LatinaLista — The new SiTV show titled Latino101: The Class You Never Took due to premier on January 8, 2010 on the English-language Latino cable channel has a lot of potential — too bad only Latinos are going to be watching it.
The network describes the show as:
Our hilarious group of comics, celebrities, and experts deliver lessons on Latin pop culture, family, religion, and more. This is one class you’ll never cut.
Seeing just a few minutes of the trailers, it’s evident there’s some substance in these shows that lean hard for laughs. For example, some of the questions explored such as: “Why Quinceañeras cost more than college” or “The only point of agreement between Cubans and exiled Cubans is the guayabera”, illustrate that there are serious topics within the Latino community that need to be brought out into the public dialogue.
While this show undoubtedly wants to entertain, a.k.a. make a joke of everything, it would be awesome if the show could balance the treatment of the topics with both humor and seriousness. Then pitch this show for syndication on the regular networks.
If networks aren’t interested, release it to online sites for rebroadcast.
In this coming year where everyone is anticipating a lot of Latino-bashing once the immigration reform bill starts getting seriously addressed in Congress, a show like this, that explains and dispels the stereotypical myths, is more important than ever.
Needless to say, it will take Latinos having a sense of humor and seeing the humor in the misperceptions that will be regurgitated by opponents of immigration reform to keep a collective cool during what will prove to be a bruising time in history.
