As Tourism Booms in Latin America, Sexual Harassment Against Latinas Has Too

On a Friday night in 2023, Monique Brasil, a 37-year-old Black community organizer, entered a swanky club in the Brazilian city of São Paulo for a lively night with friends. As she approached the bar for a drink, a stranger came up to her, asking in an accent: “How much?”

She immediately discerned the situation: The man was a foreigner who had confused her for a sex worker. Startled, Brasil retreated to her friend group and decided to cut the night short. But as she left, the man trailed behind her and reached with his hand for her tightly curled locks. 

“I was kind of scared,” Brasil tells Refinery29 Somos. While she considered confronting him, she knew she was at a disadvantage. “Many times when you say something to a man who is harassing you at the club and he’s a foreigner and white, you end up being the one at risk of being reported by the club. Not the white guy with money,” she explains.

After noticing the presence of her male friends, the stranger disappeared back into the club, but the events of that night and the fear and outrage they inspired stayed with her. 

As Latin America undergoes a tourism boom, an increasing number of visitors are American and European men looking to date or engage in casual sex with Latinas. Foreigners crop up routinely on apps like Tinder and Bumble. Guides to romancing Latin American women have multiplied online. And the Passport Bros — a movement of U.S. men going overseas for love — has soared in popularity, their videos obtaining millions of views on TikTok and YouTube. 

But Latinas are now increasingly opening up about the unsettling experiences they’ve had with travelers. Some women, like Brasil, have been subjected to unwelcome comments and contact. Others have recoiled at the stereotypes that shape the way they approach Latinas. Now, some women are sharing their personal accounts on social media and opening up conversations about a largely normalized — and unspoken — facet of tourism in Latin America.

Andrea Guzmán, a 34-year-old yoga instructor, posted a TikTok video in 2023 about the Passport Bros after hearing of the sexist stereotypes they use in Mexico City, one of the new epicenters of Latin America’s tourism boom. In theory, the Passport Bros are pursuing love. But in practice, dating a Latina seems like another box on their to-do list, Guzmán tells Somos. 

As a Mexico City native, Guzmán has seen the number of foreigners on dating apps and in upscale clubs explode over the years. But the trend is harmful partly because of the stereotypes that underlie it, she says. Foreigners will come up to her with one-liners like, “You’re caliente,” and reference stereotypes about Latin American women being overtly sexual. 

In the TikTok video, which garnered more than 30,000 views, Guzmán addresses her followers with a warning: “They don’t see you as their equal. They’re consuming you based on a stereotype that is completely erroneous, and we can’t allow this to continue happening.” 

The hypersexual Latina stereotype is pervasive throughout Latin America and has made life harder for Yahira Montoya, a 20-year-old tour guide in Medellín, Colombia. Ever since tourism picked up after a months-long lockdown, Montoya has noticed a shift in the men attending her weekly food tours. In 2021, she recalled that the new arrivals were flirtier, invited her often to drinks, and peppered conversations with questions like, “Wouldn’t you like to live in the U.S.?” 

Montoya, who was then 17, was taken aback that men double and triple her age were so forward with a teenager. She began opening her tours with a memo about her age, reminding the men in attendance that she was a minor. But when the harassment persisted, Montoya quit the tours altogether. The men, she says, had become “too dirty.”

“They think that we’re just objects for their entertainment. That’s it,” Montoya adds.

Some women like Brasil believe it’s the government’s job to address sexual harassment by tourists, an issue she’s increasingly spoken up about on her TikTok account. In March 2023, the Brazilian government launched a campaign advising that sexual harassment and exploitation are crimes under Brazilian law — a rule applicable even to tourists. While the sight of Americans and Europeans courting young women along scenic beaches has long been commonplace in the country, Brazil has warned that it will not tolerate harassment. 

But Brasil says the government should do much more to prevent sexual harassment. As a result of the country’s colonial history, “There’s a general understanding that white men can do no wrong” and that Latin American women should quietly accept unwanted advances. Since marrying a tourist can be a ticket out of poverty, some may also view a tourist’s flirting as an economic opportunity, she says.

“We should invest in the education of girls and women to change their mindset and to teach that they shouldn’t accept harassment or violence just because it’s a white foreigner,” she says.

For Montoya, foreigners should also understand that Latin American women deserve respect. While older foreigners harassed her at work, she often thought that these men would not behave in the same way at home. “They probably have daughters the same age as me, and I wonder if they would feel okay with their daughters hearing all the things they say to us,” she says. “And if they would be capable of doing this exact same thing in their own country. I would like for them to see us as intelligent people, as capable people, as working people, as normal humans like anyone else.”