Mexican actor Diego Luna says he’s “benefited from a racist system,” and is calling on white people to renounce those benefits to help promote racial justice.
In an interview the Daily Beast, Luna discussed Pan y Circo, an upcoming Amazon Prime show where esteemed guests are invited to dine and discuss a variety of important issues including the coronavirus, drug trafficking, climate change, and abortion. “From the collection of table discussions, privilege emerges as a pungent through-line exposing our biases and blind spots: the privilege of being male in patriarchal societies, the privilege to cross the border legally, the privilege of being white in a racist country, or the privilege to use drugs recreationally,” reads the outlet’s description of Luna’s series.
Episode seven looks at the topics of identity and racism and how indigenous and black cultures are supposedly dismissed in modern society.
“I’ve benefited from a racist system my whole life. Not only do we have to renounce those benefits but first we need to be conscious of them. That’s a part of reality that I had decided not to see,” said Luna in the interview. “I don’t have answers right now, but at least I’m already asking myself the questions. And I think that’s a good first step.”
Watch below:
Luna, who is best known in America for his role as the Mexican drug lord Juan Felix Gallardo in Netflix’s Narcos and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, was asked by the interviewer whether his talk show could ever invite someone like President Donald Trump to discuss pressing issues.
“No. I mean, it could be possible, but I don’t want to waste my time. For me Pan y Circo has to be a space that doesn’t amplify toxic voices, that doesn’t promote ignorance or selfishness,” the actor said. “Ours is a table where guests are willing to connect empathically with those who think differently and give themselves the opportunity to listen and understand the other’s position, maybe not share it, but start with understanding what the other has to say.”
“It’s not about generating sensationalist clashes. This is not The Jerry Springer Show,” he continued. “It’s about combating the polarization that’s happening everywhere, which scares me a lot because there might be a point when that distance we’ve created between each other will be irreparable. That’s very dangerous.”
It is not the first time that Luna has criticized the sitting U.S. president. In 2018, he slammed the administration’s policy on the separation of families crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.
“What’s been in happening in this country these last few days, this cruelty cannot be accepted or tolerated,” he said at the time. “We have to remind ourselves that we are the ones telling our stories, so we have to be telling the stories of the invisible so they can be visible.”
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