Talk:Mestizo

Mestizos in the Philippines

I deleted the changes made that suggested 20% of Filipinos are mestizos. Not only is this a gigantic overestimation, but it is also historically impossible. There just weren’t enough Spaniards to have created such an immense proportion of past or present Filipinos to be mestizo.

Off all the Spanish colonies, the Philippines had the tiniest number of Spaniards, both in real numbers and as a percentage. And of these Spaniards, only a few fathered offspring in the Philippines, and of those that did father mestizos most were friars or priests.

Large-scale immigration of Spaniards, as happened in Latin America, never occurred in the Philippines. Historical evidence in Spain indicates that Spanish migrants to the Americas almost drained the entire population of Extremadura, a significant portion of Andalusia, as well as good numbers from various other regions including Euskadi and Galicia. This never happened for the Philippines. Most of the few that did go to the Philippines weren’t actually Spaniards, they were mostly Mexicans, who themselves later returned to Mexico.

Add to this the fact that native Filipinos didn’t die in the millions of introduced diseases, as happened to the Native Americans. Amerindians had no immunities for Old World diseases. In some areas 90% of the original populations died withing the first few years of conquest, in other areas the native populations were wiped out entirely and the only remanants left of their genetic legacy is indeed in the mestizos. Such is the case for Uruguay, a European-descended nation whose only "indigenous" population is the 8% mestizo minority, who themselves are of very diluted Indian ancestry and are often indistinguoishable from an unmixed Mediterranean, and where the Uruguayan mestizo's pride in his mestizaje comes not from the acclaim of his European ancestry, but as an effort to reclaim his indigenous descent. The same goes for places like Puerto Rico, where the only remanants they have left of the native Taínos are the few genetic markers in a phenotypically European Puerto Rican population, or in the very few zambos (mixed African and Native American) of the Dominican Republic. Filipinos didn’t experience this holocaust because they are located in Asia, one of the three Old World continents, and as Asians they had a history with these diseases, which meant they also had the immunities to combat them.

The suggestion that the original small population of Filipino mestizos eventually mixed back into the native population, endowing every modern Filipino (or even 20% of Filipinos) with an extremely diluted amount of Spanish blood and ancesrty, is a fanaticized hypothesis.

Spanish mestizos in the Philippines were a very small and privileged minority. Never did they surpass 1% of the population at any given period in history. It is precisely because of their rarity that these halfcast-Spaniards held high positions in society. For this reason they were also extremely endogamous, never again mixing back with natives. They thought of themselves as a separate class and ethnicity. The idea that they melded back into the native majority to make "mestizos" out of every living Filipino would suggest that they went against everything that they were taught. Mixing back with a native would "taint" the mestizo with more Malay blood than he “unfortunately” already had. Why - when the Filipino ideal of beauty and society was to be a mestizo - would mestizos then marry back into the native population? If anything, Filipino mestizo would aspire to marry on of the very few Spaniards and Mexicans so subsequent offspring and descendants could have as little native ancestry as possible. But since this never happened, they became endogamous, marrying only amongst each other. Thus, Filipino mestizos didn’t dilute back into the native majority.

The hypothesis of mestizos marrying back into the native stock could perhaps hold true only for Latin America. Mestizos in Latin America were a growing majority, while unmixed Spaniards were a healthy large minority. So there was nothing special about the mestizos there, they had no special status, they were not a rarity. They held no privalege. More importantly, the idealization of the Latin American wasn’t to be a mestizo as it was in the Philippines. Since most Latin Americans were indeed mestizos, the Latin American ideal was to be a Spaniard. Here, it wasn't uncommon for Latin American mestizos to marry back into native communities; here it could be said that some Amerindians may have Spanish ancestry through an absorbed mestizo ancestor. But not in the case of the Philippines. However, the existance or not of Spanish genes among self-identified "Native Americans" isn't the topic.

To this day in the Philippines, because almost everyone is native (95%), the ideal is to be mestizo, and most Filipinos will falsely claim to be so, even citing the "mestiza great-great-grand-mother" or Spanish "great-great-grand-father", with no evidence other than a Spanish surname [and let's not even start with how Filipinos acquired Spanish surnames]. In Latin America, apart from the relatively large unmixed European population (aprox. 30%), the great majority are mixed-bloods (mestizos and mulattos combined, aprox. 50%) and becasue of this, the ideal is to be unmixed Spanish. So in Latin America's case, many of the mixed-bloods will falsley claim to be pure Spanish. This is called colonial mentality. Al-Andalus 15:55, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The following was added directly to the article by 203.131.65.38 on 10 September 2004, and moved to the talk page by Benc:

