Why We Would Rather People Stop Comparing Sotomayor To Other Latinas

MSNBC has a post on who they think would be a good choice to play Sonia Sotomayor should a biopic ever come to fruition. Among their selections are such disparate faces and personalities as Judge Judy (She’s a judge! Who is thought to be kind of mean! And - spoiler alert - has a vagina!), Alyssa Milano (We wonder if they’re aware that she’s Italian-American, not Puerto Rican.), Tyler Perry (What woman wouldn’t be flattered?), Rosie Perez, Roselyn Sanchez, and Jennifer Lopez, among others. And we get that such lists are fun and light-hearted and get people to chime in and participate but, you know. This sucks.

It’s akin to assuming that the only two black people at a party are related, or asking being asked if you know “So-and-so Rodriguez” because you, too, have a Hispanic last name. Rosie Perez, Jennifer Lopez and Sonia Sotomayor do not look alike. They do not have similar mannerisms or speech patterns. They’d had different goals, different life experiences. To insinuate that these women are at all interchangeable is to state that there is nothing more to a person beyond their lack of “whiteness” and, perhaps, their gender. It reduces them to a caricature, and not distinct individuals. Which is why, we suspect, it’s so easy to label these women as somehow being inherently funny for their differences:

Close your eyes and imagine how she would say the following sentence in her distinctively heavy Brooklyn accent: “Thank you, Mr. President, for the most humbling honor of my life.” The intentions would be honorable, but unintentional hilarity factor could be high.

Because people with Brooklyn accents can’t be Supreme Court Justices! Duh!

Who would star in the Sonia Sotomayor biopic? [MSNBC]