When Puerto Rican-born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio — higher referred to as Unhealthy Bunny — walked onto the Grammy stage on the finish of the evening, tears coming down his face, he was holding greater than a historic album of the 12 months statuette.
Unhealthy Bunny held the load of each abuela who crossed a border with little greater than hope and dedication. He held each father who was detained on his method to work. He held each little one who now fears the sound of a knock on the door. And most of all, it was for everybody who has been disparaged for his or her language, their music and their tradition. Bear in mind the vile “joke” about Puerto Rico heard at Donald Trump’s October 2024 presidential marketing campaign rally?
However not tonight.
Unhealthy Bunny’s smash album “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” (“I Ought to Have Taken Extra Photographs”) grew to become the primary primarily Spanish-language album to win the Grammy for album of the 12 months. After many years of Latin artists shaping the sound of American music, after generations of our tales being informed, our rhythms borrowed, our tradition consumed, the business’s highest honor lastly went to an album sung within the language our moms pray in. Sunday evening’s Grammys belonged to Unhealthy Bunny. However in addition they belonged to all of us. Nonetheless, the win tastes bittersweet at the moment.
Our communities are below siege from the Trump administration’s merciless marketing campaign of terror round immigration enforcement. But each motion has a second when ache transforms into energy. We are able to solely think about that in the intervening time Unhealthy Bunny’s identify was referred to as, ICE brokers have been tearing households aside throughout the nation. The Trump administration’s assault on Latino communities has created a local weather of terror, one designed to erase us and make us really feel invisible.
Greg Swales for Selection
In opposition to that backdrop, Unhealthy Bunny’s declaration earlier within the evening — “ICE out. We’re not savages. We’re not animals. We’re not aliens” — landed as a rallying cry. He’s about to step on a fair larger stage subsequent Sunday because the star performer within the Tremendous Bowl Halftime present. And nonetheless, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio wants to inform America: “We’re not savages.”
Personally, the strain of this second felt unbearably near dwelling for my household and me.
Earlier on Sunday, my spouse and I watched a video from our previous neighborhood in Jersey Metropolis Heights, mere blocks from our former dwelling and my in-laws. We watched in horror as a lady recorded an encounter with a Spanish-speaking man being handcuffed by an ICE agent. She requested his identify and his date of delivery. He pulled down his face protecting — it was 10 levels that day — so she may see him clearly, so he might be adequately recognized.
Then the person broke free for a second and ran.
The ICE agent caught him and would return to mock the girl recording, telling her to “get a job.” As the person was being walked again to the agent’s unmarked automotive with no license plate, he noticed one other Latino approaching and yelled, “¡Corre!” — run. He was taken away. As of this writing, we don’t know the place he’s.
The merciless irony is unattainable to disregard: on the identical evening American music’s most prestigious establishment affirmed that our artwork belongs on the pinnacle of inventive achievement, our communities are being informed we don’t belong right here in any respect.
However there’s one factor they’ll by no means take from us: our voice. When Unhealthy Bunny spoke, he did so in Spanish. He was unapologetic and highly effective.
He thanked God, the Recording Academy, his mom, and his collaborators. He additionally gave us the important thing message all of us wanted to listen to: “Hate will get extra highly effective with extra hate. The one factor extra highly effective than hate is love.”
In dedicating his award to “all of the individuals who needed to go away their homeland and nation to comply with their desires,” Unhealthy Bunny articulated the soul of “Debí Tirar Más Fotos.” The album is about nostalgia, Puerto Rico and the ache of what’s misplaced and the struggle to recollect. It’s about capturing moments earlier than they slip away, and preserving reminiscence within the face of erasure.
Unhealthy Bunny didn’t simply win for himself. He gained for fellow Boricua Marc Anthony. For Cubana Celia Cruz. For all of the legends who paved roads they by no means acquired to stroll themselves.
When Unhealthy Bunny mentioned, “We’re People,” he asserted a fact that shouldn’t want defending. Our American-ness shouldn’t be up for debate. We’re not company to be tolerated. Our labor constructed this nation, and our tradition enriches it.
ICE out. Love in.
