Get Out, Sister!
My Ethnic Background
Taking into account the toxic effects of men who haven’t integrated well romantically, I understand why the CIA would have an axe to grind with me for having a Hispanic surname and for my father being an immigrant from Honduras and for my maternal grandfather and grandmother having been immigrants from Mexico. However, associating me with the Hispanic community in America is harsh, unfair, and inaccurate, and this is because Hispanics aren’t—at all—a monolith. For example, Elon Musk is an immigrant from South Africa—but because South Africans aren’t a monolith, being a mix of British, Dutch, and African, no one associates him with the African community. That is not exactly, but sort of, like me. Pretty much all the Chinese, for example, are 100 percent Chinese, and this is also probably true for many West Asians, African Africans, and other races and/or ethnicities. This is very unlike Hispanic people. Hispanics all have very different ancestors, some of us have uncommon genetics, in terms of intelligence and European attractiveness. Using the Chinese example, besides the typical differences among people who are all 100 percent of the same race such as height, bone structure, and whatever else, there could be differences in socioeconomics and/or educational background. And similarly with Hispanics, you get not only whatever differences inherent in socioeconomic and/or educational background differences, you also get a mix of extremely distinct, ethnic backgrounds: Hispanics are a mix of European, which means you have to consider differences among those with European backgrounds who immigrated into Latin America, and in addition, Hispanics also are often Native American or African. Let’s say, for the sake of this letter not being so long, that the Native American and African part can be more monolithic, which probably isn’t true. Still, though, Hispanics vary wildly in terms of how Native American, African, or European they are. Some Hispanics are virtually 100 percent Native American, others virtually 100 percent African, and others virtually 100 percent European, and then there are Hispanics with all sorts of various European backgrounds with any combination of Native American and African. But in Los Angeles, lot of the Hispanic people here, I wonder, must be illegal immigrants or the children of illegal immigrants because I have heard that illegal immigration into America is often much more than legal immigration, sometimes up to two times more. Hispanics who come into the country illegally are typically a lower-class type of Hispanic. I hate to sound like a racist snob, but the truth is that we get a lot of Hispanic riff raff in the United States. It seems to me that the CIA is too keen to conflate me with those Hispanics, i.e., Hispanic riff raff, put all Hispanics into one giant Hispanic monolith, and then torture me for trying to be my best because Hispanics aren’t integrating well romantically—exactly like it’s my fault, as though I absolutely have the ability to think and make decisions for Hispanics in America. I am in no way shape or form responsible for the failures of Hispanic men who haven’t integrated well romantically. I am not actually even ethnically associated with these people, or if I am it is only very, very faintly. It wouldn’t even be a gross overgeneralization to ethically associate me with them. It would be a much more accurate gross overgeneralization to ethnically associate me with white Americans. In other words, I’m likely, as far as ancestors go, 12 percent Native American, 6 percent African, and about 82 percent European. I'm actually a little bit guessing here. I don't know completely for sure. Some people benefit from their ethnic associations. For some people, being judged by their ethnic association is the absolute most flattering way to judge them, and so for those people it is in their best interest if they were judged or assorted socially based on that ethnic association and if all people were judged and assorted primarily on their ethnic association. For me, that just happens to be a harsh way to judge me, and this is because, as I shared earlier, we get a lot of Hispanic riff raff in the U.S.
