Hispanic organizations in the United States are demanding changes to a new documentary about World War II that is set to run on the public television network, PBS (Public Broadcasting Service), in September. As VOA's Greg Flakus reports from Houston, producers have agreed to add material to the project, but will not change the film itself.
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That may not completely satisfy Hispanic organizations, including the National Council of La Raza and the GI Forum, a Mexican-American veterans organization that began here in Texas in 1948 to advocate for equal treatment of Hispanics at veterans' hospitals. The Ken Burns film focuses on the difficulties of black Americans and Japanese Americans during the war, but does not mention Hispanics.
Maggie Rivas Rodriguez, a journalism professor at the University of Texas in Austin, who has spent the past decade compiling oral histories from Latinos who served in the US armed forces in World War II, says they also faced discrimination.
"We have medal of honor winners who came back, wearing their uniforms, and were denied service in restaurants, over and over again," he said. "I think that is pretty interesting experience of a group."
Rivas Rodriguez says a documentary about World War II does not necessarily have to include every ethnic and racial group, but that Ken Burns set the stage for this controversy by focusing on certain ethnic groups to the exclusion of others. She says his past documentaries on jazz and baseball also failed to adequately address contributions by Latinos.
"I think, to some extent he is aware of the African-American experience and so, I think, he has included that in some of his documentaries, but I think that somehow he has a blind spot with Latinos," she said.
In a statement, Ken Burns denied having deliberately excluded any group from his documentary film and he urged people to see it before criticizing it. The film, which will not be aired on television until late September, has been shown to preview audiences in some parts of the country.
The film tells the story of the war through the perspective of four US communities: Waterbury, Connecticut; Luverne, Minnesota; Mobile, Alabama and Sacramento, California. Stories from people in those towns are used to enhance the overall story of how the war changed individual lives as well as world history.
The controversy over the exclusion of Latinos from the mix of stories had put PBS in a difficult position since a significant part of its funding comes from the federal government. In the past, conservatives have complained of a liberal bias in PBS productions, but this time it may be liberals, including members of the now-Democrat-controlled Congress, who will be calling the network on the carpet.
Several members of the House Hispanic Caucus, some of whom are veterans, have criticized PBS for omitting the contributions of Hispanics from the film and have noted that Hispanic soldiers continue to serve in harm's way, in both Iraq and Afghanistan.