I find your article debateble and innaccurate. While Filipinos have less mestizo population in all of the Spanish colonies, I disagree that only about less than 1% or 0.5% are Spanish mestizos. Historically, a MESTIZO is considered as those exclusively of European blood mixed with "indio". The chinaman are called "inchic" or "chinos". The ones mixed with Inchic and Indio is referred to as Chinese mestizo or Sangley/es during the old times. Notice that when a person is considered a Mestizo, it automatically means mixed with European (Spanish), whereas if a person is a CHINESE mestizo, this is to inform that he is mixed with Chinese (and not Spanish as the word "mestizo" originally meant). It is only recently that the word "mestizo" has been used on both. Taking off the Chinese from the mestizo with the intention of hiding the Chinese and make it sound broad to conform more to the standard of Filipino beauty which is (Spanish) mestizo. Nowadays, it has also been applied to Americans mixed with Malay(Indigeneous Filipino), now more referred to as "Tisoy". While those chinese mestizo are called "Chinito/Chinita" and/or "Chinoy"= (ethnic Chinese). "Chinito" does not only refer to Malays mixed with other asian ancestries but all orientals as well including the Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

An American Anthropologist, Otley H. Beyer divided the Filipino's racial makeup into:

40% Malay
30% Indonesian
10% Chinese
5%  Indian (Hindu)
3%  European and American
2%  Arab

Click this link for reference:

http://asnic.utexas.edu/asnic/countries/philippines/philippines.html

The Philippine population is currently close to 90 million people. I don't belive the estimate of the Spanish-mestizo population placed at around 1% to be innacurate. These are statistical figures and data provided by both Filipino census and government sources. In addition to this, the population of Spanish-mestizos in the Philippines never grew above 1%. In 1903 the population of Spanish-mestizos was 15,419, or 0.2% of the entire population. And if the population is said to be just over 1% now, it would mean that the fertility rate of mestizos in Philippines was inconceivably much higher than that of the native majority.

Now, this in itself doesn't make sense, you see, never has the fertility rate of a ruling class of any nation been higher than that of the natives. The educated and ruling class of any society have always shown similar characteristics, one of them being a tendancy of a drop of fertility.

If the native Filipino population is said to have increase by a factor of eleven in the 100 years since the 1903 Filipino census; from 7.6 million native Filipinos in 1903 to around 83 million native Filipinos in 2004, then the mestizo population would have had to increase by a factor of 65 to have been able to go from the the 15,419 (0.2%) of 1903 to the porported c. 1,000,000 (1%) that official figuers state for 2004. Despite this, we shall take it to be truth that in the case of the Philippines the ruling class somehow had a higher fertility rate, and an extraordinarily high one at that!

I bet that now the 1% estimate doesn't really sound like a small number, when one realises the actual numeric size of the Filipino population. The Philippines is almost 90 million strong today.

Also consider that the native population of the Philippines never had a holocaust, due to warfare but more importantly through disease, as happened to the Native Americans accross the American continent. Not only was Latin America's mestizo population growing so rapidly because of the high level of interbreeding between Spanish men and Native American women, but also because the mestizo populations created from these unions themselves were much more prolific amongst themselves, and with higher fertility rates than all other groups, as mestizos in Latin America were not a ruling class. In addition to this high fertility, the ratio of mestizo to amerindians was also swelling due to the extremely high mortality rate of Native Americans from Old World diseases.

If one suggested that more, let's say around 10%, of Filipinos were Spanish-mestizo, that would would imply that around 10 million Filipinos are Enrique-Iglesias-looking eurasians (himself a Spanish-mestizo), and it is obviouse that there exists no such number, anywhere in Pilipinas. Even within major cities where this population of one million Spanish-mestizos mostly reside, when one does bump into them they might appear to be slightly higher in numbers, but this is because they indeed look slightly different to the native majority sourounding them, thus the focus will centre on the rarity of the mestizo, they will stand out and thus make it appear that they could represent 5% of the population. But that's just a perception. This biased concentration on the mestizo is true even among native Filipinos. This is colonial mentality. If one based the ethnic composition of Pilipinas on the ethnicities seen on national TV, one could also summize that the Philippines must be 60% mestizo. But this is true for Latin America as well. If one was to watch their media and entertainment, one could conclude that their populations are around 80% white, when the reality is that it's around 50% mestizo and only 30% unmixed European.