Coming from a multi-ethnic country doesn’t automatically make someone representative of every ethnic group in that country. I’d like to be understood to be a European descended person whose ancestors were immigrants from Latin America. That’s accurate. But honestly, even that would not be very fair for me because the Spanish ethnicity is so associated with the Native American ethnicity, and Americans tend to combine and conflate both of them with each other, even though they are both distinctly different ethnic backgrounds. However, because I believe I wasn’t ever given the respect I deserve from my academic accomplishments, grit, and work ethic because of the American tendency to conflate everyone with a Hispanic surname into one Hispanic monolith and then to abuse and oppress everyone in that group, regardless of how much they are even a member of the ethnic group, I would like to be as clear as I possibly can about my specific ethnic background. And this is because, although I can’t say for sure, I don’t think the CIA would oppress and sideline a white woman with my exact same academic accomplishments. I think if I were understood to be white, I would be on a different career trajectory, and this is because less people get upset about a white woman with elite educational and career accomplishments, but people, particularly good-looking, middle-class white women, can feel offended by women they deem to be minority women with elite academic accomplishments because those accomplishments can empower a minority woman to romantically disenfranchise a white woman. So this could, like I suspect, be in part about race. It’s also about geopolitics because the CIA is a little nicer to Asian women.
In the past I mentioned being Mexican or a little Jewish or a little Italian or Native American and also of having a posh ethnic background with ancestors who look like British aristocrats and also that my sister looks a little like Kamala Harris, so I’ve been thinking my ethnic background explanations to people seem somehow incoherent, so I think maybe showing who these ancestors are or what I think they looked like and how the percentages breakdown might be helpful.
My dad had pretty blue eyes. My maternal grandmother, Emilia Terminel, is a mix of Spanish, and she is definitely at least 25 percent Italian (making me definitely 6 percent Italian) and she is 25 percent Native American, from Mexico. My maternal grandmother had pale skin, brown hair, and brown eyes. Here is a picture of her with my mom, when my mom was a baby:
I have already shared that I am about 80 percent European, 12 percent Native American, and 6 percent African. My mother, Maria Guerena, is 87 percent European and 12 percent Native American. She has pale skin, brown hair, and brown eyes. Here is a picture of my mother with my father:
Here is a picture of my 50 percent Native American great grandmother, my maternal grandmother’s mother, with her children, although one can’t tell in the picture half of them had green eyes, my grandmother didn’t inherit the green eyes, though.
I don’t have a picture of my maternal grandmother’s father when he was an adult. (I do but it’s blurry.) In this picture my maternal grandmother’s father was a child. It's also interesting to note that his two sisters became Catholic nuns. He’s 100 percent European and had green eyes. The two adults in this picture are my great great grandparents. My great great grandfather was an immigrant from Italy. My mother had mentioned that her parents are third or fourth cousins, so the woman in this picture, who looks a little like Queen Victoria, is related to my great grandmother on my maternal grandfather’s side. (They share either great great or great great great grandparents, which suggests to me these people kept better track of their ancestry than my parents did.) My great great grandfather, who might’ve had green eyes because his son, my maternal grandmother’s father, had green eyes, was a handsome man.
My maternal grandfather, Carlos Guerena, was a mix of Spanish, from the Basque country, English, and Jewish but mostly Spanish. And although my maternal grandmother had brown eyes, half of her sister’s had green eyes, so I think she thought she probably had the gene for green eyes, but she didn’t inherit it, so even though my maternal grandmother’s father had green eyes, and half of her sister’s had green eyes, and my maternal grandfather had green eyes, neither my mom or any of her siblings inherited the green eyes. In the ‘40s and ‘50s, my maternal grandfather ran a business doing upholstery with a few business partners, which was on Jefferson and Western, a little west of USC. However, he was a 100 percent European descended Mexican immigrant with sort of light brown hair and green eyes. Here’s a picture of my grandfather:
Here’s a picture of my maternal grandfather’s father, the man whose ancestors are from the Basque country in Spain. Although my maternal grandfather had green eyes, his dad had brown eyes. The main sort of cool thing about this great grandfather is that he was definitely very tall.
Here’s a picture of my maternal grandfather’s mother. Because she had green eyes and thin, straight, light brown hair (in the picture her hair looks darker than it really was), I think she looks like Queen Victoria. This woman, my mother’s paternal grandmother, is somehow related to my mother’s maternal great grandmother. They are third or fourth cousins. This woman has some Spanish, English, and Jewish heritage and is 100 percent European. In my family, she is sort of like the British royal family version of the Queen mother if the Queen mother looked like Queen Victoria because I inherited longevity from her because she lived to be 103 years old. That's the kind of amazing genetics I inherited from this woman. I never met any of my grandmothers, but I actually met my great grandmother.
