Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Plural form of wetback; a slur towards persons of Mexican descent in the United States

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The argument "we can't afford to pay a U.S. citizen a fair wage, so let's legalize (and then get rid of when the crops are in) some wetbacks" is a thinly disguised argument for the greed of U.S. citizens for cheap produce, and of U.S. megacorporations for lower-priced strawberries and sugar to capture ever larger portions of the international market -- and incidentally to force other producing nations to underpay their own workers in order to stay in the game.

    I don't mind you disagreeing, as long as you keep tuning in 2000

  • In his generation, we were known as wetbacks and illegals.

    Yahoo! News: Business - Opinion 2011

  • They used to be called wetbacks, but that was judged to harsh and even "racist."

    The Rule of Reason 2010

  • The kikes and the niggers and the fags and the wetbacks are the patchwork monster of his very own self, formerly hidden by a puerile Catholicism, and by an adolescent notion of himself as a hero -

    All Stories | The New York Observer 2010

  • In a series of taped phone conversations with his ex-girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, released by website RadarOnline.com, the 54-year-old actor unleashed a torrent of nasty, vile, vicious, racist expletives and threats of violence that suggest that Mad Mel not only dislikes Jews and gays, as his past behavior demonstrates, but blacks, Mexicans "wetbacks", as he calls 'em and women too.

    Andy Ostroy: The Passion of the Gibson Andy Ostroy 2010

  • Criswell College President Lamar Cooper angered many for referring to illegal immigrants as "wetbacks" on air before a radio-broadcasted class last Sunday.

    Bible College President In Hot Water For Anti-Immigrant Slur 2010

  • In a series of taped phone conversations with his ex-girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, released by website RadarOnline. com, the 54-year-old actor unleashed a torrent of nasty, vile, vicious, racist expletives and threats of violence that suggest that Mad Mel not only dislikes Jews and gays, as his past behavior demonstrates, but blacks, Mexicans ( "wetbacks", as he calls 'em) and women too.

    Andy Ostroy: The Passion of the Gibson 2010

  • In a series of taped phone conversations with his ex-girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, released by website RadarOnline. com, the 54-year-old actor unleashed a torrent of nasty, vile, vicious, racist expletives and threats of violence that suggest that Mad Mel not only dislikes Jews and gays, as his past behavior demonstrates, but blacks, Mexicans ( "wetbacks", as he calls 'em) and women too.

    Andy Ostroy: The Passion of the Gibson 2010

  • The case that I've hammered time after time in my posts concerns Professor Donald Hindley, who was found guilty of racial harassment for explaining and criticizing use of the word "wetbacks" in his Latin American politics class.

    Greg Lukianoff: Will the Real Brandeis Please Stand Up? 2009

  • In yesteryear, many Hispanics from northern New Mexico, where my father's family hailed, were quick to thumb their noses at the Mexican immigrants they competed with for work in the ski resort's service industry, deriding them as "wetbacks" and "mojados."

    Wayne Trujillo: The Barrio: Home To Immigrants, Mother Cabrini And My Inner Child 2009

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