Talking about privilege is not easy for most people. But for Kat Lazo, it’s just another day on the job. The director, producer and host for Mitu, a media company with a focus on Latino audiences, came to Bradley Monday. She spoke on issues facing the Latinx community.
The event filled the seats in the Michel Student Center Ballroom, even if half of the students came for extra credit, as Lazo joked about. In addition to a Latinx presence in the room, there was a diverse audience ready to hear about the elephant in the room for another culture.
“Lazo was chosen to come to campus because she is very knowledgeable on issues found within Latinx culture,” said Abigail Fuentes, senior family and consumer science major. “She is most famously known for her series ‘The Kat Call’ featured on Mitu, where she debunks common taboos [and] misconceptions found within the Latinx community.”
As Lazo explained in her presentation, she was invited to create content for Mitu but wanted to do it on her own terms. She decided to expand from one demographic, looking at multiple ethnicities and backgrounds to elaborate on hard hitting issues.
Although the title “The Kat Call, Calling Us Out” can sound daunting, Lazo informally adds “With Love” to the title to expand the importance of changing these aspects of the culture.
“It’s concentrated on holding Latinx folks accountable to the ways we can hold both privilege and oppression,” Lazo said. “Only when we acknowledge that we have both will we be closer to liberation and freedom.”
The slideshow for the night covered how people holding toxic traits can hurt the individual and others and how these issues can be resolved. These issues can be taboo, but for people looking from the outside, who never had to deal with such topics, it can give them perspective.
“I thought she sent out a powerful message tonight,” junior psychology major Isabella Pumo said. “There’s something for not just the Latino community to learn about but for everyone else that came here tonight. The white community, black community or even other communities came here and learned s o m e t h i n g new tonight.”
