"Blackface" Discussion

4bars

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Can I just add as well that it’s fine to not know that it’s racist but once its racist context has been explained to you and you are still trying to justify doing it, THAT is the problem
YOu definitely can add that

Blackface is racist 100% . And I see why and I see why it offends people. Period

Saying that it wasn't racism because some blackface comes from a different origin to another blackface is not justifying, is explaning why people didn't (and don't find it racist. The more we know, the more we learn and act accordingly
 

DOTA

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I’m loving this. Trudeau’s supporters are the first to find any small thing and scream racism, sexism, transphobia and everything under the sun and to now watch them come up with far fetched reasons to excuse legitimate racism is amusing to me.

Black face from minstrel shows has been slammed as racist since the 1970’s. There was an episode of All in the Family on this subject. In 2001 you can’t say he was unaware that this was considered racist.
Hopefully people realise he is awful and vote for Jagmeet Singh.
 

UweBein

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60 years ago I used to dress up in a cowboy outfit and pretend to shoot ' Red Indians '.

Makes me a Racist ??

Damn....If only someone had told me that 60 years later the answer would be ' Yes ' then I might not have done it.
Of course not.
I guess blackfacing can offend people, and quite understandably so.
But as many have said, there is context to be considered.
 

WensleyMU

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why is that so hard to believe?
It's not really, but I would be interested in the reasons why it wasn't considered racist.

In the UK, it was considered racist because it offended black people. So was it that continental Europe was more racist than the UK, or simply didn't recognise that it was offensive? Or was it because the usage was different. For example, in the UK, black face used to be a disguise. It wasn't used to mock or imitate black people, but to hide faces at night. There were even laws passed to make it illegal, but this is going back 2-300 years.
 

4bars

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It's not really, but I would be interested in the reasons why it wasn't considered racist.

In the UK, it was considered racist because it offended black people. So was it that continental Europe was more racist than the UK, or simply didn't recognise that it was offensive? Or was it because the usage was different. For example, in the UK, black face used to be a disguise. It wasn't used to mock or imitate black people, but to hide faces at night. There were even laws passed to make it illegal, but this is going back 2-300 years.
If you don't have black people or they are so rare that don't have a public voice, is impossible to notice that is racist to them.
 

WensleyMU

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If you don't have black people or they are so rare that don't have a public voice, is impossible to notice that is racist to them.
Where about in Europe are you referring? I've always assumed southern European countries would have a long history of black African and islamic immigration going back centuries.
 

DOTA

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All it will likely end up with is a Conservative government that is Trump Lite - that in effect is Trudeau's long term damage.
I wouldn't bet against Trudeau winning, to be honest. Canada's very white.
 

4bars

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Where about in Europe are you referring? I've always assumed southern European countries would have a long history of black African and islamic immigration going back centuries.
Not in Spain, Spain dropped black slavery very soon because they could enslave native americans, so only a few colonies had black people and mostly in america. With the decline on the spanish empire on the XIX and XX century, Spain was more a country that immigrated on the XX century than receiving immigration. Black immigration usually comes from Africa because is way easier than crossing the atlantic (and because quantity) and Africa was the domain of mostly France and UK, therefore they immigrated more on those countries. Also, their economies were way better off than Spain, so if you risk it, better go there (and other minor countries).

After the dictatorship on 1975 and getting a better economy we stopped immigrating in the 80s and in the late 90 and early 2000, we started to receive immigration, mostly northern african (non black) and latinamerica (for historical and culture ties) and we started to get black immigration also but in short numbers. I have black family and is a rarity. both guys were the only 2 black guys that married to white girls and the whole town bullied them, incredibly racist.

Now, black people though not rare can't even compare with the numbers that UK or France have.

The same with southern Mediterranean countries, we are not the wealthiest and less colonial ties with Africa, so they don't immigrate as much there.
 

FlawlessThaw

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I wouldn't bet against Trudeau winning, to be honest. Canada's very white.
Yeah I’m in Canada right now so experience the scandal first hand. You could be right though since I’ve had to explain what was wrong with blackface to a number of middle aged white people.

If Trudeau was a right wing politician I can see it not harming him that much, but progressives are less forgiving all round.
 

DOTA

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Yeah I’m in Canada right now so experience the scandal first hand. You could be right though since I’ve had to explain what was wrong with blackface to a number of middle aged white people.

If Trudeau was a right wing politician I can see it not harming him that much, but progressives are less forgiving all round.
But most of them would be voting for Singh anyway.

