ŒWings¹ rides on ethnic stereotypes

Published: Thursday, December 5, 1996

Thursday, December 5, 1996

DISCRIMINATION:

portrayal of Hispanics fuels racial ignoranceBy Migdia Chinea-Varela

This is in reference to an episode of "Wings," which aired on NBC Nov. 14, 1996.

In this "Wings" segment, Sandpiper, (the charter plane around which the series revolves) acquires a new owner, who in turn appoints his spoiled son, Cord, as the boss. It is all pretty funny up until the punch line, which is that Cord, who has been kicked out of just about every university on the planet from Harvard to UCLA (the list goes down the line to mention numerous second-rate colleges, etc ... ) finally graduated from a "university-slash-brothel outside Guadalajara."

Unfortunately, here the joke falls flat. The vision of Mexico and Hispanics that seems to emerge from that line is racist, offensive and untrue.

The path is altogether very different. If "Wings" producers had done their homework, they would have learned (according to the Encyclopedia Britannica), that La Universidad Nacional de Mexico Autonoma was founded in 1561; that is, in fact 85 years before Harvard University was founded, in 1636. And that the state of Guadalajara also has its own university founded in 1792, making it more than 120 years older then our own UCLA.

It is, therefore, clear that the people who write and produce "Wings" are projecting a kind of insensitive border-town experience to the entire Hispanic culture. And it illustrates, once again, the prevailing lack of Hispanic writers, actors, producers and network executives.

I am a professional writer. I know the problems all too well. According to the 1993 Hollywood Writers' Report commissioned by the Writers Guild of America, west, Latinos comprise 1 percent of the WGA west membership. And our employment ratio is even smaller.

There is no doubt that shows such as "Wings" are a reflection of an existing trend in television with regards to its depiction of Hispanics and other racial and ethnic minorities. And it is not a healthy picture. The image of Hispanic culture that emerges in these types of shows is precisely the reason why the Writers Guild of America, west, in collusion with the networks, feels that it is all right to create cut-rate training programs for its professional Hispanic members as a means of "increasing" diversity.

I am referring to a 1993 "access" program at CBS created by the Writers Guild, under which professional Hispanic writers were required to call themselves "trainees" and work for half of our contractual union minimum just to get a job. Programs such as these serve not only to create an immoral two-tier wage system based on ethnicity, which not only exacerbates the underlying problem of racism, but may in fact be at the very root of racism.

One might think that these "access" programs are designed on the notion that we Latinos are somehow inferior. But then, one is reminded that according to NBC's "Wings," even our universities ("slash-brothels") are inferior.

So for me, there is no way around it. The NBC "Wings" episode represents another example of one ignorant racist stereotype feeding right into yet another ignorant racist stereotype and hurting all professional Hispanics in terms of employment and access to employment. And there appears to be no end in sight.

There are, therefore, some things that we must all begin to understand:

That ultimately, the view of Latinos, as a culture, is degraded by these practices, not only in our own eyes, but also in the eyes of our children and the eyes of the viewing public.

That in light of certain racist remarks made by top executives at Texaco, which have been used to epitomize the kind of rampant racism that exists in corporate America, so too, these remarks in "Wings" serve to drive the point home about the manner in which Hispanics are viewed in the television industry and the need for change in the way we do business.

That there is simply no justification for the racist remark about Mexican universities made on "Wings."

And that all the networks, in this instance NBC, are playing to this racism until they extend equal employment opportunities to all professional Hispanic writers, actors, producers and network executives.

According to ... "Wings," even our universities ... are inferior.

Migdia Chinea-Varela is a third-year political science student.