Former President Donald Trump is an example of why people with power should not be allowed to make certain remarks in wide-audience platforms.
Well at least without fact checking the information that is published.
Trump has made comments against the immigrant communities by comparing them to rapists and criminals. Comments as these cause harmful consequences to immigrant communities because it creates false norms and stereotypes. Trump compared immigrants from Mexico to rapists and criminals with connections to the cartel and drugs, which is evidently not true.
My parents were immigrants to this country, yet have no connections to the cartel. My mother and father have never committed a crime for them to be labeled as someone who degrades the integrity of this country.. When I first heard these comments, I was offended that someone who potentially was going to be my president, was putting down immigrants.
I don’t know if I was naïve, but I never experienced racism growing up as much as I do as an adult. The major concern is that Trump fed into conservatives with racist mindsets and erroneous stereotyping, and gave them fuel to continue their behavior.
Latinos already are portrayed in the media as thugs or criminals on popular programming. There is already a misconception that Latinos are associated with criminal activities. By Trump making misinformed comments, he providing other’s to believe the misconception in media.
According to an article by Variety, “7% of films from 2019 featured a lead/co-lead Hispanic/Latino actor.” There is already a lack of Latino visibility for audience to question what Trump stated, which allows them to believe whatever this man says as true.
Another example is when trump labeled children of immigrants as anchor babies. The derogatory term is used to label U.S. first generation natural born citizens from immigrants that come into the United States.
The term anchor baby refers to the ability of natural born citizens to eventually be able to convert their family members to U.S. citizens.
One can I assume that these comments are not factual or exaggerated to the normal educate audience. But for someone who is not experienced with different cultures or experienced immigrants living in their neighborhoods are forming their conception of immigrants through media.
Additionally, Trump lied in his last interview with Univision, stating that Mexican people love him, including the president from Mexico. That statement, which Trump lied about, was not fact-checked by Univision and allowed the airing of the interview.
The positive outcome of that event is that audiences held Univision liable for not checking Trump.
Trump is held at a higher pedestal because he was president of the United States. Many people take into consideration the comments he has made against the immgrant community and believe him.
Just as audiences from Univision held the network liable, we as the audience should hold any network responsible in publishing information that’s not fact-checked especially when it’s involving a political candidate. By holding people with media platform accountable, we can reduce the spread of misinformation in the public.
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