Are Argentines racist?

[sergio]

An African friend has told me he is very upset at the racist songs Argentine footballers sang after the Copa win. Is racism widespread in Argentina?

 

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

Yes

 

[LuckyLuke]

I personally think every country is racist, they just don't like to admit it. Americans have hated any foreign country that was involved in a previous war (korean, vietnamese, german, russian, british, middle eastern, mexican, japanese etc.). Japanese hate Chinese and vice versa. Indian and Japanese even hate their own based on skin crayola box colors. Belgians hate the Flemish and vice versa. English and Irish have a history of murdering each other. I mean is there any clean shirt in this world? Does anyone really think racism doesn't exist?

In my personal observations, one thing that has struck me about my travels through Argentina outside of BA is just how amazingly homogenous it is. I don't ever hear a foreign language in the street and I very rarely see someone from outside South America.

They seem to hate any Chinese, because they "refuse" to integrate.
They hate Bolivians, Peruvians, Columbians and Venezuelans because they "took our jerrbs"
They hate English because Falklands
Many even hate Americans because Capitalism = Evil, IMF = devil
They hate Chile because territory disputes & helping the English during the Falklands
I could go on...but you probably get the point...

 

[Quilombo]

Are Argentines racist. Is racism widespread in Argentina?

Yes and yes, but it's different than racism in the US/Canada/Australia/NZ/Europe.

We don't have the Klan here, but there's a lot of racism none the less, even if it's less violent.

For example, there's a sort of passive racism like when people assume my husband is the help, or that he's
an immigrant because he's mestizo. There's even been a couple times where people have assumed I'm
Argentine and he's not all because I'm white and he isn't.

There's more active but not explicit racism like profiling him if we're shopping, assuming he can't pay for things saying
"Oh, it's expensive" or security guards telling him to check a bag but not me. You notice these things when it happens to
your spouse, and it doesn't to you, in the same store, by the same people, with only difference us being what color we are.

Finally there's the active racism, asking him where he's really from, as if his paternal family aren't the native Argentines,
having walked here from Asia when indigenous peoples first settled the Americas tens of thousands of years before Columbus.
There's also the racism of Argentines blaming people that look like him for everything from drugs, crime, poor school testing
scores, etc. as if white Argentines don't do these things.

Now, this has been his/our experience as a mestizo guy, it's much worse for Black people, whether Brazilian, Senegalese, Haitian,
Dominican, or African Americans visiting on vacation. Yes, it's less open hostility than in the US or EU, but the biggest difference is
that people here unlike in the US/EU are unashamed of their racism/don't think it's racist to do things like stare, ask or touch people/their
hair, make direct comments about people's race, play 20 questions naming every country in Africa to guess where people are from, etc.

Racism is a problem in Argentina, and seeing how upset Argentines online have gotten about the accusations of it, instead of the fact
people think it's acceptable to say "Bolivianos y Paraguayos de mie..." in public show just how out of touch people are with reality.

In the early 2010s I came to Argentina for the first time and saw Blancaflor in Dia and literally said "What the fuck?" and my friends didn't
understand why I was shocked. Molinos didn't redesign the packaging until like 2-3 years ago, and people got really angy so, take that as an example of how some people here see racism as a none issue.

 

[QuilmesSlo]

would you prefer to know what people think or would you like them to hide it from you?

Argentine views on race are pretty similar to Americans imo, but the filter is less.

 

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

Yes and yes, but it's different than racism in the US/Canada/Australia/NZ/Europe.

We don't have the Klan here, but there's a lot of racism none the less, even if it's less violent.

For example, there's a sort of passive racism like when people assume my husband is the help, or that he's
an immigrant because he's mestizo. There's even been a couple times where people have assumed I'm
Argentine and he's not all because I'm white and he isn't.

There's more active but not explicit racism like profiling him if we're shopping, assuming he can't pay for things saying
"Oh, it's expensive" or security guards telling him to check a bag but not me. You notice these things when it happens to
your spouse, and it doesn't to you, in the same store, by the same people, with only difference us being what color we are.

Finally there's the active racism, asking him where he's really from, as if his paternal family aren't the native Argentines,
having walked here from Asia when indigenous peoples first settled the Americas tens of thousands of years before Columbus.
There's also the racism of Argentines blaming people that look like him for everything from drugs, crime, poor school testing
scores, etc. as if white Argentines don't do these things.

Now, this has been his/our experience as a mestizo guy, it's much worse for Black people, whether Brazilian, Senegalese, Haitian,
Dominican, or African Americans visiting on vacation. Yes, it's less open hostility than in the US or EU, but the biggest difference is
that people here unlike in the US/EU are unashamed of their racism/don't think it's racist to do things like stare, ask or touch people/their
hair, make direct comments about people's race, play 20 questions naming every country in Africa to guess where people are from, etc.

Racism is a problem in Argentina, and seeing how upset Argentines online have gotten about the accusations of it, instead of the fact
people think it's acceptable to say "Bolivianos y Paraguayos de mie..." in public show just how out of touch people are with reality.

In the early 2010s I came to Argentina for the first time and saw Blancaflor in Dia and literally said "What the fuck?" and my friends didn't
understand why I was shocked. Molinos didn't redesign the packaging until like 2-3 years ago, and people got really angy so, take that as an example of how some people here see racism as a none issue.

Yes a lot of it you wouldn’t notice unless your better half happens to not be blond with blue eyes.

Villaruel’s tweet yesterday is extremely out of touch bordering on the delusional.
“We’re not racists because we’re not colonists”
I suppose the conquest of the desert was just kicking negros/Indios de mierda off their land.

 

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

would you prefer to know what people think or would you like them to hide it from you?

Argentine views on race are pretty similar to Americans imo, but the filter is less.

That’s because the majority of Americans are also racists. Must have something to do with living on land you’ve colonised, see above post.

 

[QuilmesSlo]

That’s because the majority of Americans are also racists. Must have something to do with living on land you’ve colonised, see above post.

I think white Americans have a problem with black Americans and are pretty accepting of others fwiw. JD Vance is married to an Indian; Vivek and Nikki Hailey did well in the primary of the so called racist party.

 

[QuilmesSlo]

Argentina elected the Arab, Menem.

 

[Lanick]

Before calling Argentines are racist; tell me where else a Syrian guy could get elected as President including in Syria? They may hate other countries because of political reasons but they don’t because of their race! Argentines are not racist at all!