I understand the stereotyping associated with the old minstrel shows and why the strictly defined blackface as a genre was so racist but I’m struggling to understand how examples like these qualify as blackface or why they would be inherently offensive. Is it just because it’s a parallel or reminder to actual blackface?
Or because it’s just a slippery slope?
There is no line. There is no such thing as “offensive”. People choose to be offended by things they don’t like or are sensitive to. You could create an algorithm for guessing what sorts of things might trigger people, but it would be more of a curve than a line, and might even have contradictory results in different demographics, or even the same demographics.
There’s also no definitive idea of what blackface is. Originally it was literally bad makeup to superficially resemble people due to racial stereotypes that were being mocked. A case could be made to expand this as a euphemism for other forms of racial mockery or cases of black makeup which may or may not intentionally resemble actual black face. Then it came to be associated with cultural appropriation and even Halloween and dress as your hero or book report subject day. Now it is so broad as to be near meaningless.
You could broadly divide it I suppose:
intentionally being a jerk
unintentionally resembling a jerk
having good intentions but accidentally tiggering sensitive people
being prejudged and therefore all behavior will be considered offensive regardless of any other factor
It’s also obviously context specific. The United States has a particularly troublesome history of racial divide based on an especially dichotomous model of race (as well as specifically minstrel shows), so it is going to be one of the top hotspots for it. And the way social media as well as clickbait sites work tends to highlight the most extreme voices on any side of every topic, so today is going to seem like the day the most people are upset about something.
Last night I read an excellent Wikipedia article entitled “Blackface”. It provides a historical context in which to set the offensive nature of blackface.
Makes sense, I’ve always had trouble understanding anything that’s subjective.
Those broad divisions make sense too.
What doesn’t make sense is that it seems with 3 and 4 that normally reasonable people are eager to jump on a bandwagon deriding someone in that category.
To the point that say some kid wanted to dress as Micheal Jordan for Halloween, there’s no way in hell you could let him.
Can’t find anything on video games. Here’s one from Teen Vogue(yes, they cover politics and culture) on not emojis but reaction GIFs as “digital blackface.” It’s quite nuanced and acknowledges the fraughtness and complexity of the topic.
In the Teen Vogue article and this compiled comment thread by a historian of blackface, you’ll find arguments about the harm that blackface has done through American history – harm that goes beyond hurt feelings. According to these writers, blackface is not bad merely because it’s offensive; it’s bad because it normalizes white supremacy, an ideology that causes violence and death to this day. (I will point out that white people who grew up with this in the culture were hurt by it as well: we had to unlearn a lot of what we learned as children if we wanted to get along in a diverse society. Small potatoes, maybe, but I’d rather grow up today without racist cartoons on my TV.)
I mean, there are traditions of anti-Semitic stereotyping and camped-up portrayals of gay men on stage and screen, so … avoid engaging in those? Many think there is something special in the US about blackface, just as there’s something special about the n-word, and it comes out of our history – it can’t be derived logically from first principles. So “just as bad?”
I think the history of minstrel shows in the US has tainted all acts of dressing up as a different race, even when it’s not specifically a caricature. The cultural wound is still sore.
Maybe, in the future, if institutional racism stops being such a pervasive problem, non-caricature “blackface” will become as inoffensive as crossdressing. Right now? Best to err on the side of caution.
If a white kid wants to be Michael Jordan for Hallowe’en, he can dress up in Bulls #23 kit and a bald wig and carry a basketball–done. Not offensive, nobody’d have a problem. But as soon as you try to paint him black, it’s offensive and you’re over the line.
Because the main way someone would know you’re cosplaying Michael Jordan is that you’re WEARING HIS UNIFORM. Nobody would figure out that a kid with the same natural complexion as Jordan was cosplaying him if he was just wearing a polo shirt and khakis. Jordan is a BASKETBALL PLAYER so you’d make it clear that you’re cosplaying A) a basketball player who is wearing B) Jordan’s uniform.
