The first episode of the Disney show “¡Primos!” is scheduled to broadcast on Jan. 19, 2024. However, the theme song was released earlier this year in June to a substantial amount of outrage.
Firstly, the Spanish grammar is incorrect. The main phrase in the theme song, “¡Oye primos!” – translating to “Hey cousins!” – is conjugated wrongly. Due to the plural form of cousin, the word “hey” must be plural to match. Therefore, changing “oye” into “oigan,” and creating the correct saying: “Oigan primos”. To make matters worse, this phrase references the title of the show. It is what a majority of the public uses to reference the show and considers the extended, unofficial title. When people imagine Disney’s Hispanic representation, the first image will be that of careless spelling.
Executive Producer and Creator of Primos, Natasha Kline, attempts to clear up this controversy. “The main character, Tater, doesn’t speak Spanish. That’s why she says ‘oye primos,’ because it’s obviously wrong,” Kline said. (Interview with NEWS X MUSE, June 16, 2023) Still, this doesn’t explain why other characters sing along to this mistaken expression.
Secondly, Disney seemingly gave zero regard for accurately representing Hispanic names. In the theme song, the cousins of the main character are introduced. There is a substantial number of notable ones, to say the least.
Going down the roster, some of the first names that ring alarm bells are “Nacho,” and “Nachito” (“Little Nacho”). These names perpetuate stereotypes regarding Hispanic people. Giving them ingenuine names is incredibly dehumanizing and makes the characters seem more like caricatures and erases the immense history and culture behind Hispanic names. There are a variety of great options to give to these characters, which have been reused for generations. The writers knew this, as other characters have typical names, such as “Anita” or “Ted.” And yet, they continued to select the worst ones available.
However, those are not the worst of them. Following down the list of characters, two young girls are named highly inappropriately. Starting with the first girl’s name: “Ch*cha,” is a shortened version of the word “Muchacha,” while in certain countries it can mean “young woman,” particularly in Mexico, it can translate as “woman servant.” In other words, this startling name is considered a slur in Mexico by many, and has been used in the past to demean and humiliate female maids, or women in poverty who perform domestic work. The second girl’s name, “Cookita,” sounds very similar to the Spanish slang word for the female reproductive part, “Cuquita.” To make matters even worse, this character is a baby.
These names simply emphasize the little amount of attention and thought put into the making of this show. The goal of their names is unclear – but whether they were meant to be comedic or purely an uneducated action, it is still incredibly harmful to Hispanic depiction in media and an undeniably sloppy job done by Disney.
Thirdly, the designs of the characters are tasteless. Multiple cousins are drawn fat with unibrows. It brings us back to the times of Jim Crow when, coincidentally, racist cartoons depicted Mexicans as ugly or dirty. Although the personality designs of the characters are also glaring. The characters act rowdily and uncontrollably. This once again pushes the stereotype that Mexicans are loud, discourteous, untamed or uneducated.
This is not how you do representation. If this show releases, there will be a generation of kids potentially using this as their first introduction to Latinx and Hispanic culture and the myriad of children who will see this awful mimicry of themselves. This could heavily damage the minds of our youth, and start their lives off with skewed perceptions of these communities.
In conclusion, “¡Primos!” is an obscenely offensive show, which maintains and preserves harmful stereotypes and inaccurately portrays the Hispanic community. It is going to need a lot of improvement if Disney expects a successful release of the full show.
