Latinx Files: My hot take on ‘Mexican Catholic Girl’-core

It’s been a hot minute since I’ve had a Flamin’ Hot take, so here’s one for you.

This week I learned about “Catholic Mexican Girl”-core, “a growing fashion trend where purportedly ‘Old World’ colonial aesthetics are romanticized and updated for the internet age,” per the Washington Post.

“Think: white dresses, braids, red accents, gold jewelry and crucifixes,” writes reporter Sofia Andrade. “There’s a virginal quality to the look, yet it’s not quite modest: Bare shoulders and exposed midriffs underscore the potential for sexuality.”

What caught my attention about “Catholic Mexican Girl”-core is that this fad itself follows a broader trend of people wanting to be a specific type of Mexican or Latinx without actually being Mexican or Latinx.

Other examples include cowboy culture, Nuestra Señora de Gwendalupe Stefani, Shia LaBeouf in “The Tax Collector” and Kendall Jenner, whose 2021 portrayal of a doña de hacienda in a promotional ad for her company 818 Tequila resulted in backlash.

It’s not lost on me that this macro fad gravitates toward celebrating byproducts of Spanish colonialism: the architecture of San Miguel de Allende, the aesthetics of Catholicism, and agave spirits (contrary to popular belief and branding by mezcal and tequila companies, distilled liquors are not Indigenous).

My knee-jerk take after reading the Washington Post story is that this trend isn’t just cosplaying; it’s preparation for when Americans move en masse south of the border because of climate catastrophe.

I’ll admit that this crackpot theory was largely influenced by my recent rewatch of “The Day After Tomorrow,” the 2002 movie that sees Los Angeles destroyed by massive super tornadoes and New York City wiped off the map by a massive tsunami and winter megastorm.

The film ends with a United States that is largely uninhabitable, and as a result, surviving Americans are granted asylum in Mexico (but not without the U.S. wiping out all Latin American foreign debt in exchange).

Putting aside the naivete of believing that any mass migration of that magnitude would be so seamless, easy and peaceful, Roland Emmerich’s film is a masterpiece of the disaster movie genre.

I understand that the movie is meant to be hyperbolic with its repent-or-die warnings about our dependence on fossil fuels, but it’s hard not to read into its cautionary message of displacement caused by massive crises, especially when it’s already happening.

We’ve seen it in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. The displacement and gentrification that has occurred on the island has been well-chronicled.

“They’re pushing us out,” Yanira Ocasio told independent journalist Bianca Graulau in 2021. Ocasio was evicted from her longtime apartment in Quebradillas after Giovanni Feroce, a former Rhode Island resident who took advantage of tax incentives implemented after Hurricane Maria, bought the building.

“They’re pushing us out of our place. When we open our eyes we won’t have an island and we will be Puerto Rico without Puerto Ricans.”

It also happened in Mexico City, which as my colleague Kate Linthicum reported in 2022, saw an influx of Americans who wanted to take advantage of working remotely after the COVID-19 pandemic.

And it will probably occur in Hawaii, where there’s already growing fear of “climate gentrification” in the wake of the devastating Maui fires.

I’m willing to concede that I’m reading too much into all this. It’s a fair critique, and in my defense, it didn’t help that my viewing of “The Day After Tomorrow” happened on Sunday, a day in which Southern California was hit by Tropical Storm Hilary and an earthquake. Dealing with the possible threats of two types of natural disasters on the same day is enough to make you expect the worst.

And if it’s truly the case that this whole “Mexican Catholic Girl”-core is nothing more than just a fashion trend, then the joke is on them. To steal a clever remark made by newsletter editor Elvia Limón when I showed her the Washington Post story, if people really wanted to dress like actual Mexicans, they’d be wearing jeans and Aeropostale shirts.

“That’s what my cousins wear,” said Limón.

Things we read this week that we think you should read

— CalMatters and the Fresno Bee both reported on the tragic death of Elidio Hernández Gómez. The 59-year-old agricultural worker collapsed at a tomatillo field near the Fresno area on Aug. 8. The temperature that day was 100 degrees.

The details of Hernández’s death are unclear. Leyda Rangel, communications director for the United Farm Workers Foundation who spoke to the Bee’s Melissa Montalvo, said coworkers were instructed by supervisors to take Hérnandez to the local hospital. A coroner ruled that the cause of death was atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, and that extreme heat wasn’t a factor. The UFW claims otherwise. Per the story by CalMatter’s Nicole Foy, union president Teresa Romero, president of the union, said Hernández Gómez “reported feeling ill to his supervisor but did not receive help” and that the incident was not reported.

— Not to brag but as editorial director of De Los, I’m very proud of the way in which our team covered the controversy surrounding comments made about Mexico City by group Yahritza y Su Esencia. It began with an initial report by reporter Alejandra Molina two weeks ago. Last week, columnist Suzy Exposito caught up with the band and got its side of the story. On Monday, we published a commentary from Albert Perez, who went to the Yakima Valley to learn more about the hometown of which the band is extremely proud. To me, these three stories shed light on the complicated and tense relationship between Mexicans and Mexican Americans, and between Latin American and U.S. Latinxs. We plan to continue to report on this topic.

— I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the concept of “Si Díos Quiere Syndrome” since learning about the term last Thursday after reading De Los contributor J.P. Brammer’s weekly essay, which asks some very good questions.

“Do Chicanos, or, I suppose one could also ask, do Latinos in the U.S. have a gratitude problem? In other words, are we too content with scraps? Do we fail to self-advocate in the workplace and beyond? And, if so, where does this issue stem from, and how do we overcome it?

— If you haven’t seen “Blue Beetle” yet, wyd? Not only is the movie fun and good, but it’s also full of pop culture references to Latin America. For De Los, Carlos Aguilar wrote about the superhero movie’s nods to the region’s cinema and television.

— Since we’re on the subject of the No. 1 movie in America, De Los reporter Alejandra Molina wrote about the community support of ‘Blue Beetle.” Because of the ongoing actors’ strike, the film’s cast is prohibited from promoting the project, and as such the film has relied on community groups to get the word out.

— As many people with financial interests in its outcome had hoped, the inaugural Leagues Cup tournament between Liga MX and the MLS culminated in the American coronation of Lionel Messi, arguably the greatest soccer player of all time. El compa Eduard Cauich has this postmortem analysis on what both leagues can take away from the Leagues Cup.