Oh Latin America, You're So Emo

In my search to find blogs from Central and South America I happened upon blogs about "emo" culture in the countries of the region.

"Emo" is short for emotional, usually those that follow this way of life define themselves through dark clothing, dark makeup and listen to depressing music. "Emo" is a label, like "grunge" in the 90's or the free loving "hippies" of the late 60's. More often than not, those who follow the emo scene are teenagers or young adults who find something to connect with in the culture.

Personally, I don't have too much association with people in the "emo" scene and often use the label to make fun of my boyfriend who hates it when I say his "outfit looks soooo emo." Yes, I am stereotyping a little but I identify "emo's" with tight fitting jeans, Van's shoes and black hair with long bangs. Hey as a tattooed woman who owns a rottweiler I am often lumped into categories such as gay, punk rocker, white trash or a felon. As human beings I think all we lump everyone into some kind of organizational structure. But seriously, to beat someone to a pulp because of their clothes and musical preferences.

Emo

Wow?! Here is a generic photo I found (right) from Google, showing that Emo bashing has been around for a while. People get crazy huh, when someone is not like them?

The emo culture has spread to Latin and Central America and many of the youth who are involved in this scene are facing persecution from local residents and the news media.

On March 22, Daniel Hernandez, wrote about "emo's" in Mexico for his blog Intersections.

"A bizarre wave of mob emo-bashings is sweeping across Mexico. The movement is being generated on message boards and social networking sites by non-emo youth who highly dislike like the emo look and attitude.

The spark came first in Queretaro on March 7. An estimated 800 young people poured into the city's Centro Historico hunting for emo's to beat the crap out of. They found some. The next weekend it spread to Mexico City, where emos faced off against punks and rockabillies at the Glorieta de Insurgents, the epicenter of emo social space in the capital. There have also been reports of anti-emo violence in Durango, Colima, and elsewhere."

Hernandez followed up his "emo" blog report for LA Weekly.

"In Mexico, emo culture is a butt of many jokes. It is either despised intensely or generally ignored. But it's only the despising sentiment that lately has been getting wide airplay. For Televisa an on-air personality named Kristoff expresses a serious dose of antiemo rhetoric and switches to English to say, on network television, "Fucking bullshit" to the emo movement. Some emos I've interviewed point to the Kristoff clip as a defining provocation of the current wave of anti-emo violence."

Mexico City resident, Harry24, a user on the LastFM "Anit Emo Death Squad Forum", describes why he thinks there has been a rash of attacks on Mexican emo's.

"But why there are a high number of emos here in my country?????
As you may know, Mexico is a "developing country", but that's a fuckin lie, we are walking backwards, and the country is turning worse and worse, if somebody tells you that Mexico is walking to the progress its a fucking liar, i say this because I live in Mexico City, and I can honestly say that this city and all the country is getting worse.

So what are the factors that contribute to the high number of emos???"

Here are his five reasons involving a breakdown of these aspects in Mexican society:

1. Family

2. Music

3. Media

4. Culture

5. Government

The phenomenon of "emo" hating as spread to Peru and bloggers are telling the public of what they think about Peruvian emo's.

Here is what Marco of Andando Sin Caminos wrote about "emo's" in Peru.

"It is true that I was not familiar with such a strange living species until I went to the Spanish Cultural Center, which is located in Lima and I stopped to observe a park located in front of the center. It attracted my attention, in the first place, to see so many youth dressed in a strange manner, somewhere between black punk clothing, mixed with a bright pink, and with a haircut of a character of Japanese anime. Upon first glance, they appeared to be defenseless for how skinny they are and for looking childlike. And they are defenseless because a friend told me that he had seen many of them beaten by gangs and by punks that hang out around the Spanish Cultural Center for their appearance."