Though many Latinos remain conservative, many more are drifting away from the traditions, and sometimes values, of their parents to come into their own and live life in their own terms. We’re now Muslim, agnostic, and as noted in last week’s article about faith, atheist, and that’s just in regards to religion and faith. We’re also bucking tradition and choosing to marry later or not at all. We’re also embracing our sexuality as a natural part of who we are by not saving ourselves for marriage and being open about being gay and/or lesbian.
But this new found freedom doesn’t come without cost or hardship. The decision to embrace any or all of these parts of ourselves is not an easy one to share with our loved ones. We fear we may be ostracized and lose what is still central in our lives, the family. In homes where culture, tradition, family, and faith are valued over individuality it can be difficult to do that drifting away to explore a different life.
Image from MyCuentame.org video "An Honest Conversation"
Such was the case for Samantha, now 33, and Guillermo Moreno, now 29, siblings who came out as gay 11 years ago. An experience and its difficulty, which they describe in a new documentary video produced by the civil rights advocacy group Cuéntame.
In an interview with The Huffington Post, Cuéntame’s founding director, Axel Caballero said:
“The video is part of a larger series called ‘An Honest Conversation,’ and tells stories that come from the voices heard in the community,” said Caballero. “It is a sober, honest, direct approach about LGBT Latino youth and their friends, families, and the community at large. We cover stories from bullying to abuse and from struggle to triumph. Our work aims to break taboos within the Latino community.”
Read more at The Huffington Post.
About Libby Juliá-Vázquez
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4268504/la_mission_movie_trailer/
This film dealt with this topic within the Latino community. Very powerful film.
thanks
Ok but why keep at it. Ok u gay congratulations. Whats the big deal!!!
Another person blocked for being rude about this article. If you can’t understand how hard is to be Latino and gay then you will never understand at all and stay closed minded.
Angel, I’ve been watching La Mission on Showtime this month and the movie is really good. Benjamin Bratt, was really good as the homophobic father. Something people should see that was underrated as a film.
Some members of our community remain bigoted and inspired by their “faith” to hate gays and it’s sickening and regressive. We should embrace everyone regardless of such personal characteristics.
Wait I thought this was Being Latino?? A part of being Latino and the biggest part about being gay and Latino is dealing with the members of our community that is more traditional and against acceptance of the gay lesbian community
Melissa, it’s a big deal because this is still a taboo subject within the Latino community. I have a friend that recently came out and her parents cut all ties with her and havent spoken to her in over a year. It’s sick that someone be shunned by their own family just for being who they are. This topic needs to be covered more often until people realize that we’re all human, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation.
Some people just have there information wrong just because ae have our faith doesn’t mean were close minded we try go protect moral issues. if your open minded then you dont have a problem with grown men having sex with young children right.? Were we the people of faith says its wrong and sin is sin no matter if your gay or a drug addict our goal is to try to save ppl from harming themselves or others. We DON’T hate thats a word you ppl use if we hated then why are we the ones going into dangerous area were we killed all for the name of love..during gay pride were the o es out there feeding and giving them water or helping them when they are to drunk. Please dont confuse us ppl of faith with the word hate cause if we hate anything that will be SIN and sin only oh and also were not perfect ppl were just trying to do the best we can with God…
Ditch the ‘God’ habit and the whole homophobia problem goes away. Pretty simple.
Victor, let me get this straight. You’re saying that being open minded can lead to the acceptance of pedophilia? Then you go on to defend the church when most reports of pedophilia come from the church itself. I fail to see the correlation between pedophilia and homosexuality. Pedophilia is sickening and anyone caught in the act should be done away with, including the very leaders standing behind the pulpit trying to tell you whats wrong and right. Homosexuality is the attraction (and relations) with those of the same gender. That’s between consenting adults. Children are not consenting adults, animals are not consenting adults, inanimate objects are not consenting adults. So stop it with the played out “next they’ll legalize ________” defense. It’s played out, and was never a good argument to begin with.
Thank you Nelson for pointing that out. When I read that I said wow comparing gays to pedophilia? Then I was like bye no time to deal with that one.
I hear you. I wasn’t gonna reply, even click away, but I had to come back. It really bugged me.
@Victor. First of all, how naive you sound. Pedophilia exists in all kinds of sexual preference. Gay doesn’t mean sleeping with boys. Older men have had sex with little girls. Older women have had sex with boys. So let’s go straight to the fact. It seems you like to mention God and man of faith a lot. If you really believe in your God, as far I know God is perfect. So logically it is fair to say that gay is either God’s mistake or just God’s children because is He is perfect. And my questions to all of you: What is morals?? What is that mean to you?
Um, the atheist communists in Russia and in China and in Latin America where very big homophobes. In Cuba under atheist Castro gays where sent to UMAP concentration camps. You can read all about it in Before Night Falls by Reinaldo Arenas. If there was no God, and people in society knew this, there would still be homophobia -sadly it’s just part of human nature.
Oh Mario. Sometime I feel sad to see so much arrogance and ignorance. Fact: homophobia didn’t exist among Greek philosophers and their empire. Fact: homophobia didn’t exist among Romans and their empire. Fact: humans are animals and with animal instincts. Fact: we learned from Watson that human learn prejudices and phobias. These are not born.
Oh by the way, stop saying communists are atheists. Communists do not believe in religions. They could believe in higher power but no religion mandates them. They don’t believe in religions because they segregate people. Not that I agree with communist, I just know my facts straight
Wow, ignorance on your part Victor. Fact: most pedophiles are heterosexual, married men. Check the national crime statistics. Fact: pedophilia is an attraction to young age, irrespective of sexual preference. Take it from a clinician. And just so we are clear, abiding by a ludicrous mantra of “hate the sin, love the sinner” does not absolve you from the responsibility you bear with respect to perpetuating homophobia and injustice towards the LGBT community.
I know this article is about “coming out” but the thread went in the direction of religious faith and how it influences people’s feelings on the matter. My Catholic upbringing would dictate I feel a certain way but my personal experiences with gay friends or family would reflect my feelings are very inclusive. The reason I’m posting is b/c I have a sincere question for the atheists: Poof! Snap of a finger….there are no “believers” in the world anymore….do you honestly think this world of ours would be free of the many ills it currently has? Do you think the world would be such a better/different place? Or would we still contend with wars, bigotry, inequality, etc?
@Jose. I think you are implying “survival of the fittest.”. Hmm we are animals after all. We would be fight for territory and such. I think people in here are trying to say, including me, is that people tend to use the word of God and faith to prejudice homosexuality. However by bringing up your knowledge, you should know that we are a superior animal because we have a superior brain. We are superior but we are not the best species. Religious people love to use their faith to may it seen that it is ok to be prejudice. Don’t you think living in the year 2012, by now we should know better. Nowadays it is ignorant to avoid education and not able to distinguish animal instinct and prejudice. Wars have existed for the before years before the existence of mankind. Yet inequality have been created among us.
I wish a religious person could answer this for me: if God is perfect and good and being gay is unnatural and bad, why does God keep making gays in his image?
@Jose Rubio…thank you for your post but I’m not sure if you answered my questions. You more expressed what you feel religious people do. Let me rephrase the question: In the total & absolute absence of religious believers of any kind do you think there will be no war, murder, prejudice/bigotry, social injustice/inequality, sexual crimes, poverty, etc? All those wonderful things we have today and more. My apologies for taking the discussion beyond the context of homosexuality. I’m still curious to know what atheists or nonbelievers think.