The Docile Puerto Rican and other Myths
It is nearly a historical cliche to depict the Puerto Rican as a docile and innocent fellow who is commonly taken advantage of by outsiders. Arlene Davila's anthropologicla studies of Puerto Rican television reveals how this cliche appear again and agian, particulalry between Don Epifanio and a slick newyorican fellow who repeatedly steals his money in some fasion or other. Sadly, I witnessed this phenomenon while living in the United States, of a good-natured Puerto Rican girl who was clearly being monpolized by a Venezuelan girlfriend who was much more astute ('lista') than she was. The case of Hector Lavoe is perhaps the most well-known public example, from the bits and pieces of biographical information that have surfaced since Mark Anthony's new movie. Mixing with individuals who were not genuinely concerned for his well being, Lavoe entered a life of drug abuse that led to his AIDS and eventual death. (Nobody who insists on your taking morphine is your friend.) While we may question the accuracy of the myth given its inherent degradation of what has clearly been a national virtue (the stimulaiton of morally inclined indivdiuals), the cliche hides a much more worrisome broader cultural phenomenon: its gradual dissapearance with the modernization of the Puerto Rican economy. If the functionalists are correct in noting the mutually interlocking elemetns of societies, then one might validly argue that the violent statistics throughout the 20th century are a sad indiciation of the general economic development of the island. Puerto Ricans are neither innocent nor docile as the cliche suggest; and they will actually become less so in the future.