Founded in 1986, the National Hispanic Media Coalition (NHMC) has waged over 27 years of media advocacy work on behalf of the Latino community. Alex Nogales, current President and CEO of the NHMC, has led several successful campaigns to dismantle negative stereotypes surrounding Latinos. Namely, he has fought to change the perception of Latinos on the media front by fostering strategic relationships, and a ‘memorandum of understanding’ with major news media outlets.
What continues to be the most pressing media-related issue facing Latinos today and why?
Hate Speech, that is our number one agenda item—because of its relationship to hate crimes against Latinos. We saw hate speech go up on radio when we had the immigration demonstrations five or six years ago. DJs took on the issue, and very quickly started blaming the Latino community—not only for that issue, but for education, and for anything wrong with every realm of activity. Correspondingly, we saw that the FBI numbers for hate crimes against Latinos increased. That was of great concern to us. We all know that how we are perceived is always going to be the way that we are treated. And we know that SB 1070 in Arizona didn’t just happen. It happened because there were people fanning the flames of intolerance, the flames of anti-Latino, anti-immigrant feelings.
How would you describe Latino awareness for the media-related issues raised by your organization?
Fifteen years ago it was about health and education—the hardcore kinds of things. We kept saying ‘but guys, we can’t get anything accomplished unless we have media thats going to be with us, and that is going to reflect our values, going to reflect the way we are.’
As time goes along, people will be acting better and better because they see it. We have pointed it out to them. You have more and more nonprofit and civil rights organizations taking this on. It’s like everyone is coming to the same conclusion.
Over the years the coalition has had some success with campaigns it waged, but, which one has been the most notable and why?
I can’t tell anymore because we get so many victories and each one has it’s own weight, it’s own good moments. I can remember when we used to lose the majority of them, where it was an uphill battle. When we called the brown out, and we had to battle Disney and ABC—signing the memorandums of understanding with ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX in the year 2000–2001 was a big win. We did it with the assistance of coalitions. We are very good at forming coalitions. Coalitions work. Getting the inclusion of 22 Latinos into the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was a big win.
Recently, the New York Times refused to issue a directive to its reporters that they refrain from using “illegal” when referring to undocumented immigrants. What is your organization’s position and is there an orchestrated campaign already underway to challenge that decision?
“Illegal.” The “I” word was not an issue that I wanted to get into. And we did a poll last year with Latino decisions in the Bay Area—we wanted to know what non-Latinos thought about Latinos. What came back was astounding. Over 30 percent of non-Latinos across the nation felt that over 50 percent of Latinos residing in the United States were here without documentation.
People get their news and perceptions about other people in four different ways: through film, print, radio, and television. What we found was that people that watched Fox news nationally were more prone to think negatively about Latinos than any other group.
They felt that we were crime invested and that we all came from a gang background. That we were not patriotic—I mean all these ridiculous claims and assumptions about us. We didn’t have a choice, we had to get into the “I” word.
So I went to the Associated Press, the New York Times, and the LA times, the Orange County Register, to the San Diego Tribune. We had a conversation with each outlet. We did that and then we moved on because there are other people working on this—we have a bigger agenda than they do at this point.