Hi Austine, how are you? I hope you're doing well. ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡
First of all, I want to say that I love you and really admire your work. But I have something to say about your latest tweets regarding people hating Argentina.
You said something like, "Open a history book," as if we're dumb and the hate your country gets is just the result of ignorance... really?
I was going to list all the racist things your country has done in the past and still does today, but I assume you're already aware of them (If not, then maybe you should take your own advice and open a history book). So do we. It's honestly disappointing to act as if you have no idea why so many people have a negative view of Argentina while also assuming we don't know what we're talking about.
I'm not saying you're racist, i know you aren't, but unfortunately your country has a long history of racism and discrimination. Seeing you say something like that made me really sad because it feels like you're trying to tone down or dismiss what many of us know and what many people have experienced or perceived about your country.
I know Argentina, like my own country and many others, has adopted anti-racist laws and policies. But laws don't automatically change social attitudes. I also acknowledge that my own country is unfortunately still racist in many ways, and we continue to fight against that reality. That's exactly why I think it's important to stay humble about this issue. Pretending that racism doesn't exist in your countryor in any country doesn't help anyone. Acknowledging that it exists is the first step toward addressing it.
Hi, anon. I'm doing well, how are you?
First of all, I think there's some context missing here.
My tweets weren't directed at people who were simply calling out racism in my country. They were directed at the people comparing Argentina to Israel and saying things like Argentina is an entirely white, racist country. I understand that football can bring out the worst in people, but some of the things I was reading were simply ignorant, and I'd like to explain why.
First of all, I have never denied that there are racist people in my country. In fact, I explicitly said so in one of my tweets. A very obvious example is our current president, Javier Milei, whose rhetoric and politics I find deeply embarrassing. The capital (and other cities like Cordoba), in general, has plenty of people who think like him, but they are not representative of the country as a whole.
Argentina is a country that has constantly been stripped of its resources, its land, and, recently, even one of its rivers. It's also a country that has suffered tremendously throughout its history (like many others, of course)
I was going to list all the things your country has done in the past and still does today, but I assume you're already aware of them (if not, you should take your own advice and open a history book)
Yeah, I don't like your tone here. I can read between lines.
I don't need no one to tell me to open a history book. I've read plenty of them (trust me) and I've also traveled extensively throughout my country. I've been to the south, the center, and the north. I've met people from all over, and that's exactly why I say this: Argentina is, overwhelmingly, an incredibly diverse country made up of many different ethnicities, cultures, and communities. I know that what often reaches the outside world are racist people on twitter and news about our disgusting government, but that is not the reality across the 3,800 kilometers that make up this country from end to end.
Going back to my original point, I saw countless Americans comparing us to Israel or saying that the Argentine national team is "spiritually Israeli." Do you see why that upset me?
Not that long ago, parts of Argentine Patagonia were devastated by wildfires. Around that time, Israeli tourists (IDF soldiers btw) were found near the affected areas making campfires despite fire restrictions. Thousands of hectares burned, and afterward there were discussions about selling some of that land to foreign investors. Around the same period, Javier Milei was strengthening ties with Netanyahu. What a coincidence, right? Whether people agree on the political implications or not, you can understand why comparisons like those hit a nerve for many Argentines.
More recently, I spent time in the north of the country, particularly in the salt flats, where Indigenous communities work in tourism in order to remain on their ancestral lands instead of being displaced. Meanwhile, foreign companies extract lithium while only a tiny fraction of the profits stays in Argentina. I spent a long time traveling through the region and meeting people, and let me tell you, there is so much hardship there.
So yes, it frustrates me when people call Argentina a "colonizer country" (yes, I've genuinely seen people say that) or "the Israel of South America" because those claims couldn't be further from the reality I know. Those judgments are almost always based on the image of Buenos Aires alone. But visiting Buenos Aires is not the same as knowing Argentina. Even visiting three or four of the largest provinces isn't enough. This is an enormous country with an incredibly diverse population, and that diversity changes from region to region.
I know my country's history. I know what Julio Argentino Roca did. I know about the wars of the nineteenth century and how Afro-Argentines were disproportionately sent to fight. I know about the systematic massacres of Indigenous peoples in Patagonia, because I was born and raised here. I also know about the country's history of mestizaje and everything else that shaped modern Argentina.
No one has to educate me about my own country's history, because I promise you I've studied it extensively, and I have never denied that racist and deeply unjust things happened here. But seeing Americans point fingers at Argentina (when the United States had legally enforced racial segregation until the 1960s, while Argentina never had a system of racial segregation and formally abolished slavery in 1853) feels deeply hypocritical to me.
That's why I got angry. Those people tweets weren't informed criticism; they were sweeping statements made from a place of ignorance. Maybe the healthiest thing would have been to ignore them and move on, because they probably weren't worth my time. But after seeing so many comments repeating the same things over and over again... it became very difficult to stay silent.
I'm not pretending racism doesn't exist, and I never said that it doesn't. I'm not trying to tone anything down, and I'm sorry if that's how my tweets came across, because that genuinely wasn't my intention. I'm very aware of racism in Argentine society, and I've never denied its existence. But acknowledging that racism exists doesn't mean I have to stay silent when I see people making inaccurate claims about my country. Speaking up against misinformation doesn't mean I'm dismissing or minimizing racism.
So, sorry for the long message, but that's everything I want to say.