EDIT - Sorry, I shouldn't try and turn this in to a Canadian election thread.
 

WensleyMU

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Not in Spain, Spain dropped black slavery very soon because they could enslave native americans, so only a few colonies had black people and mostly in america. With the decline on the spanish empire on the XIX and XX century, Spain was more a country that immigrated on the XX century than receiving immigration. Black immigration usually comes from Africa because is way easier than crossing the atlantic (and because quantity) and Africa was the domain of mostly France and UK, therefore they immigrated more on those countries. Also, their economies were way better off than Spain, so if you risk it, better go there (and other minor countries).

After the dictatorship on 1975 and getting a better economy we stopped immigrating in the 80s and in the late 90 and early 2000, we started to receive immigration, mostly northern african (non black) and latinamerica (for historical and culture ties) and we started to get black immigration also but in short numbers. I have black family and is a rarity. both guys were the only 2 black guys that married to white girls and the whole town bullied them, incredibly racist.

Now, black people though not rare can't even compare with the numbers that UK or France have.

The same with southern Mediterranean countries, we are not the wealthiest and less colonial ties with Africa, so they don't immigrate as much there.
Thanks, makes sense now.
 

UweBein

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Where about in Europe are you referring? I've always assumed southern European countries would have a long history of black African and islamic immigration going back centuries.
Well that assumption is wrong. There are way more African immigrants in northern Europe.
 

ChaddyP

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It's not really, but I would be interested in the reasons why it wasn't considered racist.

In the UK, it was considered racist because it offended black people. So was it that continental Europe was more racist than the UK, or simply didn't recognise that it was offensive? Or was it because the usage was different. For example, in the UK, black face used to be a disguise. It wasn't used to mock or imitate black people, but to hide faces at night. There were even laws passed to make it illegal, but this is going back 2-300 years.

Well myself had never heard of black face or knew what it signified to recently. Mostly because hardly anyone on this island would require needing it. I'm more used to seeing people trying to lighten there skin than to darken it. So for me seeing white people put on black face i didn't strike me as something to be offended about as I or really anyone from here unless there a history buff and knew about what it meant.

I learned about Jim crow from "this is America" song.
 

limerickcitykid

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I was born and raised in Canada (class of 74). I'm not sure when the first time I saw blackface was but I know I was very young and even then I knew it was wrong.
Born and raised in the same riding Singh served in, in a city of 74% minorities. In 2010, my high school voted the best halloween costumes to a group of white girls who blackfaced as the Jackson 5. Had a black principal, black vice principal, half the teaching staff was minorities, over half the student body of 1,500 kids or so were minorities. No one seemed to have an issue with it, going as far as awarding it the prize of best costume with a black principal giving it to them. Evidently, blackface wasn't as commonly known as much as people like to portray it. I never even heard about it until around 2012-13.
 

Dr. Dwayne

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Born and raised in the same riding Singh served in, in a city of 74% minorities. In 2010, my high school voted the best halloween costumes to a group of white girls who blackfaced as the Jackson 5. Had a black principal, black vice principal, half the teaching staff was minorities, over half the student body of 1,500 kids or so were minorities. No one seemed to have an issue with it, going as far as awarding it the prize of best costume with a black principal giving it to them. Evidently, blackface wasn't as commonly known as much as people like to portray it. I never even heard about it until around 2012-13.
I'm pretty sure they don't like black people in Brampton either, mate. ;)
 

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Ah, so apparently you're not allowed to have that hair, because it's cultural appropriation.

I was wondering where I'd draw the line. Guess I've found out.
 

Sweet Square

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Yah, enlighten us @Sweet Square
:lol:

Well feck no pressure on the white guy from North Dublin to try and explain racism but here we go..........

The haircut in the video seems to be more like a costume than a actual style(Almost like a wig), it is possible to get a similar looking haircut without having to go to such extremes. That haircut seem to be some form of racial fetishism/stereotyping on afro hair(Doesn't help that it appears to be a all Korean barber shop). And while I seen it argued that its similar to say a black women getting her hair straighten which maybe thats correct, considering the long history of racism towards afro hair(California had to ban discrimination over natural hairstyles this year)I would argue that its not the same.

Also there's a certain privilege non black people can have in that they appeal or in this case take black cultural but not get any of the racism that follows.
 

KirkDuyt

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:lol:

Well feck no pressure on the white guy from North Dublin to try and explain racism but here we go..........

