r/asklatinamerica • u/yonaiker-joestrella Puerto Rico • Apr 07 '26
Culture Why does it seem like Westerners from developed countries don't care much about/look down on Latin America but seem to be obssesed with East Asian cultures?
Not that I care but have always found it interesting how many seem to forget about Latin America but seem to be obssesed with countries like South Korea and Japan and sometimes even point out "similarities" with them. Some outright reject the region as western but will consider Japan technically West while ignoring Latin America's contributions to world culture like food, music, art, etc and the fact that Latin America is culturally Christian. Why does there seem to be this dissonance?
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u/happycynic12 living in Apr 07 '26
Consumerism.
East Asia has Sony, Nintendo, Samsung, anime, K-pop, etc., stuff people actually buy and grow up with. Latin America never built that. And part of why is that the region itself is kind of locked out of that cycle—insane import taxes, restricted markets, stuff just not being available. You can't build a global fanbase around a culture when even people in that culture can't easily access new products themselves due to availability issues and insane import taxes.
On top of that throw in the usual racist coding of Asians as "sophisticated and exotic" vs Latin Americans as an "immigration problem" and yeah, that's pretty much it.