Is It Me? Worlds Gone Crazy

These things are clearly worse if they're done with malice, but symbols have meaning regardless. See also Prince Harry dressing as a Nazi.

Well yes- although clearly dressing up as a nazi is entirely different from dressing up as your favourite basketball player. The issue is where you draw the line and decide which symbols are unacceptable. Is it OK for someone who isn't Asian to dress up as Jackie Chan for example or is it just darkening your skin colour that's the issue due to the history of minstrel shows? I mean there are articles online saying that no one is allowed to dress up on Halloween as someone that isn't from their ethnic background due to "cultural appropriation" which I think is absolutely insane.

Isn’t verbal being a bit racist & sexist by assuming that we’re all white blokes. I thought that was a total no no in the 21st century. For all he knows I could be a black chick.

 

 

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You should never assume someone's gender. Even if you look white you could identify as a different race anyway so you just never know.

I heard that Lenny Henry is getting whitefaced to play a country bumpkin in panto. Helluva makeup department.

 

Edited 20 December, 2017 by shurlock

You should never assume someone's gender. Even if you look white you could identify as a different race anyway so you just never know.

 

Aren’t blokes allowed to identify as chicks, even if they’ve got a penis anyway . Verbal needs to get into the 21st century, with his attitude he could end up upsetting people.

 

 

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The racist Ronnies

 

As notes below the picture: "this series was made in 1987 and this recording is a repeat from 1989"

 

I think we all agree that standards of acceptability have changed in the last 30 years.

I heard that Lenny Henry is getting whitefaced to play a country bumpkin in panto. Helluva makeup department.

 

 

I think you'll find thats Shergar

I think you'll find thats Shergar

 

 

#flaringnostrils

I heard that Lenny Henry is getting whitefaced to play a country bumpkin in panto. Helluva makeup department.

 

Who's that an actual picture of?

Who's that an actual picture of?

 

Our very own guided missile.

Well yes- although clearly dressing up as a nazi is entirely different from dressing up as your favourite basketball player. The issue is where you draw the line and decide which symbols are unacceptable. Is it OK for someone who isn't Asian to dress up as Jackie Chan for example or is it just darkening your skin colour that's the issue due to the history of minstrel shows? I mean there are articles online saying that no one is allowed to dress up on Halloween as someone that isn't from their ethnic background due to "cultural appropriation" which I think is absolutely insane.

 

That’s exactly it, where you draw the line. The thing is there’s been a well defined line on blackface for decades.

 

Cultural appropriation is a lot more nuanced and I don’t know how I feel about it.

Digital Blackfacing is a thing too...thought it was a joke at first.

That’s exactly it, where you draw the line. The thing is there’s been a well defined line on blackface for decades.

 

Cultural appropriation is a lot more nuanced and I don’t know how I feel about it.

That's what I was asking you. I don't think we've managed to define where the line of acceptability is yet. So any sort of darkening of the skin for a costume is an unacceptable line to cross yes? Is that the case for every ethnicity? Could an Asian person darken their skin to dress as a black figure they admired? Or could a white man change the colour of his skin to go as atilla the hun? Or is the very act of changing your skin colour unacceptable?

 

I see there was a documentary on apu from the Simpsons and how a white man playing him is perpetuating harmful ethnic stereotypes. What are your thoughts on that?

Edited 21 December, 2017 by hypochondriac

Haven't seen the film but Apu is quite clearly a racist caricature, regardless of who's playing him.

 

As far as I'm concerned skin colour is a no-go area unless you're dressing as some fictional race, Avatar or whatever, but particularly blackface given it was used as a tool of racist oppression within living memory. I'm not sure that debate has changed much for decades.

 

The thornier area is costumes, wearing native American headdresses and what have you. For me it largely depends on the importance of the symbol to the people who created it. I can see why marginalised people (like native Americans) don't want to be seen as quirky costume characters while their real lives are made worse through politics.

Edited 21 December, 2017 by DuncanRG

Haven't seen the film but Apu is quite clearly a racist caricature, regardless of who's playing him.

 

As far as I'm concerned skin colour is a no-go area unless you're dressing as some fictional race, Avatar or whatever, but particularly blackface given it was used as a tool of racist oppression within living memory. I'm not sure that debate has changed much for decades.

 

The thornier area is costumes, wearing native American headdresses and what have you. For me it largely depends on the importance of the symbol to the people who created it. I can see why marginalised people (like native Americans) don't want to be seen as quirky costume characters while their real lives are made worse through politics.

 

So your view is that the character of apu is racist? I suppose the counter argument to that would be that the Simpsons is a show full of stereotypes and many individuals of Indian origin have praised that character and got rather heated at the suggestion that a character they love is a racist representation. For my part, I don't like to throw around words like racist unless there is some sort of harmful intent behind it which brings us nicely back to this darkening of the skin thing.

 

Thank you for expressing your opinion by the way. I don't really agree with what you've said but I like to hear opposing views. I tend to favour a libertarian outlook where people are free to dress however they like just as long as they can accept the criticism that comes with it. I'm still not sure I understand how blackening your face to pay tribute to a favourite sports star or person you admire is actually being harmful to anyone. I doubt most of the people complaining about that are either black themselves or were old enough to remember minstrel shows. I do however think more of a case could be made against blackening your skin due to the history of it but my personal view is that dismissing every incident of that type of thing as irredeemably racist is a step too far.