The haircut in the video seems to be more like a costume than a actual style(Almost like a wig), it is possible to get a similar looking haircut without having to go to such extremes. That haircut seem to be some form of racial fetishism/stereotyping on afro hair(Doesn't help that it appears to be a all Korean barber shop). And while I seen it argued that its similar to say a black women getting her hair straighten which maybe thats correct, considering the long history of racism towards afro hair(California had to ban discrimination over natural hairstyles this year)I would argue that its not the same.

Also there's a certain privilege non black people can have in that they appeal or in this case take black cultural but not get any of the racism that follows.
I do understand this point, but I think different cultures melting into one another by adopting stuff is not the problem. Cnuts discriminating people over a hairstyle are.

Telling people getting a perm is wrong, I dunno, doesnt seem like the way forward.
 

villain

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That's not blackface.

This is really bad, right ?


I would say that's more cultural appreciation.

It's not an insult, but natural black hairstyles on black people is so political (even within the black community) that when I see stuff like this it feels empty.
There does seem to be a fascination with black culture from the Far East, at least among the younger generation - I'd love to understand what that's all about.
 

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Telling people getting a perm is wrong, I dunno, doesnt seem like the way forward.
Who said that ?

The perm point was about the haircut in the video being no different than a black women getting her hair straighten(Although I would argue that its not the same).

That's not blackface.



I would say that's more cultural appreciation.

It's not an insult, but natural black hairstyles on black people is so political (even within the black community) that when I see stuff like this it feels empty
Yeah had no idea until I followed this great twitter account - https://twitter.com/Iamblirish

There does seem to be a fascination with black culture from the Far East, at least among the younger generation - I'd love to understand what that's all about.
Would be interesting to know as well. I know that there's a Grime scene in Japan which surprised me.
 

villain

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Yeah had no idea about this until I followed this great twitter account - https://twitter.com/Iamblirish
One of the many side effects of white supremacy. It's probably worse than skin bleaching because it's so normalised.
That twitter account looks pretty good, thanks for sharing!

Would be interesting to know as well. I know that there's a Grime scene in Japan which surprised me.
Yeah I think I've read about that a few years ago, all the K-pop & J-pop stuff seems to derive directly from hiphop & r&b too - I wouldn't be surprised if these hairstyles are just an offshoot of that.
 

mancan92

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The far east for a long time has had huge facination and interest in hip hop/ R&b culture. They are huge into street dancing and alot of anime is influenced by that culture. It's culture appropriation but not anything like black face.
 

giorno

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It's not really, but I would be interested in the reasons why it wasn't considered racist.
It's not that it wasn't considered racist, it's that racism wasn't considered. It simply wasn't something people thought about. With nobody raising the issue, it never was an issue
 

oneniltothearsenal

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Ah, so apparently you're not allowed to have that hair, because it's cultural appropriation.

I was wondering where I'd draw the line. Guess I've found out.
Yeah I call BS on that one. Total BS.

@Sweet Square

What your post misses is that that hiphop and funk artists, labels and clothing brands have spent the last 30 years intentionally marketing and selling and spreading hip hop and funk culture directly to places like Tokyo, Seoul and Paris.

When I worked at a hiphop store in Hollywood in 1994 there were massive deals with Japanese and Korean businessmen for everything hiphop related. There was a mutually beneficially relationship and the prevailing mindset among the underground was that spreading the culture was good! Not "appropriation" or whatevs

Pretty sure they would buy stacks of URB magazine to bring there and there was a ton of marketing from companies like Echo Unlimited with Tokyo and Seoul businesses at the clothing conventions like Magic in Vegas.

You had street dancers like the Electric Boogaloos spending years in Asia specifically spreading and teaching hiphop and funk culture from California directly to kids from Japan and So. Korea.

If you go into these actual scenes like street dance youll never see this whack shite like getting mad over a haircut. The culture already was spread both for positive reasons and for profit, its too late to put genie back in the bottle.

People need to chill over haircuts and grow up ffs
 

Sweet Square

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Yeah I think I've read about that a few years ago, all the K-pop & J-pop stuff seems to derive directly from hiphop & r&b too - I wouldn't be surprised if these hairstyles are just an offshoot of that.
Oh didn't know that. I don't want to derail the thread on this topic(Although I really could)but I have say that to the best version of the Chinese National Anthem is by Mr Paul Robeson




:drool:

Yeah I call BS on that one. Total BS.

@Sweet Square

What your post misses is that that hiphop and funk artists, labels and clothing brands have spent the last 30 years intentionally marketing and selling and spreading hip hop and funk culture directly to places like Tokyo, Seoul and Paris.

