![]() ![]() The magic here is that it all seems effortless. I am taken in by the constructed perfection, disposable incomes spent creating scenic paintings in three dimensions. The newly painted wood of a ranch-style home in tonier neighborhoods of suburban Arizona the windows freshly washed, reflecting back mirror images of trimmed oaks and maples in greater Denver. There are the sculpted bushes and trees you see in the most affluent corners of Southern California and southern Connecticut. In the class structure of this country, the role of Latino people is to build the movie set of white perfection again and again. ![]() When I wander into these neighborhoods in real life, they do, in fact, have the otherworldly feel of a movie set. When the movie camera enters into the homes themselves, we see carpeted spaces, and polished dining-room tables, and mom at work in the kitchen in heels and an apron. ![]() Or the curving suburban tract of an early Spielberg drama, with cul-de-sacs and boys pumping the pedals on their bicycles to go faster. The kind you might see decorated with plastic reindeer at Christmastime, holiday lights dangling from the pitched roofs. The self-image of the “white” American middle class, as depicted in film and on television ad nauseam, begins with a block of large, orderly homes with big lawns. ![]()
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