My paternal grandmother, my dad’s mom, Teresa Vanderveer, is 100 percent European, maybe 75 percent Spanish and 25 percent Dutch. In the picture I’m showing of her, the only picture I have of her, she’s tan in the picture, but a lot these people had tans because in Latin America people often eat outdoors, if not work all day outdoors. Sometimes it can make someone look like maybe he or she is a little Native American, and it’s kind of the custom in Latin America to not be self-righteous or proudly or arrogantly offended if someone were to assume you have some Native American heritage. But Teresa probably didn’t care about all that, although it’s kind of hard to tell in the picture, she had blonde hair (sort of dark blonde hair) and blue eyes:
This is a picture of my paternal grandmother’s father, Anastasio Ortiz Vanderveer. It’s too bad he didn’t conquer the region and impregnate all the women in Nicaragua and Honduras. I think he looks sort of like King George VI. For all his posh good looks, of all these people, he had a sad life of no-results sabotage. It’s particularly sad because he was ambitious. He was the Vice President of the country Nicaragua. He had policies, a vision, business ideas. And right after he got elected, he got killed. So at five years old, my paternal grandmother, Teresa, lost her dad. He only had two daughters. I don’t know who his wife was, my great great grandmother, but she must’ve had blonde hair and blue eyes because my grandmother had blonde hair and blue eyes.
As far as my exact ethnic background, I’m a little bit guessing here, using my results from 23 and me and cross referencing them with the little my parents have actually told me about my ethnic background. The one ancestor that is the biggest mystery to me is my paternal grandfather Miguel Rivera. I’ve never seen a picture of him. And I know almost nothing about his specific ethnic background, except because my father has blue eyes, he had to have been European enough to have had the gene for blue eyes. I think my father is likely 75 percent European, maybe more, and 12 percent African, and 12 percent Native American, although I don’t know. If that’s true, then my paternal grandmother would be 100 percent European, and that seems to be the case, and my paternal grandfather would be 50 percent European and 25 percent African and 25 percent Native American. Watching the World Cup 2026, specifically looking for my paternal grandfather, I thought the top player from Columbia, Luis Diaz, probably has a similar ethnic background.
I think this must be what my paternal grandfather looked like. I asked my mom, who met my paternal grandfather, if Luis Diaz looks like him. She said, “yes but straighter hair and thinner lips”. She did say the skin, hair, and eye color are the same. Maybe he’s the ancestor my dad’s brother was talking about when he said, if it’s true, that we are from the south of Spain, either that or being from the south of Spain is a euphemism for being African among Hispanics because a lot times Hispanics aren’t clear about their ethnic background. Here’s another picture of my dad. My dad inherited his mother’s blue eyes, but his hair is more of an African texture. He has a brother with blondish hair, though.
I personally think, though, that overall, most of my ancestors look like aristocratic European people, not that they were rich, they weren’t, but they had those kinds of looks. I wonder if some of these people came to Latin America on some blanqueamiento scam, like hearing a rumor about how someone found gold in Northern Mexico. In many cases, the whole logic of blanqueamiento created a mythos around European arrival, as if the Europeans were part of some civilizing mission or carried a certain aesthetic prestige. That old mythology around European arrival still shapes how people imagine the “quality” of those ancestors today, often in ways that are disconnected from reality. That mythology also feeds into modern American assumptions about what European ancestors in Latin America looked like, as if the region were populated by the less aesthetically distinguished Europeans. For example, there’s a stereotype that Hispanics likely have unattractive European ancestors who look, at best, like maybe Dean Koontz, and that Spanish people aren’t as good looking as English people. Based on these pictures, it seems that Europeans in the 19th century, whether they were from Italy or Spain or Holland, were often posh looking. And part of what is contributing to the mating crisis is that Mexicans and Central Americans aren’t as good looking as they used to be. Although it’s extremely difficult to be proud of oneself in the context of the 24/7 bioweapon attacks I deal with, I am proud to come from a lineage of good-looking Hispanic people. There is such a thing as good-looking Hispanic people. I don’t have any oil paintings of ancestors. This is pretty much all I have.