So 1% doesn't sound wrong. If anything, it could only sound like a bit of an overestimation, considereing the number of Spaniards and Mexicans present in the country during the colonial period, and those that were present hardly ever produce offspring except for the clergy. Spaniards when they left Spain, they left with no women, and they saw themselves in need to get some, and they did, when they reached the Americas, but those Spaniards who left for Philippines, didn't leave from Spain, most left from Mexico and these men by then had already acquaried native women from the Americas. And at the end of the colony of Pilipinas, most of these men didn't stay in the Philippines and they didn't return to Spain, they returned to Mexico to their Families, because they hadn't produced families in the Philippines to stay back for, but they did in Mexico to go back to.

Al-Andalus 10:05, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Disagreement with statistics

I disagree with you, you are in no position to speak for all of the Spanish in the Philippines during the time period, saying that they hadn't produced families in the Philippines to stay back for, it sounds a bit racist and biased towards your own agenda. Many Spaniards STAYED in the Philippines after the war, with their families, and I know because that was the case with my family, as with many other families I knew growing up in the Philippines. A prominent example of this is Isabel Preysler's maternal great grandfather, and her paternal grandparents, both full-blooded Spaniards from Spain who chose to stay in the Philippines and make it their home.

This is an encyclopedia, and the object of it is to be objective, not to infuse your own personal opinions on how things might've been, or to inject your own personal theories such as "most of these men didn't stay in the Philippines and they didn't return to Spain, they returned to Mexico to their Families, because they hadn't produced families in the Philippines to stay back for, but they did in Mexico to go back to." Who are you to speak for the Spanish men during the 1800s and 1900s who made Filipinas, Mexico, America Del Sur, or wherever country their home, when you weren't even alive during those times, and have no evidence to back up your statements?

I grew up in a Spanish-speaking Filipino family from Manila, the same as Isabel Preysler and many other families, and my family has been speaking Spanish for generations, so I know what I'm talking about, and I know my country because I've lived it, and I've been studying it my whole life. I'm not exactly sure what nationality you are, Al Andalus, but if you're not Filipino and lived your life as a Filipino, you have no right to make judgements or personal statements about other people's cultures, and as a human being, you have no right to ridicule those Filipinos who aspire to be mestizos saying "my great-grandfather, etc.", and to automatically dismiss that what they're saying is not true, because you don't know them personally, and you DON'T KNOW their family history, or to ridicule those Latin Americans who aspire to be Spanish, because every culture has a history that influences how society perceives things to this day, and how their society determines class structures. It's also just plain overly sarcastic, the way you say your opinion, and it shows a lack of respect for the beauty of the Filipino culture, as well as for the beauty of the Spanish culture in general. Posted by: 68.70.73.121

I don’t mean to ridicule, be rude, sound condescending or sarcastic. It’s just the plain simple facts.

In the Philippines, mestizos (of the Spanish variety) were always small in numbers, never reaching above 1% of the general population at any time (and that height of 1% is relating to contemporary numbers, who themselves are now of extremely diluted Spanish blood). It’s just that miscegenation in the Philippines wasn’t commonplace like in the Americas, it was extremely rare. There just weren’t many Spaniards or Mexicans to begin with.

Of the Spanish mestizos that were indeed sired in Pilipinas, the overwhelming majority were the resultant offspring of unions between Spanish clergymen and native girls. It is for this reason that these mestizos were never a part of nuclear families. A man of the cloak could never acknowledge siring a bastard child, as doing so would basically serve as a full confession and declaration of the breaking of his vow of celibacy. Much less would the man be able to marry the mother of his children to then form a nuclear family. Hence, when I say that the Spaniards and Mexicans didn’t have families to stay back with, I was referring to the fact that most of the few mestizos that were created in the Philippines indeed did originated from these doomed unions of clergymen with native girls. They just couldn’t stay back with them because recognition of such liaisons and families was barbaric to the church.

Meanwhile, of those fewer non-clergy Spaniards who procreated offspring with local girls, most were either already married (having wives either in Spain or native ones they had acquired in Mexico) with the Filipina merely serving as a concubine. In fact, it is documented that some Spaniards even sailed to the Philippines with their earlier coceived mestizo sons they had with Native American women. Ttheir sons accompanied them as co-captains or crewmembers. This alone indicates that most indeed had obligations and responsibilities that they left behind, if some even took their Mexican mestizo sons.

I do agree with you on one point. The fact that most Spaniards and Mexicans men eventually returned doesn’t mean that some didn’t stay. I agree with you here, as it is obvious that some did. This is why only very few families can rightly claim so, and I really mean a very, very, very few. But those who did stay were the rarity of all rarities. Those who stayed were four times a minority.

