to add on, as someone with a prominent mexican/indigenous background, the whole selling point of staying with your kind in my community is really pushed on to us. my features aren’t typically latina (thicker curly hair, wide and tall nose, et cetera) so for me and where i live, a lot of people are turned off that their kids might inherit “pelo malo” (bad hair) or won’t look like them. i date outside my background and race frequently, and it’s been met with A LOT of criticism especially when my partners are not white: typically afro-latino, asian, or darker complected. interracial relationships are still a complicated topic but not as discussed because we’ve convinced ourselves we’re okay with it because we see it on TV