Depressingly true, but largely because our popular culture is so pervasive that anything weird that you’d talk about openly is already pretty commonly known.
Like, the Netherlands don’t have a particularly pervasive culture, so anything you learn about them that’s not “everywhere” won’t make sense at first. It dilutes the whole “wait, what the fuck is ‘black pete’?” thing.
All that to say, not all of our nonsense is racist, just the unfamiliar nonsense we don’t talk about anymore.
Bizarre Dutch Santa Claus helper. Like an elf, except canonically a black person with curly hair, silly mannerisms, bright clothing, big red lips and played by a white person wearing blackface.
It’s almost over the top how racist it is, and there’s controversy around if they should keep doing it.
Turns out if you have a history selling slaves, you’ll pick up some stuff.
Point being less about pivoting this to the Dutch, and more that not hearing much about a culture also means you don’t hear as much about their awful stuff, and when you hear a lot about a culture you tend to mostly hear about the parts that people want to share in public.
No one’s gonna make a movie that just casually drops the wide variety of ethnic slurs for the Italians or Irish that have existed.
No no no, didn’t you read the statement from the spokesperson for the far right xenophobic organization in the article?
Wagensveld does not believe there is systemic racism.
“Eighty to 90 percent of the Dutch population see Zwarte Piet as non-racist,” he claimed. “When I dress up as Zwarte Piet most people like it … Black Pete is absolutely not racist.”
It’s not systemic racism if the people not impacted by it don’t think it’s racist, obviously.
Depressingly true, but largely because our popular culture is so pervasive that anything weird that you’d talk about openly is already pretty commonly known.
Like, the Netherlands don’t have a particularly pervasive culture, so anything you learn about them that’s not “everywhere” won’t make sense at first. It dilutes the whole “wait, what the fuck is ‘black pete’?” thing.
All that to say, not all of our nonsense is racist, just the unfamiliar nonsense we don’t talk about anymore.
what the fuck is ‘black pete’?
Bizarre Dutch Santa Claus helper. Like an elf, except canonically a black person with curly hair, silly mannerisms, bright clothing, big red lips and played by a white person wearing blackface.
It’s almost over the top how racist it is, and there’s controversy around if they should keep doing it.
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2020/12/4/the-netherlands-black-pete
Turns out if you have a history selling slaves, you’ll pick up some stuff.
Point being less about pivoting this to the Dutch, and more that not hearing much about a culture also means you don’t hear as much about their awful stuff, and when you hear a lot about a culture you tend to mostly hear about the parts that people want to share in public.
No one’s gonna make a movie that just casually drops the wide variety of ethnic slurs for the Italians or Irish that have existed.
OMG.
I can understand an elf covered in soot.
But full on black-face caricature?
Almost like institutional racism is a thing.
No no no, didn’t you read the statement from the spokesperson for the far right xenophobic organization in the article?
It’s not systemic racism if the people not impacted by it don’t think it’s racist, obviously.
🤦