An old adage came to mind as I watched the Puerto Rican music superstar Bad Bunny on the most recent episode of “Saturday Night Live”: Behind every laugh there is a kernel of truth.
And one sketch in particular struck a chord, as a pair of Latino characters bristled at the suggestion that a family member was seeking help for his depression. A single line, played for laughs, summed up a dispiriting reality about Latino culture’s attitude toward mental health.
While cookie tins might look like one thing on the outside, they can have a hidden secret inside.
In the sketch, “The Last of Us”-star Pedro Pascal reprises his role as Ms. Flores from “Protective Mom,” a skit from an earlier episode that he hosted. This week’s sequel introduces Bad Bunny as Ms. Flores’ sister, Kia, and follows the original’s structure: When Luis (played by Marcello Hernandez) brings his white girlfriend, Casey (played by Chloe Troast), home to his Latino family, his mother and aunt surreptitiously disapprove of the relationship, throwing Spanglish shade at her even as they reassure her that she’s not the topic of conversation. (“Saturday Night Live” is a product of NBCUniversal, the parent company of MSNBC.)
The sketch starts off with a lighthearted, culturally specific bit: Casey offers Ms. Flores a tin of butter cookies as a present. Pascal opens the tin, dumps out the cookies and replaces them with sewing materials — a phenomenon that is instantly recognizable to many Latino households. After the opening bit, the skit veers into its main gag, as the sisters make fun of Casey in Spanish, often ending their remarks with an English phrase that raises Casey’s suspicions. For example, when Casey says she works for her father’s nonprofit, Pascal launches into a tirade in Spanish that ends with “nepo baby,” joking about Casey buying all of her food at Trader Joe’s while Bad Bunny comments on her “flat butt.”
The sequel also brings back another joke from the original, but with a twist. In the earlier sketch, when Luis’ girlfriend lets slip that Luis is taking medication for attention deficit disorder, Pascal retorts: “My son does not have ADD. He just likes to jump.” In this sketch, when Casey mentions Luis’ depression, Pascal responds angrily: “My son does not have depression. He just likes the dark.”
Just as with the cookie tin sewing kit, the joke resonated for many Latinos. While cookie tins might look like one thing on the outside, they can have a hidden secret inside. So it is with many Latino families when it comes to mental health.
Some Latino people will avoid seeking mental health treatment, believing that it might bring shame to their loved ones.
Social stigma against seeking treatment for mental health has been well documented in Latino communities. As a consequence, some people fear that a mental health diagnosis means they could be perceived as dangerous, violent, incapable of getting better, or simply incapable of anything, according to Medical News Today. That perception is extremely important here, as it can make the community’s response appear worse than the diagnosis itself. In some Latino communities, the value of familismo, or family unity, can take priority over an individual’s needs. Because of that stigma, then, some Latino people will avoid seeking mental health treatment, believing that it might bring shame to their loved ones.
That that stigma is a barrier between Latinos and mental health care is alarming, especially given the rates of depression and anxiety among the many ethnic groups under this umbrella. A 2014 study from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine found that 27% of Latino people reported high levels of depression, with 38% of Puerto Ricans alone experiencing high levels of depression. Those numbers outpace concurrent depression rates nationwide, though it should be noted that in the last few years, given the state of the world, depression rates in America have increased. A 2021 study estimated that just under 7% of Latinos had experienced a major depressive episode in 2019, which works out to as many as 4.1 million people. The 2014 study also found that while 27% of Latinos reported major depression, only 5% of the sample were using antidepressants, a rate that changed depending on whether the respondent had insurance. In fact, structural issues like access to insurance can affect Latinos at every stage of a mental health journey. It’s well known that, despite the assumption that mental health is an individual problem, structural inequalities and health disparities are a major factor in mental health, meaning that Latino people, who experience racial discrimination, low wages and other structural issues, are more likely to develop mental health issues. And social stigma contributes to the likelihood they won’t seek treatment as often as the general population, which turns depression and anxiety into problems that can eventually become debilitating. It was fitting for Bad Bunny to be featured in a second outing of the “Protective Mom” sketch, since he has been upfront about his own experience with depression. In 2018, he released the song “Estamos Bien,” along with a message to fans on social media that read, “Many times we’re sad and we don’t know why and it’s simply because we forget about the simple things in life. I’m human just like you! And even though I’ve done many big things there are smaller ones that I have yet to achieve. And it’s those smaller things that give happiness.” Bunny revealed to People en Español in 2021 that he put his career on hold from 2016 to 2018 to treat his depression. Bad Bunny’s frankness about his mental health is breaking the taboo for Latino people. Seeing him address the issue with humor on television was heartening, even if Bunny’s advocacy makes clear that there’s a lot of work to be done to make sure we can get ourselves to the therapist’s office. Just as much work needs to be done by care providers to make sure that mental health care is accessible, culturally competent and capable of understanding the specific context for Latino people who seek mental health care.
Mathew Rodriguez
Mathew Rodriguez is a queer journalist and essayist who is currently the associate editor of The Body, an HIV/AIDS news website. His writing has been featured in Mic, Out, INTO, Slate, The Village Voice and POZ. 
