Distinguished Speaker Series: John Quiñones

BROWNSVILLE, Texas- The Distinguished Speaker Series at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, hosted John Quiñones, host of ABC’s  “What Would You Do”’ on Sept. 21 at the Brownsville campus.

Quiñones is an author, award-winning TV journalist and motivational speaker. According to his webpage, “‘What Would You Do?’ is his latest phase in a television news career spanning 35 years.” Recently, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Guerra Lifetime Achievement Award from the San Antonio Association of Hispanic Journalists. 

At UTRGV, Quiñones talked about his popular show “What Would You Do?” According to ABC News, using hidden cameras, John Quiñones observes and comments on how ordinary people behave when they are confronted with dilemmas that require them to take action or to walk by and mind their own business.  He said, “It’s all about doing the right thing. All of us, we face these moral and ethical dilemmas every day in our personal and in our professional lives no matter what we do for a living.” He said that at the beginning stages of the show, he thought that he would only be doing a few scenarios. However, since 2008, the show has had more than 137 episodes. 

In addition, Quiñones talked about the current immigration issues  and hate crimes towards minorities happening in the United States. He also talked about the Walmart shooting in El Paso, Texas that occurred two years ago. 

“Again, the alleged shooter, he didn’t come from Mexico or another country. He came from North Texas determined to kill what he called invaders,” Quiñones said. “It strikes me that we’re building all these walls, and all these fences along the border but in my humble opinion, we should be building bridges.”

Quiñones also told the students that every day people face ethical dilemmas and that it  happens “especially to people of color, or people who have been marginalized by society,” including him. 

“I have found that time and again, the people who step in and sound the alarm and do the right thing, are people who themselves have been the targets of racism and bullying and gay-bashing,” Quiñones said. “That’s why in many ways I kind of feel like I was born, was destined to do this kind of show, to create ‘What Would You Do’ 14 years ago, because of the world that I grew up in.”

Quiñones talked about his childhood, and how at 13-years-old, his father was laid off from work. He said his family made the decision that a lot of Latino families make. They became migrant farm workers. Then, he spoke about his first journey from San Antonio to Northport, Mich. in a truck full of migrant workers. He said they traveled 1,700 miles to pick cherries for 75 cents a bucket. “I’ll never forget being on my knees, on the ground, 6 in the morning, looking at a row of tomato plants … And my father he said, ‘Juanito, do you want to do this kind of work for the rest of your life, or do you want to get a college education?’” said Quiñones. “It was a no-brainer. I knew I didn’t want to do that work, that kind of back-breaking work.”

Quiñones ended the night with another small story. He talked about an episode of “What Would You Do,” where a homeless woman helped an unconscious old man. The woman walked with a cane because she had suffered a stroke and began to ask people around her to call 911 for the unconscious man because she didn’t have a phone. She even took the beer out of the actor’s hands to give him some dignity so people wouldn’t think he was drunk. The homeless woman, Linda Halmiton, stayed with the man until finally a woman called 911. She had no idea that the situation was staged. After the episode aired on TV, viewers raised $1,000 for her heart condition medication and a new cell phone in return for her good deed. Rounding up the evening, Quinones said, “So, I leave you with the message tonight. Next time you witness an injustice, you see something wrong, someone’s criticizing, being racist, stealing, bullying, you see that and your little voice in the back of your head, it says, do something. [Do it.] Because as my dear mother Maria would say … ‘It’s the right thing to do.’”

The next guest for the Distinguished Speaker Series is Lana Condor, known for her protagonist role in “To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before.” This virtual event will take place on Nov. 3 from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. To RSVP, visit https://utrgv.campuslabs.com/engage/event/7291828.