When I worked at a hiphop store in Hollywood in 1994 there were massive deals with Japanese and Korean businessmen for everything hiphop related. There was a mutually beneficially relationship and the prevailing mindset among the underground was that spreading the culture was good! Not "appropriation" or whatevs

Pretty sure they would buy stacks of URB magazine to bring there and there was a ton of marketing from companies like Echo Unlimited with Tokyo and Seoul businesses at the clothing conventions like Magic in Vegas.

You had street dancers like the Electric Boogaloos spending years in Asia specifically spreading and teaching hiphop and funk culture from California directly to kids from Japan and So. Korea.

If you go into these actual scenes like street dance youll never see this whack shite like getting mad over a haircut. The culture already was spread both for positive reasons and for profit, its too late to put genie back in the bottle.
Oh I don't have any problem with this. My issue is the haircut in the video goes to extreme and is basically stereotyping and fetishising black afro hair. The kid can still read all the Hip Hop magazines he wants.

Sorry I meant afro not perm.
No worries.
 

ChaddyP

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Who said that ?

The perm point was about the haircut in the video being no different than a black women getting her hair straighten(Although I would argue that its not the same).



Yeah had no idea until I followed this great twitter account - https://twitter.com/Iamblirish


Would be interesting to know as well. I know that there's a Grime scene in Japan which surprised me.

There is a huge Reggae and dancehall following in Japan aswell. They love our (jamaican) music and culture and try to emulate it. They put on fake dreds and rasta tams and even some follow the rastafarian religion. We have shows in Jamaica and we invite them to participate. Junko a Japanese girl won out Dancehall Queen competition.
Our artist have stage shows in japan constantly and make good money there. They have always like things like this. I find it funny that Black america has just found this out and trying to figure how to deal :lol:
 

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This is really bad, right ?


Don't see anything wrong with her hair at all - it's a style, like a black woman / man having straightened hair etc.

White people have had dreads for decades.

Blackface isn't a style, it's a crude 'impression', often carried out in the context of also making a 'clown' out of the target of the impression.
 

VP

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:lol:

Well feck no pressure on the white guy from North Dublin to try and explain racism but here we go..........

The haircut in the video seems to be more like a costume than a actual style(Almost like a wig), it is possible to get a similar looking haircut without having to go to such extremes. That haircut seem to be some form of racial fetishism/stereotyping on afro hair(Doesn't help that it appears to be a all Korean barber shop). And while I seen it argued that its similar to say a black women getting her hair straighten which maybe thats correct, considering the long history of racism towards afro hair(California had to ban discrimination over natural hairstyles this year)I would argue that its not the same.

Also there's a certain privilege non black people can have in that they appeal or in this case take black cultural but not get any of the racism that follows.
This is ridiculous. The world would be a better place if white people, even if they're well-intentioned, just wind their necks in when it comes to racism.

We're getting to a stage where it's white people deciding what's racially offensive. I actually think that's more racist than changing hairstyles.
 

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:lol:

Well feck no pressure on the white guy from North Dublin to try and explain racism but here we go..........

The haircut in the video seems to be more like a costume than a actual style(Almost like a wig), it is possible to get a similar looking haircut without having to go to such extremes. That haircut seem to be some form of racial fetishism/stereotyping on afro hair(Doesn't help that it appears to be a all Korean barber shop). And while I seen it argued that its similar to say a black women getting her hair straighten which maybe thats correct, considering the long history of racism towards afro hair(California had to ban discrimination over natural hairstyles this year)I would argue that its not the same.

Also there's a certain privilege non black people can have in that they appeal or in this case take black cultural but not get any of the racism that follows.
You're overplaying the extend of racism outside America (I don't know about Europe), but half the world doesn't hate Blacks, Half the world doesn't even see many black people enough, you think an asian girl would go to extreme length and discomfort (that flock of braid is actually hard to maintain and stressfull on hair you need a good hair to support that looks) because they "hate blacks"? They do that because the hip-hop culture, something blacks should be proud off that people adore their style. Ask any other countries I don't think anyone would object if other country emulates their looks. The korean are so happy that many other countries embraces their k-pop style, and they actively pursue it. Indonesians are proud if you like our Batik, our traditional dances or martial arts and actually promotes it to the world. Never in a million years we call an innocent westerner wearing Batik as "racist" even though we see them as invaders due to our past history.

Racism should be fought on a more fundamental basis, systematic discrimination by the government, unjust policing, and many other heavier stuff than what sort of hair style an Asian woman support.