Why I’m Writing Essays

I’ve been thinking a lot about why I’m even doing this… writing essays. It’s not for clout or clicks. It’s partly selfish, but I’m mitigating that by not promoting these at all. They’ll be published quietly on my personal site, and that’s it. I’m trying to think out loud, trying to make sense of what I’m seeing around me.

But deeper than that, I think it’s because of a quiet trend in the Hispanic community that’s been bothering me: anti-intellectualism.

“But Jonathan, what do you mean?” you might ask. My parents and family encouraged me to go to college, get a reputable degree, and to salir adelante. And to you, kind reader, I say you’re right. What you’re describing is education. I’m not worried about anti-education; that part is covered. What I’m referring to is intellect, the ability to think, reason, and understand. Abilities you (hopefully) learn in school.

These abilities aren’t meant to be exercised only in work or academia. Yet when you use them at home, they’re rarely celebrated. More often, they’re challenged.

You come to a disagreement with a relative, and they argue using every logical fallacy you can name, circular reasoning, appeal to emotion, ad hominem, all of it. You point it out respectfully, and suddenly you’re the arrogant one.

It’s confusing. For years, education has been the golden path, the reason your parents left their country. But the moment you start applying what you learned to real-world ideas, not just exams, you’re met with resistance.

I don’t think this comes from ignorance or bad intent. I think it comes from survival. Most Hispanic families didn’t grow up in systems that rewarded questioning or nuance. Asking your parents “why” was almost always met with “because I said so,” which is never really an answer. I don’t blame them. Children ask endless questions, and it can be exhausting. But I challenge parents: instead of dismissing curiosity with the usual response, try entertaining the question, especially when it carries thought and sincerity.

And to the parents reading this, realizing their shortcomings, whose kids are already grown, don’t beat yourself up. You did what you knew. You did what worked. You complied because compliance worked for so long. But now, as more of us enter the worlds of startups, finance, and entrepreneurship, that mindset does not fit anymore. These spaces are built on experimentation and argument. They reward ideas, not hierarchy. If you can’t challenge or be challenged, you can’t grow.

And that’s the second reason I’m writing essays. The number of Hispanics in the startup or financial space is small, meek, really. I can count them on one hand at most events I attend. So, part of this is about leaving breadcrumbs for whoever comes next, for that younger version of me who wanted to make a change.

I want to show that thinking deeply, writing clearly, and building ambitious (even borderline delusional) things aren’t traits reserved for one group of people. If you grow up in a culture that values hard work but quietly dismisses intellectual work, you start to believe that reflection is a luxury. That writing about ideas isn’t “real work.” But the truth is, reflection is labor, just invisible labor. It’s how ideas get refined, and how cultures evolve.

And I do want to warn you, kind reader, beware the pseudo-intellectual. You see them everywhere now, people who have memorized the language of thought but can’t exercise the ideas they promote. It’s easy to quote philosophers; it’s harder to challenge your own thinking with the same rigor you apply to others.

The goal isn’t to sound correct, it’s to understand.

So, I’m writing essays because someone in our community needs to. Not because I think I have the answers, but because I think we need more questions.