Why Brazilians are not Considered Latinos in the US: A Gamer’s Perspective on Identity Politics
As a lifelong gamer with thousands of hours logged across RPGs, MMOs, MOBAs, and more, I know firsthand the power and peril behind labels. Your class, race, server region, guild, gear score—external labels shape how you move through digital worlds. And the right identity markers can foster solidarity or sow division.
The same holds true in society, where bureaucratic checkboxes encode access and belonging. Just as picking Horde over Alliance or NA East over West impacts your player journey, categorical ethnic identities shape migrant experiences.
So from my perspective as a passionate gamer, I understand why many Brazilian-Americans feel excluded when technically not meeting “Latino” definitions imposed by the government. It’s like having your guild turn you away due to some dusty technicality. Or worse, being mislabeled entirely—like rolling a druid but assigned “warrior” at character select.
Today over 70% of Brazilians living in the United States self-identify as Latino or Hispanic, despite official policy excluding them from this pan ethnic designation. As a gamer, I know the importance of self-determining your identity within dynamic communities. So why are Brazilians still barred from embracing “Latino” labels?
Let’s explore this complex topic through relatable metaphors to online gaming universes. Because just as gamers know the disconnected powers dictating our virtual worlds, Brazilians navigate the messy reality between technical state classifications and evolving identities on the ground. The result leaves many caught between policies and community.
Lay of The Land – Brief History of Hispanic/Latino Labels in the US
First, let’s survey the lay of the land. When analyzing any gaming environment—or sociopolitical ecosystem—it helps reviewing how we arrived at the current state of affairs.
In the 1970s, policymakers first zoned the ethnic server space of America into “Hispanic” territories, designating certain Latin American migrant spawns as part of this domain. The initial worldbuilders based this around shared Spanish colonial codebase between Mexico, Central America, South America and the Caribbean.
However, Brazil’s unique Portuguese source code meant getting left out of the “Hispanic” server zone. And later when “Latino” emerged as a wider pan ethnic identity, the Brazilian migrant population remained exiled.
Still over the next decades, as more diverse Latin American player classes immigrated to America, organic affiliations grew based around cultural lore, faith-lines, regional chat channels and lived struggles. Despite technical isolation from “Hispanic” and “Latino” labels, Brazilians increasingly felt connected to the wider Latin American guilds thriving across different US servers.
Racial Factions – The Power and Peril of Pan Ethnic Groupings
Now to understand this better, let’s discuss the pros and cons of pan ethnic racial factions more broadly. These collective groupings based around shared origins, languages, struggles or appearances help foster in-group solidarity and access to resources.
For example, the “Hispanic” and “Latino” faction tags grant political influence, healthcare boosts, gold bonuses and more to those sorted across their vast 600 million plus member super-factions. So Brazilians barred from entry lose out.
However, pan ethnic identities also risk flattening incredibly diverse experiences between distinct userbases. After all, Mexican, Colombian, Chilean, Cuban and more migrant players share some cultural code—colonial legacies, Catholic SMBIOS, regional chat logs, etc—but arrive from varied home servers with unique playstyles, currencies, debuffs and more.
Binning them together into a single “Latino” faction affords mutual support navigating America’s racial environment. But it can also mask key differences in needs between members. Like an overextended guild claiming superiority but failing individual players.
Evolving Self Identification Among Brazilians
For a while, few Brazilians even sought to join the “Latino” faction, instead playing their own isolated user network. But lately Brazilians demonstrate fresh desire assimilating into the wider Latin American migrant forces.
The Pew Research Center uncovered a spike between 2018 and 2020 of foreign-born Brazilian players self identifying as “Hispanic” and “Latino” from roughly 5% to over 50%. Then the 2020 Census showed 70% adoption rates of these labels among Brazilians, granting the faction benefits without any vetting or skill checks.
This signals Brazilian migrant preferences shifting, potentially revealing more kinship with the shared debuffs confronting Latin American guildmates in America—discrimination, language barriers, homesickness and more. Or perhaps it simply reflects opportunism to access “Latino” perks.
Yet it demonstrates the fluid, self-driven way identities take shape organically. Brazilians play their own way but still align with certain faction priorities against encroaching threats and barriers built into America’s racial game engine.
Between Policy and People
Ultimately, the Brazilians’ complex positioning reveals a great dissonance lurking when external rules dictate internal realities around collective identities. Policy rarely keeps pace with people and culture.
So the dated parameters set by the old worldbuilders around “Hispanic” and “Latino” do little justice to evolving experiences facing Latin America‘s diverse migrant classes imported into different US servers under shared struggles. Their self-identification says more than bureaucratic divisions.
In truth, Brazilians occupy an amphibious state between slippery technical definitions and meaningful solidarities surging on the ground. They straddle two racial domains between Latin America and America—neither here nor there. Thrust into an outsider status against kin guilds facing shared foes.
Going forward, the influencers and moderators imposing racial factions from on high should better align labels with on-the-ground affiliations organically forming between players based on lived realities—not just outdated servers and code provisions.
As gamers, we know the power of banding together against shared threats and enemies across vast interconnected systems. And we understand the strength stemming from diverse talents and approaches. Perhaps one day Brazilians and the wider Latin American migrant ranks can unite forces under the same “Latino” banner against encroaching threats and barriers;officially becoming one meta faction, regardless of arbitrary programmer lines erroneously dividing natural allies for too long.
Until then, we‘ll keep respawning…and playing on. Luta continua!