• 1st. Spaniards and Mexicans were a minority in the Philippines, never accounting for more than 0.5% of all people living in the archipielago;
• 2nd. Race mixing was extremely rare in Las Filipinas. Meaning most Spaniards and Mexicans didn't sire offspring
• 3rd. Of those few that did sire offspring most were clergymen
• 4th. Of those fewer who weren't clergymen most weren't fortunate enough not to have prior obligations back in Mexico or Spain that they would have to return to (whether it be positions in government and society they had left, families, lands or estates, etc).

So the simple fact is, most Spaniards didn't stay back, and the odds that one would stay back for a newly created Filipino family was even smaller. One must understand that Spaniards and Mexican never ventured to the Philippines with the mentality of settlers. They left for the Philippines because New Spain appointed them as officials to la Colonia de las Filipinas.

As a matter of fact, it was seen as a form of ridiculed having to go to Las Filipinas. Most viewed these sailors with contempt and hardly with the praise and reverence given to those sailing from Spain to the Americas. Those going to the Philippines were not only regarded as not being proper men of Spain, not the noble creole men of Mexico, but rather the rejects of Mexico. It was even immortalized in proverb. This alone encouraged them to head back as soon as their duties were fulfiled.

It must be acknowledge that initially the Spaniards that went to Latin America didn’t go with the mind of settling either. However, the difference is that after the first wave of Spaniards came, the one's with no plans to stay (i.e. conquistadors, missionaries and officials), not too much latter did wave, after wave, after wave, of immigrant settlers flood in. In fact, some Latin American governments were the ones that encouraged these waves of immigration so as to "mejorar la raza" (better the race) of so many of the mestizo and mulatto children that had been created by the first wave of Spaniards. Some goverments even offered farm land so Spaniards could come to better the race, and for each offspring the cleared up with more European blood (thus "helping" to whiten Latin America) monetary recompense was paid. So when these settlers eventually established themselves throughout the Americas, the original wandering Spaniards stayed too.

The Philippines never received any type of Spanish immigrant wave other than the first type described above, and of this type of Spaniards and Mexican that did land on Philippine shores, their numbers were small.

It’s an unfortunate truth, I know, but the fact is that of the Spaniard that did have Filipino mestizo children, most did abandon them. And as mentioned already, those who were fathered by clergymen were without a doubt abandoned (for the reasons given of the clergy), and most of the few Spanish mestizos, like it or not, are descended from these particular unions. This history of abandonment repeated itself with American-mestizos when their fathers also abandoned them when the US retreated at the end of the American occupation.

On another note, I would like to address the issue you brought up with the following quote: …you have no right to ridicule those Filipinos who aspire to be mestizos saying "my great-grandfather, etc.", and to automatically dismiss that what they're saying is not true…

Firstly, it’s not a matter of whether I have a “right” to state this. It is just reality. If all historical and current sources and data indicate that Filipinos of an actual mixed Spanish ancestry have never constituted anything above 1%, logic would dictate that if more than 1% of Filipinos claim to be so, whatever the discrepancy between 1% and the percentage of Filipinos declaring their ancestry as part Spanish must therefore also be the frequency of false declarations of Spanish ancestry. Now, the main reason why most Filipinos assume that they descend from a Spanish ancestor is because they posses Hispanic or Hispanic-sounding surnames. However, the way Filipinos acquired Hispanic surnames was very different to the way the people of the Hispanic world were bequeathed theirs. Surnames were imposed on Filipinos during the colonial era to facilitate tax collecting and record keeping.

Of Filipinos, only the 1% which have already been stated as trully being of partial Spanish ancestry actually derive their surname from a Spanish or Mexican ancestor. Why do you take offence to this fact? When your Spanish ancestry is put in doubt, it’s not an attack on you as a person. If the likelihood of Filipinos claiming Spanish ancestry is very high, and those who do actually have that ancestry is very low, then by all means it is not irrational to doubt the majority of the claimants. Unfortunately, for the few that do have Spanish ancestry, which you say you are one of, you will be doubted because of the very high nature of the frequency of false claims.

The only people to blame for creating the prevalent dismissals when Filipinos claim Spanish ancestry, and the assumption that ethnic forgery is being committed, is all those Filipinos that claim they are part Spanish, but aren’t.

In the Australian census for the year 2001, of all people who declared they were Philippine-born or born to one or two Philippine-born parents, 1 in 10 (10:100 or 10%) claimed their ancestry to be Spanish. Yet, if the true numbers of Filipinos who are of Spanish ancestry (mixed at most) is only 1 in every 100 (1:100 or 1%) then that means that Filipinos falsely claiming Spanish ancestry is 10 times greater than the reality. This means that of every 10 Filipino Australians claiming Spanish ancestry, 9 (9:10 or 90%) are claiming it falsely. The rates for Filipino Americans claiming Spanish ancestry is much higher (even higher in Hawai’i), with around 1 in 4 (25:100 or 25%) claiming so. This means that of 25 Filipino Americans claiming Spanish ancestry, 24 (24:25 or 96%) are claiming it falsely.

