In The Community
With the current political climate in a state of low-key crisis, advocacy groups are intensifying their efforts to convey the importance of voting. A yearly estimate of 1.4 million Latinos become eligible to vote in the U.S., according to the Pew Research Center, yet only 22% of those Latino first-time voters are expected to cast a ballot this year and participate in U.S. democracy. Poder NC, a values-driven North Carolina nonprofit dedicated to empowering the Latine community, has taken a creative approach in trying to close the Latine voting gap.
Poder NC launched a new initiative to boost Latine voter participation through the art of the telenovela. Designed to resonate with Latine audiences and inspire civic engagement, they’ve created a mini-telenovela that uses the power of relatable storytelling to remind eligible voters how important it is to take action with their votes.
The mini-telenovela follows Alexia, a young Latina, as she navigates her personal life, workplace challenges, and her journey to becoming an informed voter. Through humor, touching moments, and references to Latino pop culture, the episodes connect with viewers on a cultural and emotional level. Through each episode, which only lasts a couple of minutes, we see Alexia go from uncertainty to confidence about her role and power in making a difference through voting.
We reached out via email to Latina activist Irene Godínez, Founder and Co-Executive Director of Poder NC, to learn more about this creative and light-hearted approach full of Latinidad. “I want viewers to feel seen and walk away feeling reinvigorated! As the story unfolds with each scene and interaction, we can also see how Alexia becomes stronger [...],” Godínez shares.
“I want the impact [of the initiative] to be for all of us to vote of course, but to make it an activity that we do together, in community! I want folks texting their friends and family to remind them to vote; I want folks to normalize talking about "taboo" topics. We can't build in isolation, we need each other,” she explains.
The final version of the telenovela, which only has an 8-minute runtime, complete with Spanish subtitles, was released on August 1, 2024. This engaging initiative is part of a broader outreach strategy targeting 150,000 "high opportunity" Latine voters in North Carolina—people who are less likely to vote but have significant potential to impact election outcomes. The strategy includes canvassing, mailers that reference the videos, digital ads, and events with beauty service businesses.
Alexia the Voter: In Our Voting Erawww.youtube.com
While the Latine electorate isn’t apathetic or indifferent to what their vote means, Poder NC has found that traditional political campaigns and organizations don’t always engage with the Latine community in a way that’s culturally relevant and relatable to them. This can lead to a feeling of exclusion from the electoral process, which is exactly what this initiative wants to prevent.
“Our voters, like all voters, deserve for us to build outreach programs that are made from a place of love and hope. At Poder NC we build our work as if it's for our loved ones because that's the level of care we have for our community, especially those we don't know by name,” states Godínez. “People are told to ‘choose the best of the two evils,’ but at Poder NC we believe in abundance and if we can imagine more options, we can activate and organize to create the necessary conditions for us to transform our communities for the better,” she shares.
The unique approach to this initiative makes it a first-of-its-kind and that’s because it’s grounded in Latino culture. “Most Latinxs are familiar with telenovelas, whether we love them or not. In order to create impact, we have to meet people where they are. We are at a point, socially and politically, where we have to try new tactics to engage and connect with our people and encourage their civic participation,” asserts Godínez.
“If we want [Latine] involvement, we must think outside the box and use this as an opportunity to lean into our robust culture to create content and programs that resonate with our community. And as corny as it sounds, we need to be building from a place of honesty and love. We can all see ourselves reflected in Alexia, especially during this election year. The novela is an opportunity, too, to create the stories that we want to see embodied in real life!” she concludes.
Poder NC has also partnered with other Latino-led organizations across the country to expand the reach of the mini-telenovela. These partners include the Arizona Center for Empowerment, Florida Rising Together, Voces de la Frontera in Wisconsin, PICO California, and the Latina Initiative in Colorado.
By leveraging these partnerships and championing Latinidad, the initiative aims to inspire Latine voters around the nation and increase turnout. This initiative is a bold new approach to increasing Latine voter participation. In combining entertainment with civic education, the organization hopes to create a more inclusive and engaged electorate, ultimately fostering a political landscape where Latine voices are heard and valued.
If you were around 2008 watching telenovelas, I bet you watched Sin Senos No Hay Paraiso. I remember catching small glimpses while hanging out with my abuela, who was an avid telenovela watcher. I was 8 at that time and the Telenovela was not PG at all, so she would tell me to go play while she watched. I remember being way too curious and wanting to see what my abuela was watching. But to be honest, it’s not like I understood any of it – but I definitely do now.
Rewatching it as an adult made me realize how heavy the topics are, and later finding out that it’s based on a real–life story had me shooketh. In case you can barely remember it, the telenovela centered around Catalina, a 17-year-old girl from Pereira, Colombia who very desperately wants to escape poverty.
In a neighborhood heavily influenced by narcotráfico, Catalina, her friends, and other girls her age are led to believe that the only way to live in the luxury that they desire is to render sexual services as “pre-paid girls” to powerful men in the drug trafficking world. If you saw the novela you probably remember that it was so normalized for them, that the novela borders on romanticizing it, but as the story unfolds and Catalina suffers so many hardships, it brings you back to the reality of what’s going on.
The telenovela is an adaptation of the book written by Gustavo Bolivar, whose intention was to showcase the struggles that some young girls face in his home country, Colombia. Bolivar’s Catalina is based on a real-life teenage girl he met while in Pereira, who told him she had gotten breast implants with money she had received in exchange for “sex”, the girl was in a critical health condition at that point, as the doctor who had performed the surgery had re-used implants on her which led to a severe infection.
There aren’t any more details surrounding the story but seeing as the book unfolds in a similar way, it seems to be a way to tell her story. The book also denounces “narco culture” and takes it down from the pedestal that topic still enjoys. It also touches on how it is directly related to the number of young girls who got breast implants in this region. Shady plastic surgeons did anything for money, including servicing the families and narcos who pimped out their daughters for money.
The whole story gets even more disturbing as you realize these are children we’re talking about.
In the book, Catalina was only 14, which leads us to assume the real-life Catalina is probably also around that age. So, the way they are portrayed in the Telenovela is disturbing, especially because of how the “romantic interests” playout, particularly the relationship between Catalina and El Titi who is one of the novela’s male leads, meant to be Catalina’s “love interest.” In the book he’s more of an antagonist which is a more accurate characterization than the romanticized version in the novela.
Their relationship is romanticized and sanitized, however the gruesome ending leaves you with a very clear message: this is tragic, and no one would want to go through all this. The book gives you that feeling from the get-go, and you can almost feel Catalina’s suffering as you can clearly see what’s going on from the beginning; no romanticizing there.
The book, the telenovela, and the movie (yes there is not only one, but two) are all interesting, but need to be consumed with a critical eye.
It’s this writer’s opinion that the ending was exactly the type of closure that the stories needed. However if you’re a fan, you know that they decided to make 3 more seasons of the telenovela. This was an interesting approach as the producers attempted to create the follow ups as “female empowerment” themed, which was a stretch. Stay tuned for that discussion here on Luz.
Did you watch Sin Senos no Hay Paraiso? Come talk to us on Twitter @luzcollective.
