish language, how it rolls off our mothers’ tongues, and in the food we make, which you already know. There is also beauty in the color of your skin and the bridge of your nose–something I didn’t learn until much later in life. There is beauty in your culture as Latinos and as Americans, because no matter what anyone says, you are American.
There is danger, obviously, in the masked men, but there is also danger in plain sight. There is danger in relenting when your name is mispronounced, danger in Americanizing your food and words, danger in forgetting where you come from. It is so easy, especially in Texas, especially in Minnesota, to forget why you are here. To forget that somewhere along the line, someone loved you so much that they crossed borders to protect you.
My brother and I are sixteen years apart. I remember growing up and wondering why I wasn’t considered “just” American. I was born in Texas, had never left the country, and came from a military family. Yet, I was always labeled with the caveat of Mexican-American. It didn’t bother me, per se, but it did puzzle me. How was I only part-American? What differentiated me from my white peers? Safe to say, I learned very quickly how it felt to be othered. The first time it sank in was in middle school, a few months after the 2016 election, when my “just American” classmates called me names I had only heard in movies.
My baby brother, however, is proudly Mexican and American. I think I was, too, at some point. His six years have not yet taught him the names and cruel words that twenty-one have taught me–but he’s catching on. Children are smarter than we think, and they notice when things are different about them.
I cannot say whether or not Liam is proudly Ecuadorian. Whether or not he understands that the circumstances of his birth are the reason people treat him so differently, that’s why the masked men came. My heart breaks for when that realization happens, because it will. All Latine children learn, eventually, that we will only ever be “part” American.
What Latine adults learn is that the other part of our American is not some caveat, it is not a “despite” signal, it is the other half of our life and history. We learn that there is not one, singular way to be an American, and we learn to integrate all parts of ourselves into our lives. Liam is five, and my brother is six; they have so much more learning to do. So many steps to take before they can understand what it is to be whole in two parts. As a big sister, as a Mexican-American adult, I want to shield them from the whiplash of racism, fetishization, cultural appropriation and appreciation, and the cycle of self-hate into self-love. But I can’t.
In ten years’ time, they will be fifteen and sixteen years old. The same age I was when I began to view myself as Mexican and American. The same age I was when I became a big sister again. Hopefully, in ten years’ time, the masked men will be a nightmare of their childhood–a problem they never have to deal with at twenty-one.