Televisa Star Did Not Do Her Homework When It Came To Parodying ‘Roma’ Star Yalitza Aparicio With Use Of Brownface
Mexican television personality Yeka Rosales has quite a serving of arroz con mango on her hands. The Televisa actress is currently facing a world of backlash after donning brownface in an attempt to parody “Roma” actress and rising Indigenous star Yalitza Aparicio and the entire scenario has gotta make a girl wonder if people still truly live under rocks. Or if, even as someone in the public eye, Rosales blatantly believes she can be the exception to decades worth of forceful objections against blackface satire.
Either way, this actress is about to experience a major lesson.
The TV personality faces criticism after she took a parody of the Indigenous Mexican actress who was also nominated for an Academy-Award nomination this year.
In a February 24 post to her Instagram account, Rosales shared photos of herself dressed as the Roma star and wearing brown paint, thick lips, and a nose prosthetic. She also wore a dress similar to the one Aparicio wore last month on the night of the Oscars. According to the Guardian, the facial expression Rosales used in the photo is typically used to stereotype indigenous people.
The photo captured a behind the scenes moment from Televisa’s season premiere of “La Parodia,” a comedy TV series.
According to the Associated Press, Televisa spokesman Alejandro Olmos said the network does not align itself with any form of racism or discrimination. “We do not believe that the production of La Parodia engages in this type of practice,” Olmos told AP. She went onto explain that certain aspects of the skit that were in “bad taste” will be edited from the show. Soon after, the network later deleted a video of Rosales mimicking Aparicio while wearing brownface from its Twitter page.
Users online were quick to strike at Rosales and Televisa over the offensive images.
Not only were critics quick to denounce Rosales’s actions and come to Aparicio’s defense, they also used their platforms to criticize the racist attitudes of Latin American media that have perpetuated such images for so long.
Despite the backlash, Rosales has yet to take the images down.
Soon after the backlash began to unfold, Rosales took to Twitter to defend herself. In an attempt to sell critics that she is far from racist, she shared a string of images of herself in performances where she had previously donned blackface.
You can imagine how that played out.
Sadly, this isn’t the first time Aparicio has endured racist treatment from her community of actors in Mexico.
In late February of this year telenovela star, Sergio Goyri used racist slurs to disparage the actress’s recent Oscar nod. In a video recording, of which Goyri had no knowledge of taking place, the veteran was seen spouting off anti-indigenous slurs in reference to Aparicio. His denigrating comments accused Aparicio of taking on a role that was mostly as a servant.
“Que metan a nominar a una pinche india que dice, ‘sí señora, no señora’, y que la metan a una terna a la mejor actriz del Oscar” he said in Spanish.
The actor quickly apologized for his offensive use of words and issued a video apology to Aparicio.
“It was never my intent to offend anyone. I apologize to Yalitza, who deserves [the Oscar nomination] and much more,” the 60-year-old said on Instagram. “For me, it is an honor to see a Mexican be nominated for an Oscar.”
Mexican actress Gabriela Platas also chimed into the chaos, saying she didn’t agree with Goyri’s opinion. However, she did defend his freedom of expression about the topic.
Platas soon faced a Twitter wrath of her own after for defending Goyri’s words.
In response, the actress was also forced to head to the platform to defend herself. “I never defended the expressions,” Platas tweeted. “I said that I think Cuarón’s casting elections are great, and that I do NOT agree with what Goyri said, but that he is in his right to express what he wants in his private environment.”
In response to all of the comments, Aparicio told The Guardian. that she was “proud to be an Oaxacan indigenous woman, and it saddens me that there are people who do not know the correct meaning of words.”
“Roma” director, Alfonso Cuarón, also came to Aparicio’s defense and pointed to Goyri’s words as part of what should be a broader discussion as to why people, particularly in Mexico, have such viewpoints and furthermore the media’s role in their perpetuation.
Aparicio has also been the target of racist criticism from Mexican actresses who are not of color.
Ahead of the Ocsars, Mexican actresses Dolores Heredia, Blanca Guerra, Regina Orozco, and Vanessa Bauche were rumored to have been part of a chat in which they wanted to ban Aparicio from being nominated for Best Actress in the Ariel Awards in Mexico, which is the equivalent to the Oscars. Most of them have since come forward to deny the accusation.
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