Who taught you to believe that race is real? That skin pigmentation reflects identity? That anyone darker than you is "exotic" or uneducated? Colonial teachings are outdated and do not reflect the truths of human history.
Scientific racism is real, and reveals how scholarship is manipulated to serve oppression. The remnants of scientific racism are specifically mixed into languages like English and Spanish. Prejudiced thinking of the past weaves itself into casual conversation like backhanded insults and passive aggressive side comments. It speaks in perverse euphemisms and deceptive code.
If you are Latin@/X and you use language like "ese negrito," "el oriental," or "esos indios," then you enable ignorance from the past. Your thinking is born from dehumanization. The future of Latin@/X culture has no room for an ignorance presently exposed by science.
Thankfully, miseducation is being revealed as an illness that can be surgically healed. It's only a matter of time for the ignorance of the past to be outlived by metamodern thinking.
Ignorance like racism and colorism must be called for what they both are: a conscious choice, resulting from when you do not question your thinking, your behavior, nor your beliefs. Talking in confidence amongst friends and family who agree with colonial teachings, for example, reinforces this inherited structure of thinking, and it keeps the grapevine of ignorance alive. It is important to question why we think what we think, and to question the thinking of our sources. What purpose does education serve if not for discernment?
In the 21st century, we have an opportunity for change with an active practice of mindfulness. We have opportunity to renew the language we use, to stop distancing ourselves from other cultures, and to reanimate one another based on the fact that we are all human and we all hurt because of prejudice.
We are not simply objects meant to be used and categorized to fulfill the supremacist agenda of social distinction. We are not a threat to each other, unless, of course, there is intention to be a threat. If we continue to use dehumanizing language, to distance others with stereotypes, and to give power to the structures that divide us, then our society will squander the innovations made from holistic education opportunities.