To those folks criticizing this column, in the spirit of Persuasion, I personally would like to hear your thoughts on the appropriate actions the individual should take given the circumstances of Kat's hypothetical.
Hear, hear, Kat! I'm a black guy, and I just don't understand the freak out over this. Maybe it's because I'm in my sixties, and grew up in a world in which actors donning blackface was still a thing. But for the life of me I can't understand what the big deal is. it's in bad taste for white people to do this sort of thing. They shouldn't do it. But I don't much care when I find out that somebody did do it, especially if it was something they did in the distant past. I just don't bloody care. I'm at a loss to know why I'm supposed to.
Remember the governor of Virginia? it came out that he wore black face as a young man too. The overwhelming majority of black voters in Virginia shrugged and voted for him anyway. Like me, they just didn't bloody care. This is an obsession mostly of guilt-ridden white people. Get over it.
What is "blackface"? The term USED to be exclusive to a type of makeup characteristic of minstrel shows in which sub-Saharan African racial features are grotesquely exaggerated in order to emphasize the alleged "ugliness" of that "race." NOW we are constantly told that any "white" (How is that defined?) person who applies darker makeup in order to play or imitate a real or fictional person with a darker skin tone is guilty of a heinous racial crime somewhat equivalent to lynching. Even worse, I have read the term "blackface" used to denounce past and present white actors who play another WHITE person who happens to have some black ancestry (as in "Imitation of Life" or "Pinky"). Isn't it time to stop this whining over nothing? The nation is in danger from REAL and ARMED white supremacists, but it's so much more fun to bully, libel and slander the reputations of GOOD and DECENT people.
"[T]he kind of people who go hunting for kompromat in your college photo album are also the kind who love to demand apologies that they then refuse to accept." Someday I may find a sentence written by you that I don't feel in my bones, but today is not that day.
White people need to acknowledge racism. All that is needed is " I understand now that this was racist behavior and I am sorry." Get directly to the point and do not hide behind being "ignorant".
Is this serious column or an attempt at humor? Does it represent the biases one sees in more serious posts from time to time? A certain hostility to people concerned with race? It seems so. I'd get rid if the column, beneath the attempt of Persuasion to take a respectful tone even towrds those on the left with whom you have lots of criticism and not much that would move things forward.
Wow, you really whitewashed Blackface. Such a white perspective “Nobody was harmed.” Stop beating yourself up for doing something super racist is centering on white fragility. Supposedly 30 Rock had four episodes of Blackface one with Jon Hamm. Tina Fey did that weasely white lady thing of- It was ok at the time! Way to be utterly tone deaf in an age where white supremacy is raging and “good white peoples’ feelings” matter way the hell more than BlackLivesMatter. Soooo much unexamined white privilege in this letter and response. As if you’re saying “Don’t worry about being racist, you’re off the hook because you didn’t storm the Capitol in a racist coup.” I just subscribed to this Substack and had no idea y’all ain’t woke. Considering canceling subscription based on this tepid endorsement of racism. So disappointed in your white fragility.
To those folks criticizing this column, in the spirit of Persuasion, I personally would like to hear your thoughts on the appropriate actions the individual should take given the circumstances of Kat's hypothetical.
Hear, hear, Kat! I'm a black guy, and I just don't understand the freak out over this. Maybe it's because I'm in my sixties, and grew up in a world in which actors donning blackface was still a thing. But for the life of me I can't understand what the big deal is. it's in bad taste for white people to do this sort of thing. They shouldn't do it. But I don't much care when I find out that somebody did do it, especially if it was something they did in the distant past. I just don't bloody care. I'm at a loss to know why I'm supposed to.
Remember the governor of Virginia? it came out that he wore black face as a young man too. The overwhelming majority of black voters in Virginia shrugged and voted for him anyway. Like me, they just didn't bloody care. This is an obsession mostly of guilt-ridden white people. Get over it.
What is "blackface"? The term USED to be exclusive to a type of makeup characteristic of minstrel shows in which sub-Saharan African racial features are grotesquely exaggerated in order to emphasize the alleged "ugliness" of that "race." NOW we are constantly told that any "white" (How is that defined?) person who applies darker makeup in order to play or imitate a real or fictional person with a darker skin tone is guilty of a heinous racial crime somewhat equivalent to lynching. Even worse, I have read the term "blackface" used to denounce past and present white actors who play another WHITE person who happens to have some black ancestry (as in "Imitation of Life" or "Pinky"). Isn't it time to stop this whining over nothing? The nation is in danger from REAL and ARMED white supremacists, but it's so much more fun to bully, libel and slander the reputations of GOOD and DECENT people.
"[T]he kind of people who go hunting for kompromat in your college photo album are also the kind who love to demand apologies that they then refuse to accept." Someday I may find a sentence written by you that I don't feel in my bones, but today is not that day.
White people need to acknowledge racism. All that is needed is " I understand now that this was racist behavior and I am sorry." Get directly to the point and do not hide behind being "ignorant".
Is this serious column or an attempt at humor? Does it represent the biases one sees in more serious posts from time to time? A certain hostility to people concerned with race? It seems so. I'd get rid if the column, beneath the attempt of Persuasion to take a respectful tone even towrds those on the left with whom you have lots of criticism and not much that would move things forward.
Wow, you really whitewashed Blackface. Such a white perspective “Nobody was harmed.” Stop beating yourself up for doing something super racist is centering on white fragility. Supposedly 30 Rock had four episodes of Blackface one with Jon Hamm. Tina Fey did that weasely white lady thing of- It was ok at the time! Way to be utterly tone deaf in an age where white supremacy is raging and “good white peoples’ feelings” matter way the hell more than BlackLivesMatter. Soooo much unexamined white privilege in this letter and response. As if you’re saying “Don’t worry about being racist, you’re off the hook because you didn’t storm the Capitol in a racist coup.” I just subscribed to this Substack and had no idea y’all ain’t woke. Considering canceling subscription based on this tepid endorsement of racism. So disappointed in your white fragility.