Soon there will be a new news network in town. As you’ve probably already heard, Univision and ABC have decided to come together to create a brand new television channel that will cater specifically to one demographic and one demographic alone. English-speaking Latinos who prefer to obtain their news en ingles rather than español. While the project sounds incredibly interesting, it also begs the question what exactly to these English-speaking Latinos want? Do we really need another news channel dedicated only to Latino news?
Myself, I don’t really watch the news much these days. Except for CNN, most of the news I consume comes from the internet. More specifically from social media networks like Facebook and Twitter. There’s a certain control in knowing that the power is in my hands to decide what I do want to watch and when. Today, for example, me perdi JLO’s performance on American Idol, but as soon as I got home I watched it on YouTube. Her entire participation on Q’Viva The Chosen still shows up crystal clear on my Univision app. I don’t even have to watch the stinking commercials if I don’t want to!
What makes these shows addicting for me – more so Q’Viva than Idol – is that they are innovative in their own right. No longer are we watching the Puerto Rican cashier on South Central, the Mexican housemaid or nanny taking care of children and homes that are not her own, the shady Latino who’s always up to no good on TV dramas and film. There’s a deeper connection with the Latinos on screen these days. They’re spicing up scripts and transcripts with Spanglish and Spanish. They’re talking about and starring alongside families like our own. A few – i.e. Jenni Rivera – are even opening up the same kinds of businesses we might have had or wanted to have one day. You can’t buy that type of connection! Okay, that one could just be me since my family also owned a taco truck once upon a time.
So how does that translate to the news we consume?
I honestly don’t know. What I do know is that whatever consumption we will be expected to partake in should reflect, more and more on an increasing level, who we are as a people and a community. There aren’t really any hard and fast rules, but it’s nice to know the big players are willing to at least try.