In fact, going back to the Australian census figures, of all Australians who declared themselves to be Spanish; 9% were born in the Philippines!?!?! Meanwhile 9% were born in Chile, 5% in Uruguay, 4% in El Salvador, 4% in Argentina, 2% in Peru, etc. Apparently there are more Filipino Australians who are ethnically Spanish (or at least they think they are) than there are Hispanic Australians who come from Spanish-populated Argentina, Uruguay and Chile, or Latin America in general for that matter? One need only to fly to the Philippines, get off the plane at Manila International Airport and walk just half a metre to realise that this is most definately not the case.

Furthermore, the Australian census includes a footnote explaining why so many Filipinos described themselves as Spanish, saying that; they often include the nationality associated with a colonial power, hence the significant proportion of Filipinos reporting their ancestry as Spanish. It isn't because they actually are of Spanish ancestry.

Having said all that, one must also concede that many Filipinos who falsely claim Spanish ancestry aren’t doing it out of deceit. Many truly believe that they are Spanish descended, but have absolutely no foundations to base this. Almost none have undergone genealogical research, and of the few who do, it is guaranteed that they are not. They end up discovering that they are merely catholic-professing, Spanish-surnamed native Filipinos. In fact, if you need to do genealogical research to see if you have Spanish blood, the odds are you will defiantly find you do not have a drop. All actual Filipino mestizo families wouldn’t need to undertake such research, because they have always known (I’m not talking about those that have always assumed). These families all have the birth and marriage certificates of their Spanish ancestors, the vessel documents of arrival and departure that they travelled on, photos, knowledge of living extended relatives in Spain (even if they’ve never met them, they know who and where they are). All this is because being of mestizo lineage was so prestigious in the Philippines, real mestizo families never passed on oral accounts. They passed on actual evidence, documents and their wealth.

Also, when you argue that because I wasn’t born or lived during the colonial period, making me incapable of dissertation on the subject with a degree of academic merit, you are grasping very thinly on a reason to discredit facts. It’s not my words or opinions what I have written, documents from the colonial era prove that the amount of Spaniards in the archipelago was extremely limited in numbers, census data, Filipino government statistical sources all attest to this.

Finally, I want to further single out this “aspire to be mestizos saying”. This is the reason why there is such disbelief of those claiming to be part Spanish, because it is merely an aspiration (meaning almost no one is, hence they aspire). It’s not about ridicule. It’s just fact. I feel sorrow, not humour, in light of this reality. Al-Andalus 18:51, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It doesn't matter, the fact is that you DON'T HAVE a right to speak for the Spanish men who lived during the 1800s and the 1900s, because you did not LIVE during those times, and you have no right to speak for those men unless you are actually a Spanish man from the 1600s-1800s, which YOU ARE NOT. Your statements about those men (saying "they didn't have families in this country, but did in this country, etc.") have no basis in FACT, and that is something that I could prove in a SECOND with tons of history books written about the Philippines, in English AND Spanish.

I feel sorry for YOU, because I read your other articles, and you seem to be hell-bent on putting down Filipino culture, with your ridiculous RACIST "IMSCF" topic. I know that there is colonial mentality in the Philippines, but THAT IS THE SAME COLONIAL MENTALITY THAT IS PREVALENT IN MEXICO, CHILE, AND ALL LATIN AMERICAN COUNTRIES, it's from SPAIN. But to make ridiculous statements such as all Filipinos and Latin American mestizos and mulatos aspire to be white Spaniards (which you DID in the COLONIAL MENTALITY topic) is just plain ridiculous and void of any fact. WHO ARE YOU TO SPEAK FOR ALL FILIPINOS, ESPECIALLY IF YOU ARE NOT ONE? WHO ARE YOU, ONE SICK, SAD, TWISTED, DEMENTED, RACIST PERSON, TO SPEAK FOR ENTIRE GROUPS OF PEOPLE, WITH POPULATIONS IN THE MILLIONS?

I can tell you are coming from a RACIST perspective, because you DELETED all of the sections that I added about mestizos being an important part of founding the country after the Spanish-American war, which is the truth. Where is your HATE coming from? You're a SAD, SICK PERSON. And everybody knows that those who hold HATE in their hearts are going to burn in hell, in the after life, and in the hell that that they've created for themselves in the sad, ridiculous life that they're living, that YOU'RE LIVING, with HATRED in your heart.

