# Black skin is so offensive, ayup **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 8, 2014, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314 "2014-06-08T04:59:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/21 "2014-06-08T23:16:17Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > There were complaints that Jango Fett was the only character played by a Latino actor and he was a bad guy. I imagine some of those people felt rather silly when they learned the actor was Maori. Indeed. Especially since Jimmy Smits (who, unlike Temeura Morrison, IS Latino) played Senator Organa in the same movie as Jango was introduced. I don’t remember any complaining about the Gungans in general (at least not on racial grounds - they’re frequently lumped with the Ewoks as ‘a stupid idea’), just Jar Jar specifically. The Neimoidians, on the other hand… ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/22 "2014-06-09T01:08:00Z")
> [@Kamino\_Neko](#): > > I don’t remember any complaining about the Gungans in general (at least not on racial grounds - they’re frequently lumped with the Ewoks as ‘a stupid idea’), just Jar Jar specifically. If we were in GD, I’d call that a false dichotomy. 🙂 There were lots of complaints on racial grounds, and it was a stupid idea even without the racial element. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/23 "2014-06-09T01:34:02Z")
I was actually thinking of the pseudo-Asian Trade Federation. Also the Gungans, but mostly the fact that someone thought it was offensive that the not-so-nice aliens had vaguely East Asian accents. Sorry for the incoherence. Here’s a more straightforward version of my peeve: If (as in the case of certain oddly pale versions of Little Black Sambo) you think it’s “more sensitive” to portray a “dark” person with coloring and features that are relatively light, you may actually be playing into colorism. My wild ideas about mixed-race persons appropriating “blackness” and shutting out darker blacks–well, that’s an exaggeration of a practice mostly in the past, and maybe not an entirely accurate representation of what they thought they were doing. Similarly, if you think foreign accents make someone sound sinister or comical, so you “class up” or remove the accents, you’re keeping the accents unfamiliar and thus unrespected, if not reinforcing the bias against those accents. Whatever, I went to the Pit because I knew I was being crazy… ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/24 "2014-06-09T01:38:04Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > If we were in GD, I’d call that a false dichotomy. 🙂 You’d be wrong, because I never said it had to be one or the other, just that as far as I remembered one happened, the other didn’t. I might not be remembering correctly (which is why, of course, I included the qualifier that it was from my memory), but there’s no false dichotomy, there. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/25 "2014-06-09T07:21:15Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > If (as in the case of certain oddly pale versions of Little Black Sambo) you think it’s “more sensitive” to portray a “dark” person with coloring and features that are relatively light, you may actually be playing into colorism. Agreed completely. But this doesn’t mean the picaninny figure itself _isn’t_ a racist caricature. Or that using a pitch-black, thick-lipped stereotype to stand in for _all_ Africans wouldn’t be racist. But yes, by the same token (heh), taking a racist character and just mocha-ing that shit up, is bad too. > [@](#): > > Similarly, if you think foreign accents make someone sound sinister or comical, so you “class up” or remove the accents, you’re keeping the accents unfamiliar and thus unrespected, if not reinforcing the bias against those accents. Imagine, if you would, if in Star Wars, the Trade Federation had had Norwegian accents, the Gungans had a broad West Country “Ohh-Aar” accent, and Watto was a dinkum Ozzie…that wouldn’t get _most_ people’s goats up (for the same reasons), now would it? Because it wouldn’t be even remotely considered as possibly being lazy racial stereotyping - there’s no history of offensive racial stereotyping there (lazy country bumpkin/Swedish chef/Croc hunter stuff sure, but not racial). The question becomes: is the onus on producers of media to avoid the mere suspicion of racial impropriety as well as its actual presence? I’d lean towards “Yes” for something as mass-media as _Star Wars_, myself - they have enough money to not _need_ to be lazy - they can pay someone just to go over their stuff and say “Hey, quite a few people are going to find this a little racist”. But not all media producers are going to have that luxury. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/26 "2014-06-09T09:42:28Z")
Its not just skin tone. For example whenever they show someone from Australia they always have perfect white skin and sporting a bush type hat. Kind of a Crocodile Dundee type character. But back to black people, here in the US the black community gets broken up over issues of light skin vs dark skin and it can get downright nasty as one side says they are better than the other. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/27 "2014-06-09T12:35:28Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > I’m with **Smeghead** I’m sure this all seems to make sense in your head…but…not so much as you’ve written it. > > When come back, bring coherent! Don’t count on it from the jackass OP. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/28 "2014-06-09T13:40:32Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I think people were just as put off by the junkyard guy, Watto - although I don’t think they could all agree on whether it was a Jewish accent or a Greek/Middle Eastern one, so that just goes to show… I always figured he was supposed to sound Middle Eastern. To me he sounds exactly like [Omid Djalili](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0229084/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t16)’s character from _Gladiator_ (the one who [sells Maximus to Proximo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LNSiIOBGbI).) They sounded enough alike that after I saw Gladiator I googled the cast of _Phantom Menace_ to see if Djalili voided Watto too. He [didn’t](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0781181/?ref_=tt_cl_t15). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/29 "2014-06-09T14:07:26Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > If (as in the case of certain oddly pale versions of Little Black Sambo) you think it’s “more sensitive” to portray a “dark” person with coloring and features that are relatively light, you may actually be playing into colorism. Since Little Black Sambo is about an Indian boy, I’d say drawing him as an African is kind of racist. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/30 "2014-06-09T15:28:44Z")
Would it be racist if I referred to the OP as mumbo jumbo? ---
**Author:** ![Darryl\_Lict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7cd45c/32.png) [@Darryl\_Lict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darryl_Lict)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/31 "2014-06-09T21:26:55Z")
It’s been said many times here that Sambo’s started here in Santa Barbara and grew nationwide to 1117 restaurants by 1979. The name was derived from portions of the owners names Sam Battistone, Sr. and Newell Bohnett. Perceived racism led to the demise of the franchise, and only the original store remains, run by the son of one of the owners. Something came up on my Facebook feed that was kind of interesting. It has original [wall decorations](https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10201258246452833&set=pcb.10152123972821109&type=1&theater)from Sambos in the 60’s, and Sambo was considerably darker back then. Hopefully, these are viewable as I’m not sure if you have to be a member of Facebook or a member of this particular group. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314/32 "2014-06-10T04:52:14Z")
Well, at least he’s dark in that. Little golden Sambo in the later version was a cute kid, but not very “black.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-skin-is-so-offensive-ayup/690314.md?page=1)