I’ve always wondered whether using sun tan lotion was just being a lesser version of blacking up favoured by the milder racist. As a Mexican myself I never use it but do understand how it may offend,

Is this considered racist? Bearing in mind I don't think the joke would really work without the darker skin because it would be extremely difficult to see who it was.

I’ve always wondered whether using sun tan lotion was just being a lesser version of blacking up favoured by the milder racist. As a Mexican myself I never use it but do understand how it may offend,

 

I've often wondered if Dulux using the term "Brilliant White" on their white paint would fall foul of racism as I don't remember their being a brilliant black paint, isn't the inference with this that white is better than any other colour?

 

What would be useful is if we could have some of the lovely people who find this offensive could point out on a colour chart what shade is acceptable to go and which is overstepping the mark. Like you say plenty of white people use sunbeds or fake tanning products to make themselves appear darker skinned so surely there has to be a cut off point as to what is acceptable and what isn't.

 

** I'm thinking that it probably isn't appropriate to post pictures of other posters without their consent mods?** (see above)

 

Back in the 90s I used to live with a lady whose father was a principle singer in the Black & White Minstrels. His name was Les Want, now sadly deceased. He always maintained that there was nothing racist about "blackface" and that that they blacked up in homage to the roots of Afro-American music (something none of the wave of greatest British blues musicians felt the need to do in the 60s and 70s but that is by the bye). When the Minstrels finished be continued to tour with another singer doing the same routine, including blacking up, as it was still popular. Gradually though as PC kicked in, they had to stop blacking up. They continue to tour with the songs though. Lenny Henry actually got his break through the Black & White Minstrel Show. Although he distances himself from it now, apparently he was very popular amongst the company and enjoyed himself in the show at the time. Why anyone feels the need to black themselves up in order to sing black music is beyond me, but it was of its time. If you are going to embrace another culture, perform the music, play the music, listen to the music but don't change the colour of your skin, the colour of which singled millions out for slavery, rape, murder, torture and second class citizenship. As for dressing up as Diane Abbot, would you do so if she was white and fit?

I wouldn't dress up as Diane Abbott if for no other reason than I can't think of a good reason why I would want to but I see no reason why someone wouldn't have attempted to dress up at the darts as Diane if she was more attractive and white or any other nationality. It wasn't the colour of her skin that made those gaffes so amusing, it was her pompous attitude and car crash nature of the interviews. Her skin colour was entirely irrelevant.

How come that some very dark skinned persons who, allegedly on purpose, gradually got a lot lighter ( Michael Jackson for instance ) never seem to

be called racist for going "white"? Perhaps that footballer should just have taken a couple of months to get darker and darker before dressing up?

So your view is that the character of apu is racist? I suppose the counter argument to that would be that the Simpsons is a show full of stereotypes and many individuals of Indian origin have praised that character and got rather heated at the suggestion that a character they love is a racist representation. For my part, I don't like to throw around words like racist unless there is some sort of harmful intent behind it which brings us nicely back to this darkening of the skin thing.

 

Thank you for expressing your opinion by the way. I don't really agree with what you've said but I like to hear opposing views. I tend to favour a libertarian outlook where people are free to dress however they like just as long as they can accept the criticism that comes with it. I'm still not sure I understand how blackening your face to pay tribute to a favourite sports star or person you admire is actually being harmful to anyone. I doubt most of the people complaining about that are either black themselves or were old enough to remember minstrel shows. I do however think more of a case could be made against blackening your skin due to the history of it but my personal view is that dismissing every incident of that type of thing as irredeemably racist is a step too far.

 

I don’t think it’s helpful to treat racism as a binary, as if everything is either monstrous or absolutely fine. Many things are complex and feed into stereotypes (for example) but can’t be compared to bona fide racial abuse. We should question and criticise these things regardless, and not make excuses for them.

Our very own guided missile.

 

Not sure posting pictures of other posters is the road you should be going down.

Edited 22 December, 2017 by Sour Mash

I've often wondered if Dulux using the term "Brilliant White" on their white paint would fall foul of racism as I don't remember their being a brilliant black paint, isn't the inference with this that white is better than any other colour?

 

What would be useful is if we could have some of the lovely people who find this offensive could point out on a colour chart what shade is acceptable to go and which is overstepping the mark. Like you say plenty of white people use sunbeds or fake tanning products to make themselves appear darker skinned so surely there has to be a cut off point as to what is acceptable and what isn't.

 

You've missed out the worst part turks, the full name of the paint is Pure Brilliant White. That implies racial purity as advocated in the Aryan doctrine, together with overtones of eugenics. Something to ponder next time you walk down the B+Q paint aisle.

You've missed out the worst part turks, the full name of the paint is Pure Brilliant White. That implies racial purity as advocated in the Aryan doctrine, together with overtones of eugenics. Something to ponder next time you walk down the B+Q paint aisle.

 

Great point. I'll send a strongly worded email to dulux expressing my outrage at their racist production labelling.

Great point. I'll send a strongly worded email to dulux expressing my outrage at their racist production labelling.

 

One for your customers, turks....

 

 

A black guy in the office asked me which was the coloured copier. I said "mate, its 2017, you can use any copier you like."

A black guy in the office asked me which was the coloured copier. I said "mate, its 2017, you can use any copier you like."

 

Weirdly enough I heard this joke the other day after not hearing it in years, like waiting for a bus!