Nobody has to prove ANYTHING to you about their bloodlines, especially a RACIST person such as yourself. If there's anyone that needs to show proof, it's YOU. Do you even speak and understand Spanish fluently? You probably don't even speak Spanish, and if you do, it's even more evidence why you're A SAD, SICK, TWISTED RACIST IDIOT by putting down your own Latin culture and history, which includes Filipinas, because it's obvious that you have ANGER towards the Latin culture for preferring whites in the media (based on your COLONIAL MENTALITY article), which only comes to one conclusion - that you have obviously shown everyone what an IDIOT you are by giving in to the same COLONIAL MENTALITY that you criticize by trying to denigrate the value of the Philippines' Spanish culture by saying that they don't have enough sufficient white blood, but Latin America's culture is valid because they do have sufficient white blood. What an IDIOT you are, and even more, YOU'RE SO STUPID THAT YOU DON'T EVEN SEE THAT YOU'RE GIVING IN TO THE SAME COLONIAL MENTALITY THAT YOU CRITICIZE FILIPINOS AND LATIN AMERICANS FOR! WHAT A STUPID LOSER IDIOT YOU ARE! It makes me laugh to see how stupid and ridiculous you are.

There is strong colonial mentality in Latin America as well, and an aspiration to have WHITER kids, but like in THE PHILIPPINES, to say that EVERYBODY is like that, which YOU DID, is IN FACT A PERSONAL OPINION and HAS NO BASIS IN FACT. I feel sorry for you, because I can tell that there is a poison in your heart that makes you so hellbent on putting down the Filipino culture that is so beautiful, and the Latin culture that is so beautiful as well. History is history, but YOU AS A PERSON HAVE NO RIGHT TO MAKE STATEMENTS FOR THE SPANISH MEN WHO LIVED DURING THOSE TIMES.

I come from a Spanish-speaking family, and I have done a lot of research about Filipinas in Spanish textbooks, and nowhere does it say that it was a disgrace for Spaniards to come to the Philippines.

You forget that today in Latin America, huge INDIO populations are excluded from modern society, and that many mestizos and mulatos in Mexico, Chile, and all over Spanish America were also illegitimate children, in the Carribean, due to mixed children of former black slaves, the black slave women serving as concubines for white Spanish men, and the mixed mestizo children also of indio women and Spanish clergymen. Yes there is a history of Spain that is not so beautiful, but I feel sorry for you that you have so much hate in your heart that you're so hell-bent on trying to put down the Philippines, and Latin America in your "COLONIAL MENTALITY" topic. That is RACISM, except you just hide it with statements which you claim to be "facts", which in fact are statements based on rhetoric, racist hatred, and personal opinion, saying that you have the RIGHT to speak for all Spanish citizens and culture, especially during the 1800s when you weren't even alive, and are not a Spanish man who lived in the 1800s. Your racist statements putting down Filipinos and the Philippines in this topic, and putting down Filipinos and Latin Americans in the Colonial Mentality topic, and in all the other HATE topics you created such as that IMSCF topic, have no merit, and I feel sorry for unintelligent people such as yourself who have so much hate in their hearts, and at the same time, unintelligent, RACIST people such as yourselves who use internet forums like this for your own RACIST agenda to PUT DOWN OTHER CULTURES, but cover it up by trying to say that it's fact, when many history books written in English and Spanish would point out that what you're saying is INDEED based on pure rhetoric, and RACIST PERSONAL OPINION, unintelligent, RACIST people like you make me laugh. And I feel sorry for you. And like any other intelligent person with dignity and respect for other cultures, I'm not even gonna waste my time reading your posts based on a RACIST PERSPECTIVE from your own, internal HATRED towards a single group of people, or your replies that claim to be based on fact, but in reality, have their true basis in racist rhetoric statements. I feel sorry for people like you, and you make me laugh. There is so much hatred and racism in the world, and with your racist posts, you're one of those people that's contributing to it, and that's sad. You are a sad, sick person, and I feel sorry for you, and you make all of us laugh with your ridiculous statements based on racist opinions. I'll be looking down at you from heaven, and I'll see you burning in hell because of your hatred, and it's funny, because I can see that you're burning in hell at this very moment, the hell that you've created for yourself with your RACIST HATRED. I feel sorry for you. And at the same time, racist, bigoted idiots, who keep proving to the whole world how racist and unintelligent they are with statements such as those that you've made, racist, bigoted idiots like you make me laugh. RACIST IDIOTS like YOU, al-andalus, make us all laugh. --68.70.73.121 00:18, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"...I could prove in a SECOND with tons of history books written about the Philippines, in English AND Spanish."

