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As a teenager in the 鈥�90s, I looked forward to finishing my homework early nearly every night so I could watch a telenovela with my mom and abuelita. Latin American soap operas captured my imagination most when their melodrama and magical realism addressed social issues. As a queer Latinx youth from Colombia, I sat riveted to the screen when the characters struggled with classism, immigration, and racism. But I was disillusioned because the few queer characters who took center stage reinforced stereotypes and provided comic relief.

In reality, queer Latinx youth are much more complex. A 2019 focus group we conducted with parents, youth, health providers, and educators in Corvallis and Portland, Oregon, found that queer Latinx youth can face dual forces of isolation. They experience racism and xenophobia within queer spaces, and transphobia and homophobia in ethnic community spaces. At the intersection of queer and Latinx communities, we found that these youth experience identity strain that leaves them feeling unworthy and lacking someone in whom to confide.

Believing their isolation is a result of being timid, introverted, or having inadequate social skills, the queer Latinx youth in the focus group blamed themselves. Their reaction is consistent with findings about queer youth in general: pervasive social isolation and rejection drive them to feel .

Queer youth of color need a change of narrative. As director of the Engaging the Next Latinx Allies for Change and Equity (ENLACE) program, with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, I set out to create a telenovela starring queer Latinx youth in their own stories of bravery. The newly launched 聽can be found on YouTube (and here on the YES! site). The videos are all created by queer Latinx youth who participated in a filmmaking workshop led by 听补苍诲 , where I am an assistant professor and director of the Global Health Program.

Parents of queer Latinx youth, along with other family and friends, have a powerful opportunity to be their children鈥檚 advocates.

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The episodes include the story of Nat, an 18-year-old born in Portland, Oregon, who uses they/them pronouns. They are a person with a physical disability, severe social anxiety, and bipolar disorder. Nat explains, 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think I鈥檇 last very long if I didn鈥檛 have access to health care.鈥澛�

Their father was deported to Mexico when Nat was 2. Their mother is White. In Nat鈥檚 telenovela, their mom draws a grotesque parallel between traversing the gender binary and crossing the U.S.-Mexico border: 鈥溾�楾hey鈥� isn鈥檛 a real thing,鈥� Nat鈥檚 mother proclaims. 鈥淣o one鈥檚 gonna respect you if you live in some kinda fantasy world. You are just like your father. Like, what did he think? He could cross the border and live in some magical world. And where is he now? He鈥檚 in Mexico. There are boys, and there are girls.鈥�

Nat demands that their mom support them: 鈥淚t is hard enough dealing with people outside of this house, but coming home and still not feeling safe and accepted鈥攊t鈥檚 too much.鈥�

Nat鈥檚 interaction with their mom raises an important point about queer Latinx youth: Their parents, along with other family and friends, have a powerful opportunity to be their children鈥檚 advocates. Many Latinx parents in the ENLACE community advisory board grappled with traditional Catholic teaching that homosexuality is a sin; however, they held that no matter what, no child should be made to feel so alone that they attempt suicide. A found that 40% of LGBTQ youth and 52% of transgender and nonbinary youth have seriously considered suicide.

When people share personal journeys of marginalization, even others who do not share their precise identity can find solidarity.

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When I came out at the age of 13, my abuelita moved our family to an independent Catholic Church, not affiliated with Rome, that welcomed LGBTQ people. To let me know she understood how it felt to be rejected, she bravely told me the story of having been excommunicated in Colombia because she wanted to start contraceptives after almost dying when she had her 10th child. As both my grandmother and the queer Latinx protagonists in the videos show, when people share personal journeys of marginalization, even others who do not share their precise identity can find solidarity. 

As such, the youth who created these telenovela-inspired videos hope they can be used as part of a toolkit to train allies or strengthen intersectional brave spaces. For example, the youth believe the videos can be used to amplify representation of queer youth of color in institutional settings, including , Genders and Sexualities Alliances (GSAs) in schools and family support groups (such as ) across the country. Together, the series explores school bullying, family rejection, self-harm, and crossing the U.S.-Mexico border鈥攁ll to let youth with similar experiences know 鈥渢here鈥檚 a whole community out there,鈥� they are not 鈥渁lien,鈥� and they do not have to feel alone.

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