This is just a quick thought that came to me while watching the new Angel Locsin and Richard Gutierrez movie, The Promise. Eloquent sentences always come to me at the most inconvenient times, and it's hard to explain the mestizo filipino in a way that is logical and easy to understand as this thought that came to me, so I thought I'd post this here before I forget it.

Many Filipinos are mestizos and have Spanish blood, most times even without realizing that they're mestizo because the thing is that some Filipinos have more European blood than others, and often, only those Filipinos are referred to as mestizos, although in traditional Spanish speaking society, they would be referred to as castizos or criollos, while those with less European blood, although are mestizos, but are never perceived as mestizos by Filipinos because of that social perception that equates being mestizo with having strong European looks, which is never always the case as most mestizos, just by looking at historic pictures of the first mestizos in the Philippines,
real mestizos look like today's normal Filipino, meaning that many Filipinos are mestizos without even realizing it because of the social perception, and also because of the historical stigma associated with having Spanish blood out of marriage (las queridas), which happened a lot in Spanish colonies, and also in the Philippines, which would've urged many Filipinos to hide their Spanish ancestry in the past to avoid the social stigma of being a querida (mistress). It's usually only the officially recognized marriages between Spanish and Malay women that are officially recognized as mestizos, because the difference is, the official marriages had the wedding documents historically to prove it, the out of wedlock mestizos born from queridas didn't, although the Spanish blood in their future children and grandchildren are just as valid and real in those Filipinos.
I know what some Filipino kids here in America who might be reading this must be thinking because as a Filipino kid who grew up here who was always mistakened as a Latino or accused of not being a real Filipino because of the prominence of Spanish ancestry in my face and for not looking "Filipino enough" and from hearing "You don't look Filipino" my entire life, I understand us very well, and I'm personally tired of hearing my fellow Fil-Am kids immediately accuse other Filipinos who engage in a discussion about this aspect of our culture as having colonial mentality. It's not colonial mentality to discuss aspects of your culture with other Filipinos so that you may better understand your own Filipino culture and enlighten yourself.
I personally don't even believe in that term "colonial mentality", because a culture is the result of it's history, period. If a people are influenced to certain beliefs and social influences, whether positive or negative, it's because of the culture they grew up in, but it doesn't mean that they're "infected" with colonial mentality and need to be cured, like many Filipinos often preach about and show in their sentiments. The funny thing about other Filipinos is that they're quick to point fingers at one another and label each other and put each other down as having colonial mentality and all that stuff, but does that actually do any good for our people as a whole? Of course not, it only spreads negativity among Filipinos, and I believe in positivity, enlightenment, and education.
To be
ilustrado to me is not to hail your social status at others, but to be
iluminated from within, to
illustrate yourself as a positive role model for other Filipinos, and that was why I created my webpage 3 years ago in 2004: Ilustrado Filipino Magazine, to counter that negativity I saw among Filipinos and to spread positivity and enlightenment about one's own Filipino culture, which seemed to me the biggest problem among Filipino youth growing up overseas, is that they're not educated enough about their own Filipino culture, so of course that would explain the lack of pride in being Filipino. And we should educate the youth, not only overseas but in the Philippines too, to be proud of their culture and to know as much about it as possible so that they're secure and confident in their beings when they present themselves to the world's society.
Boy, I was always a writer, a quick thought for me always ends up to be multiple paragraphs, but you get my drift my friends. Love you all, Mabuhay!