Talk is cheap! The fact is, you you haven't proven anything other than your frustrations.

Every single word in your reply was an attack on my person, and nothing else. I can't even count how many times I was referred to as a devil and how I’m going to hell, and how there is hatred in my heart. And then you accuse me of talking in rhetoric? Please! That's what you've just done. Your entire reply was pure rhetoric!!! Just read it. You argue against all points going against your views, you have the audacity to dismiss (just ignored really) all sources of evidence, when you haven't even given a single one. Where in your reply did you give any evidence to your claims??? Once again, it was all merely your opinions. Put up or shut up.

You didn't give one single piece of evidence in favour of your argument. I, on the other hand, have done nothing but give source after source backing up my statements. And you then accuse me of elevating my opinions? It is you trying to convert your opinions into works of academic worth. You accuse me of having an agenda? Everyone has an agenda. Mine is to present facts, and to back them up with sources other than my own opinions and assumptions, like you are doing.

The reason why you spent all of your reply deedicated to telling me how putrid I am as a human being was because you had nothing else to argue. And even your attack on me is merely another opinion. Use facts! If you say I'm a racist, back it up with evidence! If you say I'm a devil, back it up! If you say I'm going to hell, back it up! If you say there is only hatred in my heart, back it up! But you can't. It is you who is narrowminded. Just because I state facts that contradict your opinions, you automatically responce to discredit me is to degrade my character. If I am racist, and have such hatred; name me one place where I have said Filipinos are infirior? Nowhere! Because I don't believe such a thing. Filipinos are a hard-working and honest people. Of strength, resiliance and intellect. They have a beautiful country, and a culture that is rich in history, and they have a history that posseses a wealthy of human experience. I have only admiration for the Philippines and Filipinos.

My dear USER 68.70.73.121, nowhere have I expressed my opinions. I can assure you of this. I will be honest, because I believe that is the best way to go. If I were trying to express my opinions, I would be stating that less than 0.25% of Filipinos are of partial Spanish ancestry, because that I what I honestly beileve. But I haven't stated that, have I? Why haven't I propagated my opinion? Because, it is just that, an opinion of mine, which I can't prove. I will only back up thing for which I have the data, evidence and sources to back them up with. I fight for a lot of things, even if i don't agree with them, but only if they are the truth. Figures and statistics given by the Philippine government and by all existing historical evidence indicates that 1% of Filipinos are of partial Spanish ancestry. So I am unable to say that the number is smaller unless I have the sourced evidence I would need to back up my opinion that only 0.25% are of partial Spanish origin.

Also notice that in the entirety of my reply, not once did I attack your person. I honesty thought this was going to be a civil debate where facts and figures would be used as our weapons. Instead, the only weapons you can muster are insults, defamation, and like the little girl that cried fox, you’re the one who cries racism when you can’t support your claims. I honestly thought that you were up for a legitimate debate on the topic and were prepared with all the data you said you had. You failed to do this. Why can't you post your evidence, your sources, if you so say you could do it in a second? You don’t, because you simply can't! Such evidence does not exist. And if it does, produce it, and hey, maybe I could learn something.

And anything that remotely sounds like facts that you may have said, I haven’t denied. "many mestizos and mulatos in Mexico, Chile, and all over Spanish America were also illegitimate children". When have I denied this? What you may have miss understood is that I said mestizos were created in greater numbers, by more people and a large percentage of them, and the practice was prevalent. In the Philippines, the numbers they were created was dismal, I wasn’t prevalent, there were hardly any Spaniards, and those Spaniards who did were mostly clergy. In Latin America, there was an abundance of Spaniards, the clergy represented a small fraction of them, but it doesn't matter, because in Latin America, unlike in the Philippines, the non-clerical Spaniards were the ones fathering the illigitamate, all of them. Bastards being born here, there, everywhere. They didn't do this in the Philippines. Only a few did, and most were priests, and there weren't many Spaniards and Mexicans to begin with.

With your pigheadedness all you are doing is furthering the belief already endemic of Filipinos, that they are intent on being known as anything other that Filipino. Tell me, which of your great-great-great-grandmothers was the mestiza? Lol. I’m sorry, I had to add that. You see, with all this nonsense of yours, all it has me is now questioning if you actually have any Spanish in you at all, or if you're just one of the 24 of the 25 out of 100 who only claim Spanish ancestry, but aren't of it.

