No comprendo

I get it all the time at parties. "Dude, say something in Spanish!" Or better yet, "How do you say (enter random curse word or insult here) in Spanish?" And I entertain the requests because I really don't care as long as people don't keep asking all night.\nI don't hate it when people ask me Spanish questions. I just think it's interesting because usually when this happens I'm the only Latino at a party. And people just assume that I speak fluent Spanish. But not all Latinos know Spanish. \nSometimes people can assume too much. \nAnd it's OK, we're all guilty of this sometimes. We see people who are Asian, and we assume that they speak an Asian language. But not everyone who is Asian, Hispanic or Middle Eastern speaks the language.\nThere are many people from a variety of ethnic groups who speak English only, even if their parents or grandparents are immigrants. And a lot of times their inability to speak the "mother tongue" is something that's hard to deal with because it's not what people of their own ethnicity expect of them. \nPeople outside of someone's ethnicity might be surprised when someone doesn't speak their descendant's native tongue but usually it makes no difference to them. It's the people within a person's ethnic group that are more judgmental. \nI recently read a commentary on www.NewAmericaMedia.org by David Madrid. He wrote about his experience being only an English-speaking Mexican-American working with mostly Spanish-speaking coworkers in California. \n"To their surprise, they found I did not speak the language. That would be the first and last time I would have any contact with them. Now, they won't even look my way as I pass them in the aisles," he said in the article.\nThe harshest criticism comes from people of one's own ethnicity because they have expectations. A division exists between recent immigrants to the United States and more established generations, and language is a sign of this. Immigrant generations mock English-only Latinos by calling them names like "gringos." \nAnd many times, these Latinos develop a complex about this or feel ashamed. I remember when I was younger, I used to want to be more Latino like my friends. I wanted darker skin and a better accent (ridiculous, I know). But it's not their fault; many Latinos don't have a choice in what language they speak. \nIt just depends on how they're raised. Some children are raised speaking only English on purpose because their parents are fearful that they might have problems in school. Others learn their native language as toddlers but forget it after being exposed to school and English television. \nEnglish-only Latinos or Asians just want to belong, but instead they are made fun of and looked down upon by people of their ethnic group. \nEveryone comes from a different background and judging people by the language they speak is crazy. Substance is all that matters. So just because a person can't tell someone how to curse someone out in Spanish, Hindi, Tagalog or whatever, it doesn't make them any less of a Hispanic, Indian or Filipino.