Haha, just kidding. So the woman in front of the oil painting is Maria Felix, and she was a famous actress in the '40s and '50s in Mexico. She was one of the defining faces of the golden age of Mexican cinema. She's standing in front of a painting Diego Rivera made of her. I should know how I am related to her, but I'm related to her on my mom's side. I'll find out. She is an excellent counterexample to the stereotype that Hispanic ancestry lacks aesthetic prestige. What I think is cool about her and worth mentioning because it really is so posh, and it makes sense because I'm kind of posh, is that there is a jewelry line at Cartier, that actually got discontinued, but for years it was one of their biggest jewelry lines, and it was named after her. It was called La Dona de Cartier. And Cartier even said that she was one of their most important clients. I think that is really posh, and weird too because for me owning Cartier jewelry or like a Cartier watch is such an impossible situation, which is annoying because I feel like the CIA will not let me be my authentic self.
Just to wrap this all up, I am one of four siblings, so here’s a picture showing what we all look like. I am the girl with sort of lighter brown hair on the right:
I think what happened was that by the early-sixties, when my parents met, most all Hispanic people were an ethnic mix. My mom, as I already shared, is 87 percent European and 12 percent Native American, and my dad is 75 percent European and 12 Native American and 12 percent African. What happened there is that my mom has very pale skin, and my dad has slightly tan skin, so we are likely to inherit the slightly tan skin. My dad has blue eyes and my mom has brown eyes, so we get either brown or (because my mom’s dad had green eyes) hazel eyes. My mom and dad both have darker hair than me, so in that way, I was a little bit of a wild card in the sense that my natural hair color is lighter than both of my parents’ natural hair color. That can happen, but that’s not as likely to happen. In addition, I think my sister Emilia is a little bit of a wild card situation, too, in the sense that she came out looking more African than she really is. I think a lot of 100 percent Asian women might argue, if they have fairer skin or straight hair, that they are whiter than my sister. I think that's not accurate taking into account that my sister is 80 percent European.
As a Hispanic woman, growing up, I thought of myself as having potential, but I thought that I needed to have a good body, for example, to be attractive. My parents never told me much about my ethnic background, so I didn’t know about all this posh-looking ancestry. When first saw the picture of Anastasio Vandeveer, the blonde hair, blue eyed Dutch Spanish great grandfather, ten years ago, that honestly did stun me because none of my siblings look anything like him and because he’s Spanish and extremely handsome. I also was influenced by the blanqueamiento myth that the less aesthetically distinguished Europeans populated Latin America. I didn’t know Spanish men skewed so handsome. And then I wondered, “What happened?” I wish my parents were clearer about the posh ancestry, although they hinted at it, but they are not the type to be overbearing about having lots of European heritage. It would’ve been better for them, though, to have been clearer because for my siblings and I the dominant phenotypes we are wearing masks lots of European heritage, and we should be aware of that. For other ethnic minorities, especially for the 100- 80 percent dominant gene type, their dominant phenotype isn’t masking lots of European heritage. In America, a place that is becoming more like Latin America, more multi-racial, with more interracial children, we should be more perceptive about who’s wearing the dominant phenotype mask.
After sorting through what I know about my past, I realize now that I am a Hispanic thoroughbred. A thoroughbred is a person who inherited from their family lineage a certain aesthetic prestige. I, too, like my ancestors, am a posh-looking person. But obviously being posh looking is a construct, just like how race is a construct. In other words, I have to be intentional about being a thoroughbred by thinking and living a lifestyle and presenting myself in a manner that is consistent with being a thoroughbred.