For a person who says he knows a lot about the history of the Philippines and it’s people, you sure have included very little, nothing at all really, of it in your argument. Is "wealth of knowledge" that you've used to back up your argument also the "wealth on knowledge" you have regarding your supposed Spanish ancestry? Al-Andalus 18:40, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

You only writes articles about races for disqualify to the hispanics. Nick that you have chosen leaves it well clear. You are RACIST and anti-hispanic.

Your articles about colonial mentality are falses. The preference for the blond hair is general in the world. It's not a defect of the horrible nature of the Hispanics, as you say in yor articles.

In addition, you writes about your prejudices. You should use genetic or scientific studies. By example, the genetics studies demonstrated that there are more puertoricans that descends from indians than blacks, but you writed the opposite sentence.

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EXCUSE ME, BUT ENRIQUE IGLESIAS IS ONLY 1/8 FILIPINO. HIS MOTHER'S PATERNAL GRANDPARENTS ARE FULL SPANIARDS WHILE HER MATERNAL GRANDFATHER IS A SPANIARD..THUS, MAKING HIM ONLY 1.8 FILIPINO. AND PLUS, IT IS NOT ALWAYS THE LIGHTER SIDE THAT IS DOMINANT. I HAVE A HALF-CHINESE CLASSMATE BUT HE LOOKS VERY FILIPINO. YOU'LL ONLY DOUBT THAT HE'S HALF CHINESE WHEN YOU SEE HIS SURNAME. BESIDES, LOTS OF SPANISH MESTIZOS WERE EXILE OUT OF THE ISLANDS DURING THE CAVITE MUSTINY AND THE PALARIS REVOLT.

Mestizos in Argentina

There Are mestizos of significance in Argentina? It was my understanding that the majority of Argentinians are of purely European background. -- Zoe

Officially mestizos are about 3% or so of Argentinians, but some people place the 'real' number closer to 15 or 20%. It's all a matter of how you define these groups. In metropolitan Buenos Aires, the population is heavily European, but in the "hinterlands" there is a fairly large mestizo element.

The Argentinian "gauchos" (is there an article on them?) were often of mestizo origin as well. And they are a huge element of Argentinian national identity.

Syncrolecyne

The Argentinian goverment itself states that around 13% of it's population is local mestizos native to Argentina. These Argentinian mestizos are classified as "Argentinians" (European) to distinguish them from the immigrant mestizos of neighbouring Chile, Paraguay, etc. This is what causes the mestizo population to decrease to 3%. But the actual number of both local and immigrant mestizos combined is probably between 13% to 18%. Al-Andalus 05:12, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Mestizos in Honduras

March 30th, 2004

In Honduras, when discussing "mestizo," the operant term is the African element, not slavery. Being a rugged backwater of the colonial Spanish Empire, bondage must have been, at most,"nominal," with captives easily finding freedom from their overlords. Also, Africans were present in areas deemed remote even by Honduran standards --viz., along the Mosquito Coast of eastern Honduras, as a result of occasional shipwrecks in that region. Olaudah Equiano, a black African, was welcomed by the natives of Honduras but enslaved in the United States in the 17th century.

M. Lopez Zolomon, comayagua@earthlink.net

Chart of Overall Latin American Demographics

Latin_america_demographic.gif

Al-Andalus 13:27, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

"Official" statistics

What is the source of the "official" statistics regarding race in Latin America? In Mexico the government does not ask the race question, as the US Census Bureau does, so it is impossible to have "official" race statistics, at least for Mexico. --Lupitaº 03:04, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

US Goverment sources, individual national CENSUS where census data based on ethnicity is provided, and both goverment and independant international statistic agencies.

True, Mexico does not ask the race question in it´s census, and it is for this reason that they count their population of indigenous people by spoken language (please reffer to the article: demographics of mexico). Where those who speak Spanish only are assumed to be mestizo or white.

Mexican goverment agencies for indiginous affairs places the number of natives based on language spoken at just over 10% of the population. Having said that, the mexican goverment itself sees the error in this assumption based on language and how it ould skew true numbers. Many monolingual spanish speakers may also be unmixed, or reltiveley unmixed indian, conversly, there may be some mestizos that may be bilingual in a native language, and for knowing such a language would be counted as "native". So once again, the mexican goverment states (this time unoficially) that the numbers of indiginous peoples would be better placed at 30% of the total population. this latter figuer is agreed by international statisc agencies as well as by international agencies for the betterment of native peoples.

The race question is not asked in mexico because their constitution guarantees equality regardless of ethnic origin, and as such, it can´t be included as a question as this would "discriminate". Most iternational agencies for the betterment of indigenous people attest the opposite, saying that the question should be included so the goverment can more propperly address the many problems faced by indigenous communities. Al-Andalus 22:37, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)