And never, ever, EVER attempt to change your complexion to that of another human, that’s rude. You can go zombie gross or witch green or vampire pale if you like because those are not real humans, but that’s as far as the makeup acceptability goes.
The traditional “coon” makeup, with the shoe polish and the bare patch around the mouth representing oversized lips, is offensive no matter the context. The only way it’s acceptable is as part of a historical presentation of how things used to be, and even there, you’ll want to be careful.
A costume meant to portray a generic black person, rather than any specific individual, is offensive, regardless of what the makeup looks like.
A portrayal meant to depict racial stereotypes is offensive, no matter the details of the appearance or the specificity of the individual.
Realistic dark makeup as part of an attempt to sincerely portray a specific individual is not inherently offensive, but because of the long history in this country of the offensive uses of dark makeup, it’s probably still unwise and best avoided.
Which rules out Mace windu for any white kid, but it’s probably gonna come off racist for a group of people going to comic Con to make their black friend be Mace or Lando.
Id have no issue with some one black doing whiteface for character but it doesn’t have the history.
Would it be offensive to suggest?
All in all I know these are mostly just rare and minor inconveniences but I’m just trying to get a better grasp of all this.
In 7th grade my kids had to perform a monologue in the character of an illustrious Virginian. My children are persons of color: brown. My daughter acquired a red wig and portrayed Lucille Ball. My son portrayed Booker T. Washington. Obviously no blackface was ever a possibility nor even thought of. We just put him in a suit and bow tie and he nailed it. I had fun helping them prepare and was proud of them both.
Interesting thing about your chosen example of Mace Windu is that you actually can use a specific color to represent his character, but it is not of his skin.
I actually have all kinds if issues with this type of thing in my house.
My 10 year old often wants to emulate some black character or person as much as anyone else. It’s also hard to explain to him what is appropriate here.
My 5 year old is strangely racist.
He’s yelled out in a store " get me away from all these black people"
Thrown fits in a Mexican restaurant and refused to eat because the TV had Spanish channels on and just kept saying he hated Spanish people.
His aunt is Colombian and he yells at her to talk right because of her accent.
He will ask the channel be changed if there are black people on TV.
Some if this has stopped since we bought him some books with black kids and one in particular that was some kind of first. We explained that it was the first kids book with a little black boy and asked him how he would feel if there were no books with white kids.
He still does this cringy thing if there are black people on TV.
At 3 he didn’t have that problem but he called a friend of mine “that chocolate guy” until he could remember his name was James.
So I’m also trying to figure out if we should ignore this, or try to do more to purposely intervene.
I just want to be careful not to create a negative association by pushing anything.
By browning up your skin to play a character who just happens to be black, you’re likening their skin color to a costume. That’s not KKK racist, but it is still incredibly stupid.
Like, if I were going to cosplay David Bowie, I would go all glam rock. I’d get a red mullet wig and paint a big zigzag across my face and squeeze into some crazy looking tight-ass pants and some boots and then sling a guitar around my neck. Boom, I’m David Bowie. Slapping some white paint on my face would make me look stupid. I’d be basically telling everyone that I think white skin is David Bowie’s signature, the thing that makes him special and recognizable.
That said, I don’t think cosplaying a black person is the same thing as doing “blackface”. There’s a difference between applying make-up on your face in a careful, deliberate manner to simulate someone’s real complexion and slapping on some black shoe polish. Michael Jackson did not have black skin. He had a medium brown complexion. If your costume is pretty much indistinguishable from what you’d find in a minstrel show, then yeah, you’re gonna get a lot of side eye. This is true today and it would have been true in 1984 as well.
Dan Ackroyd did brownface in “Trading Places” and didn’t catch any flak for it. Neither did Gene Wilder, Billy Crystal, or Robert Downey Jr.
Sounds sensible.
I think as someone said there’s probably so much random clickbait that I have gotten a skewed perception that people are hypersensitive about it.
Sounds like an Obama mask would probably not cause a scene but a polo and khakis and a visor and golf club and brown skin for tiger woods likely would cause problems.
Since those president masks are pretty well done to represent the actual looks of someone even if they are a bit exaggerated.