VivirLatino

I will confess that it has been years since I have attended the Puerto Rican Parade here in NYC. When I used to go, in the late 90′s and into the early part of the 2000s, it was to protest, collect petitions, and hand out flyers. But as a Puerto Rican woman, the NYC/National Puerto Rican Day Parade, with all it’s floats, musical artists and waving of our red white & blue, has never felt like an entirely safe space. Throw into the mix growing corporate sponsorship that disrespects and reflects some of the worse stereotypes of our communities and the parade’s focus on the cultural while ignoring the intersections of the political and you have an event whose value is suspect.

The latest advertising/sponsorship campaign, coming via Coors Light, an official sponsor, first encountered by me in the subway over the weekend, invites to “EmBoricuate” – a play on the words Boricua, (rooted in the Taino name for the island Boriquen) and Emborrachar , to get drunk. Because apparently nothing says being Puerto Rican like getting drunk, drunk to the point of forgetting.

Wait could Coors be onto something? Read more…